Sightseeing in Tucson

We started the week by dropping the furkids at day care and treking up a scenic mountain trail to the Sonoran Desert Museum. We spent several hours wandering about the desert floor. They have done an excellent job in presenting many species of cacti, desert plants and desert animals in their natural habitat. We attended several presentations of raptors, venomous reptiles and history of plants. It has been said that if you take off walking in the desert, you are most certainly going to either be scratched, stung or bitten by something! It's so true...almost all plants have some kind of spine or thorn and you can be bitten or stung by lots of creatures! After the reptile presentation of rattlesnakes and Gila Monsters, we left there and traveled over to the "Old Tucson Studios" where over 300 film and tv productions were hosted since 1939. Part of the buildings burned down in a late 1990s arson fire, but they have refurbished everything that remains and it is a great place to visit for old Western History. We lunched on Brisket and Beans a Big Jakes BBQ and attended Miss Kittys Can Can revue and a tribute to John Wayne in the Grand Palace Hotel. We walked the streets where many scenes were staged for film classics such as "Rio Bravo" and "The Outlaw and Josey Wales", shopped in the Mercantile and had Ice Cream at The Big Scoop Ice Cream Parlor. It was kinda cool to know that "The Duke" Elizabeth Taylor and Clint Eastwood once walked the streets in practicing their craft. DH enjoyed the sights immensely and will appreciate having seen this when he watches the old movies on the Western Channel. Their museum was full of clothing, posters and props from many films and tv series. We didn't get everything looked at, it would take a full day and we just spent part of the afternoon, but we finally gave up at sunset and made our way back down the mountain and picked up the fur kids to drive back down I10 to our home base.