![\"DSC05690\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC05690.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nI believe this was a cholla cactus\u2013the flowers not quite open yet.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
This opuntia pad and fruits looks suspiciously like a foot with six toes.<\/p>\n I<\/a> Large opuntia with the foot-pad above to the left.<\/p>\n This saguaro had been damaged\/broken and you can see the skeleton inside. \u00a0It was still growing and appeared well despite the huge loss of its entire top.<\/p>\n Open cholla flowers<\/p>\n Delicate petals and deadly spines<\/p>\n Not a plant you want to stumble upon in flip-flops!<\/p>\n More cactus flowers<\/p>\n And more\u2026<\/p>\n And one more\u2026<\/p>\n These are called fish hook barrel cactus\u2013for obvious reason. \u00a0Beautiful plants, but somewhat unsociable.<\/p>\n Another view.\u00a0 Spectacular plants!<\/p>\n The distant hills on one of my walks.\u00a0 You can see the limestone cliffs at the tops, eroded by rain and wind into beautiful shapes.<\/p>\n Another spectacular cactus flower.<\/p>\n Amazing cactus plant with delicate blooms amid the deadly thorns.<\/p>\n We hear how Saguaros are endangered and getting rare.\u00a0 And maybe all the Saguaro-like cactus we saw were not Saguaros at all.\u00a0 But if they were, there were thousands and thousands of them.\u00a0 Hard to imagine them endangered!<\/p>\n This poppy proved a bright spot in the desert.\u00a0 This wasn\u2019t a California poppy\u2013possibly a Mexican poppy.<\/p>\n The rocks\/stones\/boulders are very impressive in the desert.<\/p>\n More impressive stones.<\/p>\n And more\u2013the colors are amazing.<\/p>\n A typical view on a walk in the desert.<\/p>\n Amazing that plants, including cactus and Palos Verdes trees, find a way to grow in these extreme conditions.<\/p>\n I was pretty excited to find tamarisk along the roadside.\u00a0 Later, I read that in Arizona, this is called \u201cSalt Cedar\u201d and it is extremely invasive.<\/p>\n A close up of the flowers.\u00a0 This plant would be fine to grow in Seattle, likely, with no worries about it spreading.<\/p>\n Not sure exactly what the name of this daisy is, but it looked a bit like a tansy.\u00a0 I only saw it in one place.<\/p>\n It can get tiresome to see all the dry, dry, dry and dusty.\u00a0 So, I walked to the river and the views were fresher!<\/p>\n Near the river, these brave guys were heading straight up one of the steep\u00a0 hills.<\/p>\n Arliss took us to Quartzite to see the sights.\u00a0 This was one of the better\/worse ones.<\/p>\n Someone had been using this plastic squirrel for target practice.\u00a0 It was a strange thing to come upon in the desert.<\/p>\n Spectacular views on a walk near Arliss and Mike\u2019s.<\/p>\n Another great view.\u00a0 I was actually following the power lines so I wouldn\u2019t get lost.<\/p>\n These hills were full of quartzite.<\/p>\n You can see the sparkling quartzite that the earth is spewing up here.<\/p>\n Another view.<\/p>\n And again\u2026<\/p>\n My shadow against the parched earth.<\/p>\n Another fantastic vision.<\/p>\n A dwarf oenothera in the desert.<\/p>\n Close up of the flowers.<\/p>\n Not sure of these flowers, but they reminded me of layias, only one color.<\/p>\n Fantastic cloud formation.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Here are some more pictures from our recent Arizona vacation. I believe this was a cholla cactus\u2013the flowers not quite open yet. \u00a0 This opuntia pad and fruits looks suspiciously like a foot with six toes. I Large opuntia with the foot-pad above to the left. This saguaro had been damaged\/broken and you can see … Continue reading More Desert Adventures<\/span> <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n
![I<\/a>](\"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC05691.jpg\"){kind=link}
![\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Here are some more pictures from our recent Arizona vacation. I believe this was a cholla cactus\u2013the flowers not quite open yet. \u00a0 This opuntia pad and fruits looks suspiciously like a foot with six toes. I Large opuntia with the foot-pad above to the left. This saguaro had been damaged\/broken and you can see … Continue reading More Desert Adventures<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1501"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1501\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1547,"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1501\/revisions\/1547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}](\"http:\/\/gardenescapades.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/DSC05742-e1459662809472.jpg\"){kind=link}