Mt. Lemmon and Walnut Canyon

The temperatures are up past 100 in Tucson (heading to 108 today), so this week I made two trips to cooler climes. A few days ago I was in Flagstaff hiking to the cliff dwellings at Walnut Canyon, and yesterday Beth and I hiked on  Mt. Lemmon above Tucson.

I was so happy to see a thick carpet of new, green ferns around the trees on Mt. Lemmon that were blackened in last year's big wildfire. Mt. Lemmon was relatively cool (about 88 degrees) because where we hiked was at about 8,500 feet elevation. That's 6,000 feet higher than Tucson.

After the hike we had lunch and individual pies at the Iron Door on the mountain. Mine was a tart cherry crumble. Delicious.

In Flagstaff I was at nearly 7,000 feet, so again it was cooler. But this time I descended a few hundred feet into a canyon to see ancient cliff dwelling remains.

About 240 stairs take you down into the canyon and back out again. Because I wasn't used to the altitude, I stopped a lot. Little kids skipped and jumped up, while their parents trudged behind, heads down, breathing heavily. At the bottom of the stairs, a path wound around about 25 cliff dwellings that were inhabited as recently as the 1200s.

Here's the spectacular view from one of the dwellings:

My companion explained that the criss-cross lines on the white rock formations are ancient sand dunes. Now they're in a high desert pine forest! I could've spent hours there listening to the wind blow through the trees. It was very peaceful.

Have a colorful day