Pima Air & Space Museum, Arizona

After some excellent Mexican food in Tuscon, we headed to Phoenix, but Benjamin strongly suggested we stop at Pima Air & Space Museum on the way. I agreed, ready for some good A/C and having no expectations. But I was blown away at the depth and breadth of the collection, and what felt like, to me, living history. The museum has about 400 aircraft on over 80 acres, among the most extensive I've seen. Lest you think 400 is a small collection, they include garguantuan aircraft, like the SR-71 Blackbird (famous from the Cold War), the B-17 "Flying Fortress", several 747s, and even some retired Air Force One presidential planes. Above you see Benjamin taking a picture of the F-14 Tomcat, made famous by the Top Gun movies.

Among the profound historical displays was a destroyed Japanese Kamikazi plane next to a B-29, the same type of plane used to drop the atomic bombs over Japan. (The actual plane, the Enola Gay, is at the National Air and Space Museum.)

In a separate hangar was a fully restored B-17 bomber, known as the "Flying Fortress." A helpful silver-haired volunteer, likely a veteran himself, told us the B-17 had been restored to how it would have looked in 1945. The B-17 is a main player in the Hanks/Spielberg production of Masters of the Air, just released in 2024. But you may also be aware of this plane because it was the B-17 that dropped more bombs during the war than any other American aircraft.

The B-17 is entirely lacking in creature comforts. The interior, which can be viewed from a ladder, looks as if someone forgot to finish it. Sadly, the crew of six, mostly in their 20's, had a only a 50-50 chance of making it home alive.

The only guns were in the tail of the plane, operated uncomfortably from a kneeling position.

To see the B-17 was very impactful for me, but even more moving was to see an actual American flag hoisted on D-Day on Utah Beach. It is tattered and thread bare, hoisted by a then 19 year old named Don Drain, on the first boat to land on the beach. Drain apparently survived the assualt, as he was able to donate the flag after the war. A truly inspiring sight for me on Memorial Day, 2024.

Saguaro National Park, New Mexico

Saguaro National Park sits on either side of Tuscon, Arizona's second largest city. Yes, it's a park in two parts, East (Rincon Mountain District) and West (Tuscon Mountain District), 33 miles apart. We elected to visit the Eastern portion and take the Cactus Forest Loop Drive, an 8 mile one-way loop best driven and not walked. We stopped in at the Visitor's Center, already starting to melt in the heat. The volunteer ranger very politely asked us to hike no more than a quarter mile, as they didn't have enough staff to go out and fetch us if we collapsed in the heat. We did as requested. Nevertheless, we saw a young shirtless man, headphones on, jogging in the heat, no water bottle in sight. As our ranger informed us, the heat is so dry, we don't realize how much we are sweating, and can easily become dangerously dehydrated. (If all this is making you nervous, visit these parks in the winter!)

But now on to the main attraction - the mighty Saguaro, the biggest cactus in the United States. Contrary to all those cowboy movies, the saguaro growns only in portions of the Sonoran Desert, but it is an iconic symbol of the Southwest. The Saguaro doesn't reach its full height until 125-150 years, when it is typically 40-50 feet tall, but can be as much as 75 feet tall. Think 3 to 7 stories in height. It also can weigh 6 tons, as it 75-95% water. But it grows oh so slowly. After 5 years, it might be an inch tall (not a misprint) and it won't flower until 35 years, and grow "arms" until about 75 years old. It can live to 200 years, perhaps longer, and it either dies of old age, wind, fire, or freezing conditions.

The park was created in 1933 primarily because of a forest of Saguaro giants that had formed due to exceptionally perfect conditions over the preceding decades. The forest of giants is now mostly gone, but the habitat is preserved, and new saguaros are slowly growing.

Baby saguaros have the best start when sheltered by mesquite trees or palo verde trees. The latter trees have green trunks and limbs, hence the name. As the saguaros grow they outlive the nurse trees.

While the heat was indeed oppressive, our sweat was rewarded by seeing the Saguaro in bloom. The round cream colored blooms are Arizona's state flower, and only last a single day. Birds, bats, bees and moths feed on the nectar and serve as pollinators. Then the flowers drop off and deep red fruit take their place in July. The Tohono O'odhamo ("Desert People") harvest the fruit for wine and syrup, using a very long pole.

We saw other cactus, too, some in bloom - the prickly pear, teddy bear cholla, barrel cactus, organ pipe cactus.

White Sands National Park, New Mexico and Tuscon

Think that's snow blowing in the wind over Memorial Day weekend? Try again. It's sand, and it's white year round.

Today we visited White Sands National Park, the world's largest gypsum dune fields, covering an incredible 275 square miles. Gypsum is the same stuff they make drywall from, and it's here in overabundance. Formely the site of the Permian Sea, over the last several thousand years it has evolved into bright white dunes in a large basin next to the Chihauhauan Mountains. The gympsum is whiter in winter, but at any time of year, sunglasses are required due to the bright glare. And the gympsum doesn't feel like sand at the beach; it feels like sandy talc, leaving a little residue in your hands.

For a desert landscape, you will be suprised to learn the dunes sit atop a layer of water, as the water has no natural outlet. The Apaches came here for water. You dig a hole in the sand and it fills overnight with water. Had we camped (the star gazing is fabulous apparently), we could have tried it, but we did not.

Instead, we made it a day trip, driving in a loop and stopping to both admire the unduluting dunes and the families sledding down the slopes. (Yes it was 90 degrees, but gypsum doesn't heat up like regular sand.)

We admired the tenacious plants who either grow very very fast, like the desert verbena with pretty pink flowers, or don't mind being buried a bit (yucca), or build their own pillars to perch on (sumac). The animals have adapted too.

The mice and lizards have evolved to match the light sand, though we did see one lizard that had a turquoise head and tail. This is the little white whiptail. (But can you see the lizard in the picture above? It's the common side-blotched lizard.) Lizards, ants and a few birds were out and about, but most of the animals come out at night.

Our last "hike" was the Nature Dune Trail. A prominent sign tells you to "Stay Alive" and not enter the trail if the temperature is above 85. We think it was closer to 90, but no, we ignored that sign. As we got to the top of the hill, sweating heavily, we determined the sign had some validity and turned right back around.

Day trippers should bring lots of water, slather on that sunblock, and bring a picnic. (Mid century modern picnic shelters await.)

We finished our day in Tuscon, near the University of Arizona. Appropriately, we stayed at the Graduate Hotel, which does student low budget and kitsch in style, without making you suffer like a student. Our room was decked out in squirrel/bird/snake drapes (hysterical), red plaid chairs, and an awesome Saguaro cactus floor lamp (which, apparently, you can't get on Amazon). Not to mention random photos of students from the 50's and a macrame corded lamp (not pictured). Graduate Hotels are a chain I highly recommend.

After walking around the University of Arizona campus, working hard to stay in the shade (low 90's), and admiring a fine campus, we finished our day on the rooftop bar of the Graduate Hotel. The rooftop bar has a view of the surrounding mountains, misters, and ambient music to please all generations. I picked Tattoo Girl Reisling from Washington state solely on the name, Steven had a locally flavored margarita and Benjamin had a hazy IPA. I enjoyed a tasty salad with prickly pear cactus viniagrette as the sun set.

Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico

Lily pads, draperies, popcorn, soda straws, columns, and, my favorite, snotites, are all descriptions for cave formations that we saw today as we descended into one of the largest caves in America - Carlsbad Caverns. At 180 miles, this is an immense underground attraction.

We did the self tour via the "Natural Entrance," which is a switchback trail that takes you past cave swallow nests and Brazilian free-tailed bat nurseries, down to The Big Room, over 700 feet underground. As we descended, I kept asking Benjamin, "are we in the Big Room yet?" as he had already visited with Samuel in November 2023. But he assured me the Big Room was much much bigger.

At six football fields in length, it earns its name, and is in fact, the largest continuous cavern in North America. Along the way we saw stalactites (which grow from the ceiling) and stalagmites (which grow from the floor), and as we overhead father say to her daughter on the trail, "when they join up, they form a column."

My favorite column is officially called "Rock of Ages" but I prefer to call it the Bearded Dragon. But Steven nailed the best name: the Bearded Walrus. The fanciful shapes in this cave allow your mind to see what you want.

After that came the "Silent Bell" a white stalagmite that drips water and looks like not only a bell, but a huge ice sculpture hundreds of feet under the ground.

Then there is the "The Chandelier" which features "draperies" of calcite, a type of stalacite that forms when water doesn't drip straight down, but curves. It brings to mind the natural drapery of a Bernini sculpture.

As you reach 755 feet, comes the Mid-Century Modern surprise. In the 1950s (the cave has been a National Monument since the 1920s), a gift shop, coffee shop and modern bathrooms were built.

We paused for coffee and fudge in this cave that was a cross of The Jetsons and The Flintstones. Finally, after 10,000 steps, we ascended in an elevator originally built in the 1920s, as a compromise to blowing a tunnel through the caverns to allow cars to drive through. Did I mention that it's 56 degrees in the tunnel but with 90% humidity? Bring a jacket and expect a few overhead drips. In total, a natural wonder not to be missed.

Los Alamos, New Mexico

The Chesslers are roadtripping it in the Southwest over Memorial Day weekend. Benjamin has set our agenda, and it's a busy one. Today we transversed New Mexico from Alburquerque to Sante Fe to Los Alamos to Roswell, after unexpectedly spending the wee hours in Tempe, AZ (a 3 hour nap was all we got after our connecting flight from Phoenix to Alburqueque was delayed six hours). After a Southwest Mex lunch in Sante Fe to wake us up a little, we drove to the site of the creation of the atomic bomb. Los Alamos is a 40 minute drive from Sante Fe, isolated among mesas and canyons. Before Oppenheimer arrived, it was an agricultural town with a boarding school for rich boys from the East Coast (Los Alamos Ranch School). And then it was taken over by the Manhattan Project.

We visited the Manhattan Project National Historical Park, the Los Alamos History Museum, and peaked into the house Robert Oppenheimer and his wife Kitty lived in on Bathtub Row (so called because all the homes on this block had bathtubs, not showers).

The catastrophic impact of the bombs dropped on Japan are lightly treated, as are mentions of the spies that infiltrated Los Alamos. The Los Alamos National Laboratory replaced the Manhattan project, and according to its website, "LANL performs R&D, design, maintenance, and testing in support of the nuclear weapons stockpile. LANL also performs theoretical and applied R&D in such areas as materials science, physics, environmental science, energy, and health." Unlike the absolute secrecy surrounding the original research labs in Los Alamos, you can visit the LANL, but tours are only offered three times a year.