When it Rains...

January 30 & 31, 2015

Last Friday, rain came through Southern Arizona, and stayed for the weekend. We blame the Seahawks, who had also came to visit for some reason. Our plans were for our weekend were altered, but we still had quite the adventure!

Driving through the Huachuca Mountains on a grey day!

Of course earlier last week, we purchased our new vehicle Ghillie, and right away we started planning out all the trips we were going to take. The travel bug has bitten us, and we are desperate for adventure! On Friday, we decided to go for a road trip to "break it in." We had a couple more letterboxes to plant in Cochise county before the Tucson Letterboxing Event next week. We headed East on I-10, awe-struck at how fast we could accelerate on the interstate. ;)

This was also Charlotte's first ride in Ghillie. She misses having a seat in the middle of Curtis & I to sit in, and tries to make up for it by sitting in Curtis' lap. We put her in the back seat, where she sat for a bit, then slowly made her way back to the front, where she finally settled for my lap. 

This really wasn't the best day for this adventure. We started out by having to drive on a dirt road, but of course with the rain, it was now a muddy road with lots of big puddles. All this gave us a chance to try out the 4 wheel drive. It works! ;) Then, we did about a 2 mile hike, and decided hiking in this rain was miserable. Thankfully, we were still able to get both boxes planted!

After finishing up, we drove through Sierra Vista, into Fort Huachuca, then through the Huachuca Mountains before meeting up with Highway 83. It was still a pretty drive, with clouds hanging low over the mountains. The worst parts were the dips in the road, where the water would form large puddles and washes. Just a note, when you see signs that say "Do Not Enter When Flooded" in Southern Arizona, they're serious - it really does flood easily when it rains!

Our new Jeep handled it all great though, and we were thankful to make it home safely after having traffic backed up on the I-10 in Tucson. 

On Friday night, Curtis' sister Lydia and her husband Jeff came over for the weekend. We had been planning to do some hiking and driving up the beautiful Mt. Lemmon, but decided to save that for another time when it wasn't raining and we could enjoy the views. (We also heard later that the Catalina Highway was closed because of the weather, so this turned out to be a good call!)

Control room at the Titan Missile Museum

Instead, on Saturday we went to visit a place Curtis and I have saved "for a rainy day." We drove South on I-19 to go visit the Titan Missile Museum in Sahuarita, AZ. We took the hour long tour there, and it turned out to be an interesting and enjoyable tour.

It started with a short informational documentary, then we headed underground to view the missile and control room. 

The Titan Missile II!

Here it is - the missile! This is one of 18 missile sites that were around the greater Tucson area. This one was the one located closest to the Air Force Base in Tucson. It is now the only remaining missile out of 54 in the world. See why you need to come see it? :)

Back outside - after the tour, we walked around the area and checked out all we could see from above ground.

There's a missile under there!

My husband in a fancy shmancy hard hat. ;P

Where all the missiles around Tucson are located

After we finished there, the rain had let up so we decided to make one more stop along I-19 - to the San Xavier Mission. Constructed in 1783, it's the oldest intact European structure in Arizona, and is breathtakingly beautiful! It's still an active church, but they offer tours daily. We opted to just tour on our own though.

The San Xavier Mission

Curtis and I had actually visited here before - it was our very first weekend adventure while living in Tucson! We had only come with friends for the sake of letterboxing though. This time, I feel like I was able to appreciate it so much more because of all that I know about the history of Arizona now.

Inside the Mission

I don't have any pictures of the inside from the last time I was here, so I was once again blown away by the beauty and detail of this mission. This place is so worth visiting if you're in Southern AZ!

The view when you enter the Mission

Murals on the walls.

Facing the front entrance of the mission

Ceilings!

The detail on the front of the Mission

The mission courtyard

My souvenir for the weekend :)

Oh yeah, and while we were touring the Titan Missile Museum, the tour guide volunteered me to pull on the handle of this door on the inside, and I got a certificate for it. Pretty great souvenir if you ask me! ;)

We enjoyed a late lunch at La Parrilla Suiza in Tucson and played a few more games with Lydia and Jeff before they left. It continued raining on Saturday night, and on Sunday morning, we woke up to something that happens very rarely down here: fog! It wasn't very thick, we could see the roads just fine when driving to church, but we couldn't see the mountains at all. We couldn't see them on Friday and Saturday due to rain clouds, but on Sunday the fog completely hid them. It was weird!

And that was our weekend! We're already preparing for next week's hike and hoping for much better weather. Have a great week! :)