Camping among the Saguaros

Noisy night at the rest stop.  Sounds like a good book title. :)  We slept pretty well in spite of the really noisy big rigs that woke us up during the night.  I think the one next to me must have left early, because I slept like a log between 4:30 and 8:30.

As we were driving along Highway 17 toward Phoenix, I saw a brown State "Camping" sign and turned off toward Lake Pleasant Regional Park in Maricopa County to see what they offered RVers.  We checked in for one night at the park entrance and ended up here in the Desert Tortoise Campground.  After we got set up in our site, I called and extended our stay for a few more days.  There are water and electric hookups, but if I reach the electric plug, I can't reach the water hookup, it's weird, one is at one end of the site, the other at the opposite end.  I'm full-up with water in my tanks, though, so it doesn't matter.  I could also connect my electric extension cord that I have for this kind of site, but it's not worth the trouble.

There are tons of TV channels available with my antenna and Verizon works perfectly here.  The weather is warm and calm, a beautiful day.  This afternoon at 5:00 it was 72 degrees.  I'm loving it!

The landscape here is different than other areas I've camped in. This area has a cactus called Saguaro which is only found in this part of the world.  Some of the Saguaros here are from 150 to 250 years old, per the Ranger.  I've seen photos of them, and now, here they are!

There are also Wild Burros here - when we first drove into our campsite I heard a strange noise and thought it was a cow.  Turns out it was a Burro. I tried to find it with no luck, but later got some photos of burros drinking from the lake below us, and walking around that area.  I'm hoping to see some up close while we're here.

Some photos from the day:

 Our site, nice... lots of privacy, the park is almost empty.

 Barrel Cactus

 Bird on Saguaro Cactus

Lake Pleasant looks pretty low.

The sun is going down

Here are some photos of the burros I saw this afternoon, don't you just love them? 

And the last photos of the day:

I'm glad we took the off-ramp and ended up here - this is a really nice, quiet park and I think we'll like it here.  We've signed on for four days, but might stay longer.

BTW, a reader asked what kind of cold weather setup The Palms has.  This rig is actually prepared for freezing temperatures with an "Arctic Package" (cold weather package) that I turn on with a switch.  It ensures that The Palms won't have any frozen pipes or tanks.  I've used it twice, the last time at Zion where it got down into the 20s while I was there.  If I'm afraid it's going to freeze during the night, I just flip the switch.

From Me and My Dog, have a great Monday night, everyone!  :)