Travel Day - Phoenix to Tucson

We did not take the direct route today, and even our indirect route was made more so when we were rerouted way out of the way by a traffic accident. When the road chosen is the only way through that part of the desert, the alternate route must backtrack and go way around. We set out from Phoenix going east to Apache Junction, and then we traveled part of the northern loop of the Apache Trail. We stopped briefly at Lost Dutchman State Park. We still marvel at the desert landscape. The cactus and succulents seem so exotic to us still. We continued on up into the hills. The wildflowers were blooming, turning the hillsides yellow. Canyon Lake was our turn around location. Backtracking, we then took the southern loop of the Apache Trail to Boyce Thompson Arboretum State Park. Here was another wonderful botanical garden. Backtracking again, we were heading south on HWY 60, only to be turned around due to a blocking traffic accident. We got detour directions from the officer, and then pulled over and wrote them down, locating them on our road atlas. There was one tricky part, but it all worked just like it was supposed to, and added only about 45 minutes to our travel time. We arrived at our next stop, Casa Grande National Monument. The site is an ancient Hohokum village, where many Native Americans lived by hunting, gathering, and farming. Like the other sites we visited, the residents left or dispersed about 1400 AD. The reasons are not known, but most likely had to do with the availability of water for farming. Since we still had a long distance to travel through the desert to reach Tucson, we made an emergency ice cream stop before going on. We were checked into our hotel by 7:00. The road not taken didn't spoil our day.