Honeymoon Day 2: Ramsey Canyon and Saguaro National Park

We enjoyed our made-to-order breakfast at the Lookout before heading to Ramsey Canyon where we hiked the 1 mile, 700ft rise in elevation to the overlook at the top of the Canyon.

Common Raven

Little Quail art outside our hotel

Black Throated Sparrow

Curve Billed Thrasher

We're pretty sure this is a Red Tailed Hawk, but his tail is super short so our best guess is that he's molting

*Acorn Woodpecker

Ladder Backed Woodpecker

Strange Blimp - weather balloon maybe?

Acorn Woodpecker on a power line

Acorn Woodpecker looking to stash his acorn in whatever that is on the power line

Acorn Woodpecker stashing his acorn in the power line

If you look carefully at the black square on the right, he's clearly done this before

Ruby Crowned Kinglet

Acorn Woodpecker stash

*Red Naped Sapsucker

*Mexican Jay

Red Naped Sapsucker

little male Mule Deer

The first 1/2 mile only has a rise of about 200 ft. so it's very nice easy walking, the other 500 ft. all come in the second 1/2 mile, which was quite a bit more taxing. 

Ricky climbing up the 700' to the outlook at the top of Ramsey Canyon

little Aloe plant

Raven on it's nest

Raven

*Canyon Wren

Canyon Wren

Red Naped Sapsucker

*Yellow Eyed Junco

proof that it snows in southern Arizona

SQUIRREL!

Brown Creeper

Brown Creeper

Bridled Titmouse

Bridled Titmouse

Bridled Titmouse stares us down!

Dark-eyed Junco (*different morph than we have in Iowa)

After our hike in Ramsey Canyon, we headed north again to Saguaro National Park!

*Phainopepla (female)

Gila Woodpecker

*Cactus Wren

Cactus Wren

*Phainopepla (male)

Phainopepla

Gila Woodpecker on a Saguaro Cactus

Saguaro is named for the giant cactus, but it also has a bunch of petroglyphs!

Petroglyphs

Petroglyphs

This was mine and Rick's favorite petroglyph

Bushtit

*Rock Wren taking a dirt bath in the parking lot

Rock Wren

*Canyon Towhee

Canyon Towhee

Phainopepla out among the Saguaros

Mockingbird on a Saguaro

Ricky beside a giant Saguaro Cactus!

blending in...

Rick looks out over Saguaro park

Saguaro National Park

From Saguaro we continued north with the idea of driving most of the way to The Grand Canyon and grabbing a hotel in maybe Flagstaff. But when we got to Flagstaff, all the hotels were sold out for the night except for the Econo Lodge (we had stayed in on in Phoenix and weren't super thrilled with it) so we ended up getting a room in a Best Western at the town on the edge of the Grand Canyon park. It was after 10 before we got there.
Very fun, but very Long day!