sun, rain, snow in one day

I am very behind in posting. Leslie came to town this past weekend to look at recent debris flow channels that were just outside of Tucson. So, Leslie, Roman, Brendan and I drove down really early that morning to hike around Bear Canyon and look at the many bedrock channels and boulder levees. When we started hiking at nine am, it was sunny. I didn't even think to wear my raincoat (I actually had it on and then traded it for a plain fleece). By lunch, it was very cloudy and then in the early afternoon it was sprinkling on and off. It was also cold. When we we started the 3 (?) mile hike back to the car it was steadily raining. I have spent a lot of time doing fieldwork in the rain, but I always had full body rain gear and was dry and happy. On this hike I was soaked to my skin pretty quickly on every part of my body except my butt (which was sheltered by my hip bag). It was miserable. I speed walked as quickly as possible back to the car which made everyone speed walk to keep up with me. sorry guys.

We had planned on staying until Tuesday and drove to our hotel where we got changed and I was still freezing. When we left the hotel to get dinner, it was sleeting. We ate at some bar that Leslie knew from her days at U of A. While we watched the football game, it started snowing! Like crazy. Roman and I even had a little snowball fight on the bar patio. Once she heard that it was supposed to continue snowing on Monday, Leslie decided to call it a trip. We heard that it had only ever snowed in Tucson twice in the past 12 years.

Snow in Tucson

We went back to the hotel, packed up our stuff, checked out and drove back to Phoenix. Leslie left tempe the next morning after dumping cooked oatmeal all over my floor, using all my kleenex, and making me walk miles in the the freezing rain. What a great friend. :)

How often do you see snow on a palm tree?

Oh, on a side note, I started using Picasa because I am cheap and flickr won't let me make any more albums without paying money. So any new photos will be on my Picasa account-see sidebar for the link.