10/13 Lake Pleasant, AZ

This is one of the several Maricopa Regional Parks near Phoenix, Arizona.  I was lucky to discover these parks and am staying here for a few days.  The lake level is down, but I am told it normally is this time of year and then is higher in the spring.  In any case, the campground is high overlooking the lake, and I was lucky to have chosen one of the best sites.  All roads are paved, and camp pads are asphalt, which means no dust from vehicles driving by.  Lots of families here for the weekend.  How can you get bored when you have this to look at? 

Here is me standing in front of the visitor center and a king snake I saw walking back to the campground. 

I got up early this morning and ended up being the only person who showed up for the scheduled nature walk.  Here are some of the cactus I saw.  The first is a stag horn cactus.  The second shows some very small cacti (pincushion cactus, I think) growing in a protected area beneath another plant, a typical practice for some plants.  The last is a fishhook barrel cactus.

It’s hard to see, but we watched a little garter snake go around checking out several holes, apparently to see if there was anything inside worth eating.  He finally slithered into the 4^th hole he checked and did not come out, so we did not know if he found his dinner or not.

Also, went exploring today into a town called Anthem and found a shopping center with a Home Depot and a bagel shop.  Got some stuff at Home Depot to caulk around my bathroom vent fan where I think moths are getting in.  Also got some railing to use to prevent stuff from falling on the floor from the cupboards in my “hall” that are supposed to be pantry cupboards but are unusable because the doors keep opening and dumping stuff on the floor.  Hoping this will help and give me some more storage for heavy things like liquids and canned goods.  I was originally going to screw them in, but I don’t have a power drill with me to drill the holes, so I think I can glue them if I put them inside the frame.  I will pre-stain them to try to match the cherry finish.   That will be my project tomorrow.