Hiking as meditation #2

Yesterday, we had a break in the afternoon weather (no gray clouds or lightning) and it was not brutally hot/sunny. So, we went to the preserve for a long, slow hike. We walked out to the Ocotillo Hill trail, one we don’t often do. The trail begins on the crest of a hill, such that it seems my head is level with the tops of 50 feet tall Saguaros and then it winds down through some switchbacks so that I am walking through a forest of Saguaros. The picture does not really capture it or the calming effect it has on me.

The vegetation I see on this part of the preserve is different. I see fewer paloverde and more mesquite. The jojoba and greasewood are 5 feet tall instead of 2 feet tall. There is thick underbrush. There is more water and shade in this wash area (a normally dry river bed that floods with the rains). The trail is more sandy less rocky, but there are more outcroppings of weathered volcanic rocks. It was an amazing evening walk.