Random AZ runnings

Spring in southern Arizona has been lovely - getting warmer but not hot (until recently) and plenty of buds and flowers.  And so many more things to still see and places to explore.

We did the little climb up Keystone Peak on a beautiful day:

If there's a flood up here, we're all in trouble:

Love it!

A view of Baboquivari Peak on the horizon (I like to call it Bilbo):

Standing in line for El Charro, after learning that it's one of the more popular places in Tucson.  We did enjoy the food.  Not sure it's worth the effort and the crowds though.  And that concludes my restaurant review of the month.

Our friend Taylor came down from Flagstaff for a conference, yay!  So great to see her and do some hiking.  We tossed out the idea of doing a short adventure race (the orienteering club in Phoenix puts on some good ones) and she was game to try.  The packrafting on the lake was our favorite leg:

John led the way, we giggled a lot, found at least one checkpoint each on the paddle, bike, and trek for an official finish, and called it a success.  Thank you for the fun morning, Taylor!

I've been interested in running the Crown King Scramble 50K since I first heard about it.  "Spines to Pines", it's a climb from the desert up to the ponderosas.  Seems like a good time to try it:

John dropped me off and drove way around to pick me up.  Some things he saw along the way, including a gaggle of hot air vehicles (I also saw them from much further away):

A couple electric Amazon vans parked at the Rivian service center in Phoenix - it's happening!

Maybe they're 40% clothed on the front?

The race went great, lots of rolling hills, a few rocks, creek crossings, and of course a big climb toward the end.  Yay for the high desert!  John got to drive our Rivian on a long dirt road up to Crown King and back down, so he had a bit of fun too.

We're both working on our climbing legs, so it seemed like we were ready to try Mica Mountain again.  This time we drove Tug-E up to Redington Pass to get us a tad closer before starting off on foot.  The view of Mica on the way up - we really like the giant rocks around here:

Still a small amount of snow at the top, but no post-holing this time:

Yay, we made it!

The views from the peaks around Tucson are always wonderful:

Just for fun, we did a 5 mile/10 mile trail race at Catalina State Park.  Good for some speed work that I normally might not do.  The photographer got a couple excellent shots of us:

At the final water crossing, woo hoo John!

John finished the 5 miles and returned for a nice picture of me (and the photographer) at the end of my 2nd loop, with the Catalina range in the background:

And finally, a little peek at the aforementioned flowers:

Tucson is a great place to spend a winter in the outdoors, no doubt.

Star Trek: The Cruise VI (2 of 2)

Fun times on the Star Trek cruise!  Here are some highlights from the second half of the week.

After wandering around Mazatlán, we were back on board for another fun evening.  Of particular note, Armin Shimerman did a Shakespeare seminar.  This was a winner on a prior cruise, and we enjoyed another round of decoding the Bard.

The theme of the evening was "The Trekking Dead", so it wasn't a complete surprise to see a borg-ified Andorian and her zombie companion:

"The Devil in the Dark" got another interpretive reading.  Each cast puts their own hilarious spin on it, and this one did not disappoint.  Armin's wife Kitty played the Pizza Monster, with wheels this time:

A door decoration in our hallway... which someone (ahem) adorned with google eyes, because she couldn't help herself:

On Day 5 we parked at Puerto Vallarta.  We had a vague notion of getting off, taking a public bus downtown, and walking around, and in the end decided that a journey to the Walmart across the street would suffice.  Always interesting to see stores in other countries - I prefer grocery stores, but Walmart would have to do this time.

With spare time available, John and I took to the sports courts.  First a bit of basketball (it has been a while!) then our first foray with pickleball (fun!) and then some action-packed ping ponging.  An interested spectator:

Hey, we have a Guardian of Forever on the ship!  We decided not to jump through, just in case:

More hallway walking to look at door decorations - wow, an entire Deep Space Nine:

I should have brought John over here to get a picture of one of us in the tribble pile, very creative:

We went to peruse the Star Trek museum, where they bring real props and costumes every year.  This time it had a "Picard" theme, relevant to the show that is currently airing (the 3rd season is awesome so far, by the way!).  The plaque for the Titan ship lists a bunch of people working on the show, very cool:

The flute from "The Inner Light" and Spock's book from Picard season 2:

Not in the museum - but it could be!  A fan created this "universal machine" that appears in a bunch of Sci Fi shows, and she brought it onboard the ship.  Too funny!

Also very funny - a bunch of guys dressed up like Mormons, except they were promoting the Pah-Wraiths from DS9.  They got a bunch of doubletakes while we were standing to the side looking on:

Hello from the hidden booth on the pool deck!  This is a lovely place to sit and people watch:

Look who found us - it's JT!  Our most favorite cruise director!  We will miss you most of all:

We stayed up past our bedtime because there is one late night event you cannot miss - the Interstellar Overdub!  Denise Crosby outdid herself this time by inviting perennial favs Garrett Wang, Robert Picardo, and Ethan Phillips PLUS Todd Stashwick and Tawny Newsome (who was *finally* on board, yay!).  Todd and Tawny have improv experience at Second City in Chicago, and it really showed.  Wow, that was the best and funniest TOS episode I've ever seen, thank you all!

Why they schedule yoga with Terry Farrell the morning after the overdub, I will never understand, but I committed to doing both and it was so worth it.  Terry is amazing and we were all so happy to be a part of this session of group gratitude:

Another incredible tribble display:

Makeup artist Thomas Surprenant did a demonstration of Klingon creation, with Max Grodenchik and Robert O'Reilly as his subjects.  Robert has played a Klingon (Gowron) many times, but this was Max's first time - he's normally a Ferengi (just a different kind of prosthetics):

Gowron wanted to see what he looked like, so he got the cameraman to aim at his face, and we all got to enjoy the big head of Gowron on the screen:

It was a big day for dressing up - so many great outfits for Q's Costume Party!  I overheard someone comment that he had way underestimated the effort that people would put into this:

I got a big kick out of the guy with the mohawk, and he obliged by giving me the appropriate sign:

Is it possible there were two 3D models of Deep Space Nine on board, or did she use the one from the door decoration?

How do people even get things like this on the ship?  Crazy elaborate:

We happened upon the gathering spot for the costume contest finalists, notably Queen Arachnia (one of my favorite Captain Janeway moments), with a live Horga'hn statue (?) next to her:

The hawk people in full wings were the winners - not sure how (or if) it relates to Star Trek, but these costumes were amazing:

The captain orders everyone to enjoy their coffee (or tea):

Andrew Robinson did a reading from his new book "A Stitch in Time", a fictional autobiography as his character Garak - really good!  I hope the audiobook version is available soon.

Last day of the cruise... and time for our assimilation into the Cruise Collective for having sailed on a Star Trek vessel for 5 years.  Sad, happy, and assimilated all at the same time:

A nicely done door decoration (we like National Forest signs) with a nod to the Enterprise series:

You never know what will happen at Gorn's Gong Show, and this... balloon thing?... was on a whole 'nother level.  Tawny, Jeffrey, and Todd were incredibly good sports about it all:

A conversation with the Cardassians; Vaughn, Andrew, and Casey can tell some great stories:

Connor Trinneer is turning into a wonderful interviewer, and his conversation with Doug Jones was fun and full of interesting tidbits:

We always love cruise towel animals, so we started a collection this time.  Jana, our cabin steward, created a couple bonus washcloth animals  We added our Borg masks and a baby Gorn for good measure - quite the menagerie, as it were!

I posted a haiku on our door -- and I got a reply!!  I will forever be overjoyed and thrilled, thank you so much, Garrett:

Cheers to all the Star Trek actors, ECP folks, cruise workers, and fellow fans - bing bong!

And one quick diversion on our way home - a detour to Vasquez Rocks, the site of many Star Trek "away missions":

It was a nice day to roam the trails and admire the giant rock formations:

Just watch for gorns (or Johns) up above:

Iconic sloping rocks from many a Sci Fi alien landscape:

We seem to randomly run across long-distance hiking trails when we least expect them, the PCT in this case:

Thanks for following along on our big winter vacation adventure!