Yuma, AZ (1/10 & 1/11/2018)

Yuma claims to be the sunniest place on earth, based on Weather Service records that show it has sunshine during 91% of its daylight hours.  It also claims that Miami is hotter than Yuma, again based on weather records that show yearly average temperature in Miami is higher than here.  Of course, yearly average can be very misleading, given the hidden extremes contained within the average.  Statistics may not lie, but can certainly mislead.  Yuma's record high of 124F is way higher than Miami's record high, and the record low of 22F here doesn't sound all that attractive.  But the average is pretty good.

As for sunshine, we had one day this week that was totally overcast and very windy, filling the air with sand from all the vacant lots hereabouts.  It was truly a sandstorm until the rain suddenly arrived and cleansed the air.  In about one hour of steady rain, we exceeded the monthly average of about 1/4 inch.  That's right, 3 inches is the average annual rainfall here.  No wonder there are irrigation canals running all over the county.

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The National Wildlife Refuge system, started by Teddy Roosevelt in 1903, now has more than 562 refuges encompassing more than 150,000,000 acres.  It has become standard for me to check out any that are near my travels.  So, I spent a nice (sunny) day at Imperial NWR, which is about thirty miles north of Yuma.  Another, Kofa NWR is just a bit farther, so I didn't make it there.

At Imperial, the Colorado River spreads out quite a bit, forming several lakes and wetland areas that attract migrating birds and waterfowl.  Being right out in the mountainous desert, it also offers some pretty spectacular landscapes.  Rugged is the word that comes to mind.  There is a beautiful Visitor Center,which seems a little out of place in this wilderness.  Not much else has been done to develop the property, except to carve out a rough road that accesses several observation points.  To give you an idea of how desolate the area is, Yuma Army Proving Ground surrounds the refuge.  It's where the Army tests new weapons, vehicles, tanks, planes, helicopters, etc before placing them into combat.

At the first observation point, the lake was filled with white pelicans and a variety of ducks, coots, etc.  The size of the lake allowed them to stay too far away for really good close-ups.

 Later, I drove around some of the back roads and enjoyed the variety of colors in the rock formations.  It reminded me somewhat of Death Valley.

I turned around at the sign designating the Proving Ground boundary.

Driving back toward Yuma, I passed a large field where soldiers were practicing parachute jumps.  It was fun to watch them drift to earth, not all that slowly.  Some hit and fell, while others just started walking on impact.  Different levels of experience, I suppose.

I had met some really nice Volunteers at the NWR who directed me to Lake Martinez for lunch.  Turned out there is a whole community around that lake, including some surprisingly nice homes.  Some of the nicer ones are in a gated community, so I took no photos of them.  A few outside the gates were nice enough for my purposes.

After a great burger and fries, I visited the Imperial Dam that seems to be where the Colorado River is split up, some to Arizona, some to California, and some left to travel on toward Mexico.  Too bad I wasn't able to get close enough for photos.
 Today I made a final pass through downtown Yuma, spotting a few more birds and stopping by St. Thomas Indian Mission.  While I didn't visit the Territorial Prison, I've included a few photos of it that were taken in 2003.  It impressed me as a place I would not want to be.

Tomorrow I move on to Alpine, CA to see what I can find there.