Southern Arizona, where I now live, is a beautiful place that many people ignore in favor of the larger attractions to the north: Grand Canyon and Petrified Forest National Parks in Arizona and the many parks of Utah.  Fine by me, since this keeps the southern half of the state relatively unspoiled for the rest of us.

    This page is limited to the desert face of Arizona.  Photos of Arizona ghost towns, canyons, waterfalls, and lush mountain forests can be found by selecting other categories on my index page.

The Santa Catalinas

    These mountains dominate Tucson's north side and are great to photograph.  Catalina Highway ascends around 26 miles from Tucson at 2,000 feet to Mount Lemmon at over 9,000 feet, the environmental equivalent of walking from Tucson to Canada.  See my fall gallery for some photos around Summerhaven and Mount Lemmon.  The Babad Do'ag overlook and Windy Point Vista are definitely my favorites on this drive.
 
 

Saguaro National Park West

    The western section of the park has no entrance fee Signal Hill in the western section of the park.  The black and white photos are digital images taken with a Hoya R72 filter, which filters out nearly all visible light and allows only infrared and near-IR light to pass through.   Photographed October 2001 and March 2004.
 
 

Organ Pipe National Monument

    Beautiful park on Arizona's southern border, between Yuma and Tucson.  Take water -- in a typical year, over a dozen illegal migrants die inside the park.
 

Organ pipe cactus at sunrise	Ocatilla, ditto	Mine at the Dripping Springs camp
Turkey vultures on the border (looking for migrants?)		Blooming saguaro

 
 

Paramore Crater

    Think crater and Arizona and you usually think Sunset or Meteor.  This hidden crater is 5 miles off the beaten path in Cochise County, and most people only encounter it as the name of a USGS quadrangle.
 
 

Skull and fence at a nearby ranch	On the crater rim	Inside the crater

Biosphere 2

    This research facility, once sealed in scientists; now it's open for tours.  Also the setting for the infamously bad Pauly Shore - Steven Baldwin film "BioDome."  Don't miss the film at the visitor center, narrated . . . by William . . . Shat . . . ner.
 
 

Saguaro National Park East

    The less visited of the two halves of Saguaro, probably since it has an entrance fee and the other half doesn't.  I think you've been in the desert too long when the saguaro start to look sexy . . . see below.
 
 

Miscellany
 

Desert cat that adopted me for a while	Memorial shrine near Bisbee	Arroyo outside Tombstone
The Mission of San Xavier del Bac