Still drawing in customers with this neon sign in central Tucson.
I've traversed Arizona from north to south on this trip, from Page to Nogales, making pictures and some new friends. I happen to love old neon, couldn't resist this one a block from my hotel.
Cross in the church at Tumacacori National Historic Site
Mom and I witnessed the annual traditional procession to mass at Tumacacori National Historic Site but because of the tribal dance aspects of the ceremony, cameras were banned. I'm glad I didn't know that in advance, because I probably wouldn't have gone, and that would have been a mistake. The procesion began with a Park Service color guard. A mariachi band played while four young girls wearing headscarfs greeted and waved flags at two lines of male dancers dressed in breech clothes and leg rattles. The Knights of Columbus, a couple dressed in colonial era Spanish dress and the priests followed the girls. The service was conducted outside, and I heard the biblical readings in four languages: English, Spanish, Yaqui and O'odham. The officiating priest, one of the papal astronomers working at the "pope scope" in Arizona, joked that he was going to make the next reading in a fifth language, British. I went back with the camera on Monday, arriving in the midst of an NPS staff meeting revisiting the events of the day before and had the site to myself.
One of the odder sights on the Tucson - Nogales Highway
Mom and I encouraged each other into getting a piece of apple pie and coffee, not at the Longhorn, but across the street at the Cow Palace. Not a fast food restaurant for forty miles, but two restaurants within a stone's throw of each other. One of the park service staff who grew up in the area told me that when she was growing up, they stopped here on the long trip to Tucson before the interstate was built. Pie was "better than it has to be" good, and maybe next time we will dare cross the skull threshold and try out the competition.
