Due to high waters in the nearby canyons, we do loops around the hotel instead of going out to do a breakfast hike. We end up eating near a waterfall. Since this whole trip is about healthy eating, breakfast "on the trail" consists of fruit, peanut butter, cottage cheese, fruit, whole grain tortillas, nuts, fruit…

I wish it hadn't taken me slamming into a prickly pear cactus to make a great point about traveling solo, but it did. Here's the sad tale. In heavy hiking boots, on a trail marked "difficult," I tripped and pitched forward. Under normal circumstances I think I would have been able to right myself. But…

Bridget, a fellow hiker, had some of us laughing all morning, after she showed us the "Michigan mitten" at breakfast. Someone asked her where she grew up and she held up her right hand and pointed to one side of her palm. "Right here." Huh? Apparently, Michigan children learn that their state is shaped like…

Yesterday’s hail dusted the mountaintops here in Tucson, changing the desert palette. By this morning it was raining. If I had been out West hiking on my own, I might have spent a lonely day in my room, or hanging around the hotel, today. Maybe I would have gone shopping or to a movie. But…