872 January 10, 2023 Jeeping In The Desert

I walked from the campground into Ajo and back this morning.  It was a little more than 4 miles.  The air was cool and it was cloudy so that I missed the warmth of the sun.  There are murals on lots of buildings in town.  These are two that I don’t think I have posted before.

After Tim finished his exercise and a bike ride, we packed the cooler and went to the Barry Goldwater Range north of Ajo.  The Barry Goldwater Range is a large military range.  It covers 1.7 million acres in southwestern Arizona.  It also contains about 2.7 million acres of restricted airspace.

We started at Gate 15.  We had to watch a safety video and obtain a permit to be able to enter.  The gates are secured with combination locks.  We were given the code and away we went!

This was our first desert ride in our new Jeep…the inaugural ride! 

We really love it here!  We took the road to its end and then hiked a short distance.

We traveled further on Route 85 and to Access Gate 9.  Here we found a great lunch spot.

A manmade water source for wildlife.  There were paw prints all around.

Teddy bear cholla.

Hat Mountain in the distance.

So lovely.

It was late afternoon as we started to leave the range.  We could hear jets practicing.  This is a training ground for warfare and target attacks utilize real weapons.  We stopped to watch maneuvers as the pilots dropped bombs in the tactical range across the road.  They then made steep climbs, rapidly ascending and then quickly disappearing from sight.  We watched 6 or 8 planes.  Not too many people get to witness that!