Organ Pipe Cactus Nation Monument...

Lloyd and I had  a really hard time leaving Arizona.  The weather was so nice and the company was even better.  We decided to stay a few more days.  Ben took us to go hiking.  We stopped at this national monument on our way.  Ben taught us about all the different kinds of cacti.  There are so many.  I had no idea!  Organ pipe is one of the rarest and it only grows in select places.  

This is the Organ Pipe Cactus.

This was at the trail head to hike up to the arch.  Ben is Teaching Lloyd about some more cactus.  While we were hiking ben filled us in on what it is like to be on the Border Patrol.  He had some crazy stories.  He caught 20 plus immigrants by him self once.  Picture tracking and hiking at dusk.  Suddenly you looking up and seeing shadows of people surrounding you... Sounds intense!  Ben loves his job!

The beautiful arch.

Ben cut open one of the fruit from one of the cactus.  He said they are good when they are ripe, but this one wasn't ready to be eaten.

One more interesting fact.  Cactus have wood inside of them as their support structure.  They aren't all just mush inside.  when they die you can see.  They all have a different bone structure. some have long poles others have little holes...  

We decided not to take the girls and Ang with us.  It was a good thing, the trail got pretty rocky.  I fell three times.  :(

Lloyd on top of one of the arches.

The view from the top.

Jack was fearless!  He was not afraid to climb and go right to the edge.  He made me nervous.  He impress me with his mountain goat skills. :)  Sadie was also quite the climber.  She is still afraid of heights though.  She wouldn't go near the edge.  If she got close she would crawl close to the ground and whine.  poor thing.

Here is the king of the saguaro Cactus.  So pretty.  These are a lot more common.  They only grow a little taller a year.  This one could be hundreds of years old.