HikeArizona.COM

The endless chatter of weather.

It must have switched from spring to summer in the White Mountains on Monday morning. I thought I was going to blow away on Sunday. There were foot-high whitecaps on that little reservoir on 180/191. I put rocks in my tent when I left for a dayhike.

It isn't windy right now, but we had a low of 26 overnight, 28 yesterday. Real nice for May (sarcasm). The good news isn't Jesus Christ, but that I can leave town and escape this wonderful spring weather (more sarcasm). I'm headed to the Gila for 4 or 5 days staring tomorrow, maybe 6 days. It all depends on how long I take.

Chet P wrote:I'm headed to the Gila for 4 or 5 days staring tomorrow, maybe 6 days.

All those water crossings are going to be cold.

I think its time for the OP to change the subject back to "The Coming of the Monsoon."

And for those who are interested, there's a quick 5-minute presentation on the monsoon put together by the Tucson office of the National Weather Service.
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/images/twc/Arti ... layer.html

This year is looking to be hotter than normal, with average precipitation. However, the trends are beginning to lean toward later-season arrival of moisture, with stronger moisture further south.

I was planning on leaving this thread as is titled to keep from constantly changing it for the seasons. I guess I can change it, but we have to all play along and guess the date of the start of the monsoon, for your area of course. For Flagstaff I guess July 10, 2010.

Well, I'm gonna go with June 15th. Because, that's officially how its done now. No more dew points for consecutive days, etc.

What do I win?

You win the right to continue to post in the forum!!!! No one loses anything, so it's mostly a pride thing.

I go with what a meteorologist once said, he basically said the monsoon starts when he hears thunder in the area. So for me, the monsoon starts around here when there are storms in the area.

chumley wrote:Well, I'm gonna go with June 15th. Because, that's officially how its done now. No more dew points for consecutive days, etc.

That's no fun. Up here in Flag we're boycotting that idea and going the way of meaningless estimation like good people. June 24th, baby.

Looking to be "hot" this coming weekend and next week. Finally getting some nice weather in these parts!

Jim_H wrote:Looking to be "hot" this coming weekend and next week. Finally getting some nice weather in these parts!

Thats why you live in Flag? Here in the Valley it sucks! I'm not a big fan of the heat.

We will likely hit 90 up here sometime this week. That is kind of hot for here, but I like it.

I miss hot summers. There is something about being outside on a day when it was above 95 and the air is cooling down. The smell of the soil, the warm energy in the air. I prefer it dry. I might actually like evenings in the Valley if the days weren't so insanely hot during summer. Something about being above 110 is just not right for humans to live in. 108, thats OK, but 111 is ridiculous. I went up the Coronado Trail again the other day. I kinda like Clifton. Maybe I could get a job in Safford next year.

Jim_H wrote:Maybe I could get a job in Safford next year.

If so, I'd be interested in what you think of it. I've followed your feelings about Flagstaff to guess whether I'd feel the same after long enough. There are things I like about Safford (including the weather), but I'd probably be a fish out of water there unless I were teaching.

On a hypothetical list, prepared by people from the Valley, on pros and cons of living in Safford, I would think the average person, even the average outdoorsy person, would probably list more cons than pros! That being said, and from the perspective of one who has lived, (stranger in a strange land), in a small Arizona ranching town for 11 years, and also having visited Safford many times, I would say I can come up with a lot of positive things to say about it. (It is very easy to come up with the negative things. I am going to stick with positive things an outdoorsy person might appreciate.)

It is like Tucson before Tucson was a big city: A desert town surrounded by tall mountains that get snow in winter.

It has an actual runnable river, in the spring. Actually, 2 of them, because the SF feeds into the Gila. Gila Box is a pretty neat place, all things considered.

It has a gazillion hot springs to check out. For hiking, backpacking and general adventuring it is right next to Mt. Graham/Pinalenos, and is close to Gila Wilderness, Chiricahuas, lower Blue Range and Hannagan, to name but a few interesting nearby areas. The lowlands in winter would also have desert hiking and mountain biking.

It is a small town NOT on the interstate. This one thing, in my estimation, bumps it up above a lot of other small towns I can think of.

In the town:

There are a lot of really neat old houses.

There is a really cool old Main Street, just begging for hippie boutiques, backpacking and kayaking outfitters, bike shops, espresso bars, art galleries, cool college night clubs and other interesting businesses that will probably never happen.

There is at least one pretty good Mexican restaurant.

It seems there is a bicycle shop, but it has no website--might be out of business? There apparently is a health food store--something I sometimes desperately miss here in Eagar. Again, no website for it.

If you live in the actual flat valley you can probably rent the ditch irrigation, and can grow vegetables year-round. The possibilities of small orchard and huge gardens on your property are thus amazing--IF you can get on the irrigation. I have it here in Eagar some years, if I can remember to rent it early in the season. (This year I didn't call the irrigation district in time and all the hours on my street's ditch were already taken.)

There is a pretty good community college where you can take continuing education classes and go to concerts and plays put on by the students. I think they bring in bands and other performers, too. Maybe meet some people there, too. Take classes or even get an AA degree in something you always wanted to learn about, just for fun.

I don't know about mountain bike trails, bicycle clubs, hiking groups, kayaking clubs, etc., but they may exist, or you can always start one!

If you love swimming, as I do, it has a public pool, http://media.photobucket.com/image/saff ... /Theme.jpg
plus Roper Lake State Park swimming beach which they are keeping open, according to the website: http://azstateparks.com/Parks/ROLA/index.html And EA--the college--also has a pool.

I would bet there are swimming holes in the river, too, up in the Box when the water is low.

That was not hard for me to come up with those ideas.

I liked Safford better before the new mine started. It might have a healthier economy now, but it just doesn't seem as fun and hotel rates are through the roof. Thumbs up on the Mexican food, the Gila Box, and the downtown. It even got rain out of season a couple times when I was there.

I know this guy that moved there cause his wife got a job. He dreaded the move. After a couple years I think he's realizing his central location opens up a myriad of opportunity.

Any idea on how much precipitation they typically get in a year?

From the NOAA Weather data listed on http://hikearizona.com/decoder.php?ZTN=3068
Jan 1
Feb 1
Mar 0.8
Apr 0.2
May 0.3
Jun 0.2
Jul 1.3
Aug 1.2
Sep 1
Oct 0.9
Nov 0.7
Dec 1.2

I have heard the new mine drove the cost of houses through the roof.

azbackpackr wrote:. . .from the perspective of one who has lived, (stranger in a strange land), in a small Arizona ranching town for 11 years, and also having visited Safford many times, I would say I can come up with a lot of positive things to say about it. (It is very easy to come up with the negative things. I am going to stick with positive things an outdoorsy person might appreciate.). . .

It's the gateway to Clifton & Morenci.