So I was more than a bit surprised to wake up yesterday morning to a beautiful blanket of snow, my first time being in a southern Arizona snowstorm, and in mid-March no less!
It definitely made my day, as I hadn’t been in the snow since September in the mountains of southwest Montana, and it almost felt like a belated white Christmas, so pretty.
Snow started coming down harder and snowed all morning long, eventually piling up 2-3 inches. I don’t know how common it is for snow to fall this far down in the foothills of the mountains, only that the peaks typically get snow at least a couple times every winter, and this was the first precipitation at the end of January when it dumped several inches of moisture across the southwest, even snowing a little on the desert valley floor in Phoenix and Tucson. Still, the area’s in a bad drought I’m told by locals, so I’m sure the plant life will be happy and this will probably extend the flow of the snowmelt-fed small creeks in the area just a bit longer into the spring...
It sure was a nice treat to see the desert plants and cacti covered in snow, that’s for sure!
Not too common to see prickly pear covered in snow...
Dakota and I both enjoyed a nice morning walk in the snow, everything so still and quite (and white) in the middle of a snowstorm.
The snow-capped peaks of the Santa Ritas were particularly gorgeous when the skies started to clear off in the early afternoon...
And even prettier this morning in the clear blue sky.
There were even quite a few patches in the shade left this morning, and on an afternoon hike up a nearby trail a family had managed to find enough remaining snow to build a tiny snowman.
And now it’s already back to the way these parts usually look in the winter, with snow on the peaks and nowhere else. Beautiful place to be for a snowstorm, you just gotta love the surprises nature brings sometimes.