I guess because my 60 year old body is still running on
Eastern Time, I awoke at 3 am. Not
surprising since that is 5 am at home and that is my normal time to
awaken. I caught up on some things,
responded to some emails and watched a couple of episodes of I Love Lucy on the
living room television.
When I heard Mary stirring I made breakfast of some of the
fresh eggs and homemade bread that the property owner left for us. After cleaning up and discussing plans for
the day, we went to the nearby Fry’s Supermarket which is a partner with the
Kroger chain. Figuring that we would eat
evening meals out, we picked up some things that we might need for breakfast
and lunch on the road visiting local attractions. We always like to have a case of water
bottles in the car trunk, especially when travelling in remote desert regions.
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| Steve at Biosphere 2 |
After a quick stop at Copper Casa to unload groceries and
pack our lunch, we headed northeast to Biosphere
2 Biosphere 2 near Oracle,
Arizona. The passport book that the
property owner passed along to us gave us 2 for 1 admission to the Biosphere 2
tour. That made it $20 for both of us. Like many tours, we started with a short film
that explained what Biosphere 2 was all about.
We then walked through the glass domed structure that encloses 3.14
acres. When the facility opened in 1991
It was used as a closed system where 8 human subjects would live in a
completely self-sustaining environment where nothing, not even air or water,
would enter or leave. Today, the focus
of Biosphere 2 has completely changed.
It is now owned and operated by the University of Arizona as a research
laboratory where conditions on Earth can be closely simulated.
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| Artificial ocean in Biosphere 2 |
Biosphere is no longer a completely closed
system and visitors, like us, are permitted to enter and leave through the
airlock doors. A number of things
surprised us about Biosphere 2 including the fact that there was no Biosphere 1
structure. Biosphere 1 is Earth! The Biosphere 2 was intended to model
conditions that may exist on a “replacement Earth” that could be built on
another planet or following an environmental disaster. We also learned that the human habitation
project was not considered a failure as the press reported. It is true that during the two years that the
8 people lived there, the oxygen levels dropped despite the number of plants
growing in the facility. During the
experiment, supplemental oxygen needed to be added to the atmosphere on three
occasions. The current explanation is
that the deep concrete pad on which Biosphere 2 is built continued to absorb
oxygen for many years after construction causing the atmosphere is be deficient
in the gas required by the people and animals living therein. In addition, a medical emergency required one
resident to be removed from the Biosphere 2 for a few hours when she cut the
tip of her finger off while gardening.
Finally, when the Biospherians left following their two year stay they
were only able to take in about 2000 Calories per day which was less than what
they would require to sustain them. That
all being said, the whole project was an experiment intended to teach the
researchers about the challenges of recreating Earth conditions.
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Biosphere 2
Today the facility has a number of areas
where University of Arizona researchers and others can investigate a variety of
environmental conditions. We learning
that the technical crew working on the movie, The Martian, came to Biosphere 2
to learn what would be involved in creating an autonomous life zone on another
planet. The last thing that we learned
is that Biosphere 2 was constructed using only donated private money. Even today the project depends on donations
and fees paid by tours to supplement the grants that are used to operate and
maintain the research facility.
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| Fish hook barrel cactus |
We had lunch in the parking area of Biosphere 2 which was
the cheese and bread that we purchased earlier at the supermarket. We also had Envy apples followed by our usual
peanut butter on Ritz crackers as we drove north toward Casa Grande Ruins. Along the drive we stopped a few times to
admire and photograph some of the interesting vegetation, especially the many
cacti. Of course, the saguaro are the
most obvious and recognizable botanical feature of this part of the
desert. However, there were many types
of prickly pear cacti and we especially liked the fish hook barrel cacti that
are always slightly tilted toward south and have a ring of bright yellow fruits
at the top this time of year.
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| Steve at a marker where Tom Mix died. |
We
traveled up Route 79 and passed over Tom Mix Wash, a small dry
river bed where cowboy actor, Tom
Mix, crashed his yellow Cord automobile in 1940 after failing to notice a
detour sign. Mix was a pioneer in the
Western movie genre and set the standard for television and film cowboys for
many years.
We checked in at Casa
Grande Ruins National Monument and bought an annual National Park pass to
enter. We have found for us that the
annual pass is a much better deal than paying individual park entry since the
pass will provide entry for the entire group.
Casa Grande was a very good stop for us.
We learned that the area was occupied by the Hohokam culture since about
300 BC. These people lived in earthen
structures using caliche mud along with cactus ribs and wood from the mountain
area to construct their homes and other structures. It is believed that the current structures on
the 400+ acre area were constructed around 1350 and had over 2000 residents in
four separate walled communities. Each
community had a seven foot tall packed mud wall encircling a number of single
story dwellings, oval ball and game courts, cooking areas and many other
aspects of daily life. Casa Grande is
unique by having a large three story building at the center of one of the
walled communities. It is not known the
purpose for this large structure although there are several openings that are
aligned to astronomical phenomena including one hole in the six foot thick
outer wall that is aligned to the summer solstice. Another one is set to observe the lunar standstill
that occurs every 18.6 years.
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| 600 year old structure at Casa Grande |
When Casa Grande was discovered by Spanish explorers in 1694
the area was long abandoned. It is
speculated that the Hohokam culture dispersed from Casa Grande around
1450. It is believed that the culture
formed or assimilated into many tribal nations that still exist in the region
today. Today, the area is protected as a National
Monument and has a steel structure over the 700 year old mud building to
protect against further degradation. We
had a nice tour with a small group that was very informative and
interesting. After the tour, we walked
around on our own taking some snapshots and reading the interpretative signage
along the paths and exhibits.
We left Casa Grande to make a quick stop by the nearby
Walmart to buy a cheap Styrofoam cooler to take lunch and drinks over the next
week. We saw that there was an
Earthcache along a road leading from Casa Grande to I-10 so we decided to
stop. This cache was showing how much
the land has subsided near an irrigation well.
As water was removed, the surrounding soil level has dropped over 24
inches.
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| Sunset in the desert |
On our drive toward Phoenix us I-10 we could tell that the sunset
was going to be beautiful. We knew that
we had a good bit of time before we had to pick Mark & Cindy up at the Sky
Harbor Airport in Phoenix so we made a stop to take some snapshots. As the sun set it changed from bright blue to
include clouds with peach colored bottoms that eventually became bright
red. It was spectacular. Although their flight wasn’t scheduled until
7 pm we arrived at the airport’s cell phone lot a little after 6 pm and enjoyed
the evening. We picked them up outside
the baggage claim area and headed south toward our B&B in Tucson. We stopped for a good and fun dinner at Buca de Beppo. Mark & Cindy ordered baked rigatoni and
we got my usual Italian choice, chicken parmesan. Meals there are family style so we shared
some of all and still had a large portion of rigatoni to bring back to the
room.
Mark & Cindy seemed to like Copper
Casa and picked out their rooms before we all turned in for the night.
