I have a fascination with lichen, perhaps because it is so tenacious and tough. It thrives where there are few nutrients, and in the desert, where there is little moisture as well. For example, notice this desert lichen, a little crackly about the edges, but still hanging in there. It is hard to predict where…
One of the most famous rock formations near Sedona, Arizona is called Coffee Pot Rock. It is shaped like one of those old-fashioned campfire coffee pots that the cowboy cooks always used to keep at the ready, of course. What could be more fitting for this Western town. I took this picture from an urban…
The quality of light in Arizona is intense, and never more so than at sunset during monsoon season. For two summer months, the afternoon clouds build, fierce thunderstorms crash and threaten. Then it is over. Or is it? As a photographer, I’ve learned to be patient. If I wait out the storm, and stick around…
As you drive through Oak Creek Canyon, you’ll see a sign for Ensinoso Park. There, if you stop your car and walk down the hill you’ll find this secret place. I’ve visited when it is dressed in winter white and fall gold, but nothing is so startling as the passionate green of summer, when the…
There once was a flock of white doves that lived in the ledges at the top of the Spire of Castle Rock, near the Village of Oak Creek. Each morning I would watch them circle the spire once, twice, and then disappear into the sunlit clouds. I waited for them. Their gentle flight set my…
There is a quiet spot, just up Oak Creek from the more famous Red Rock Crossing, which has the informal name of Buddha Beach. Sedona is a spiritual community, filled with vortexes and medicine wheels. And hoodoos of rocks arranged in balance points. This was one. The morning was still with no one else around…
Each day comes bearing its own gifts. Untie the ribbons. ~Ruth Ann Schabacker Because my weekdays are filled with to-do lists and have-to’s, I cultivate a sense of slowing down on the weekends. The walks I take are longer. The pauses to talk to my cats are more frequent. I smell the air like…
Although Arizona has a desert climate, much of the Verde Valley is a riparian zone with creeks such as Oak, Sycamore, Clear, Wet and Dry Beaver Creeks and even a river, The Verde. The Verde Valley has also marshes. I used Tavasci Marsh as the setting of my second mystery, Blood in Tavasci…
When I set out to write the Pegasus Quincy mystery series, I knew the first one, Death in Copper Town, had to take place in a mining town on the slopes of the Verde Valley. To make it realistic, I had to include the Ailanthus trees ubiquitous to that part of the Valley. Apple trees in the…
My father was a rock hound, so I developed my love of geology early. He’d bring home a new find and hand it to me proudly. “This is schist,” he’d announce. Or, “Take a look at this snowflake obsidian!” His excitement was infectious, and I got excited, too. So when I moved to Sedona, I…