We took a walk in the Rio Salado in Phoenix. They have been transforming it into a riparian river walk. They have been talking about this since around 1970 when it was suggested by the ASU architecture students. The Rio Salado is part of the Salt River the great and world wide known river of Phoenix. It's right up there with the Mississippi, Amazon and the Brisbane Rivers. When Dad was courting Mum in Brisbane, she was feeling sad at the thought of having to leave Brisbane and the Brisbane River (which you will understand if you look at my Australian slides to the right). The Brisbane River is beautiful and winds back and forth through Brisbane. Well, Dad, trying to impress his girl said, we have a river in Phoenix too. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a map of Phoenix and showed Mum how the Salt River runs through Phoenix. Mum got to Phoenix and became very homesick for water. She kept trying to get Dad to take her to see the beautiful Salt River, he kept putting her off. Finally he could avoid it no more and took her to the Salt River which was dry as a bone due to Roosevelt Dam upstream! All the cottonwoods and other riparian vegetation had died. Roosevelt Dam was built around 1910 and the first time I remember water flowing in it was in 1966 when there was a flood! Needless to say she was disappointed and Dad had to take her to sit by the lagoon at Encanto Park whenever she got homesick for water. See the smile on Mum's face, she is so thrilled to finally see some water in the river!
This is the Desert Willow. We saw a lot of hummingbirds feeding on these beautiful flowers.
Jules walking down one of the paths with the trees touching overhead.
This is a picture of the leaves and seeds of the cottonwood tree. The seeds look like cotton and it almost looks like snow when there are many cottonwood trees.
I'm not sure what this is, but the flowers almost look like wattle.
We saw a jackrabbit which was at least twice this size but alas, it was the one that got away!
We saw a lot of birds. Snowy Egrets, Redwing blackbirds, Gambol Quail, Great Blue Heron, Cormorants, Roadrunners and many ducks.
We took a walk in the Rio Salado in Phoenix. They have been transforming it into a riparian river walk. They have been talking about this since around 1970 when it was suggested by the ASU architecture students. The Rio Salado is part of the Salt River the great and world wide known river of Phoenix. It's right up there with the Mississippi, Amazon and the Brisbane Rivers. When Dad was courting Mum in Brisbane, she was feeling sad at the thought of having to leave Brisbane and the Brisbane River (which you will understand if you look at my Australian slides to the right). The Brisbane River is beautiful and winds back and forth through Brisbane. Well, Dad, trying to impress his girl said, we have a river in Phoenix too. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a map of Phoenix and showed Mum how the Salt River runs through Phoenix. Mum got to Phoenix and became very homesick for water. She kept trying to get Dad to take her to see the beautiful Salt River, he kept putting her off. Finally he could avoid it no more and took her to the Salt River which was dry as a bone due to Roosevelt Dam upstream! All the cottonwoods and other riparian vegetation had died. Roosevelt Dam was built around 1910 and the first time I remember water flowing in it was in 1966 when there was a flood! Needless to say she was disappointed and Dad had to take her to sit by the lagoon at Encanto Park whenever she got homesick for water. See the smile on Mum's face, she is so thrilled to finally see some water in the river!
This is the Desert Willow. We saw a lot of hummingbirds feeding on these beautiful flowers. 
Jules walking down one of the paths with the trees touching overhead. 
This is a picture of the leaves and seeds of the cottonwood tree. The seeds look like cotton and it almost looks like snow when there are many cottonwood trees.
I'm not sure what this is, but the flowers almost look like wattle. 
We saw a jackrabbit which was at least twice this size but alas, it was the one that got away! 
We saw a lot of birds. Snowy Egrets, Redwing blackbirds, Gambol Quail, Great Blue Heron, Cormorants, Roadrunners and many ducks. 
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