 Three, two, one. Welcome to Saguaro National Park! Are you guys ready? Today we are at the Saguaro National Park, one of three national parks in the state of Arizona, and in this episode we take you with us on a health day adventure to explore this beautiful national park. This park is located in the southern part of the state near Tucson, and there are two sections to the park. The eastern section called the Rincon Mountain District and the western section referred to as Tucson Mountain District, so make sure that you have the right directions with you. The latter is the more popular and the one with more Saguaro density, and this is the one that we are exploring on this beautiful sunny day in Arizona. As we entered the park and just like usual, we stopped by the visitor's center to grab a map, ask for recommendations and lay out a plan for our day. The park ranger in duty was very helpful and even gave us some valuable information about the famous Desert Ironwood. I understand they gave them to me as they grow, but they can grow it up for a hundred years. So, you know, things in the desert, they grow forever, which is why it's so frail because once you knock it down, it's hard to get it back. Now that we have a solid plan, it's time to head to our first stop in the park and that is the Desert Discovery Nature Trail. This trail is only a half mile in and out with a lot of Saguaro and a ton of information about the ecosystem in the Sonoran Desert. The trail is paved, easily accessible, very easy to walk on and definitely kids friendly. But what I really enjoyed is the amount of information that I got out of this very short hike. Did you guys know that an adult Saguaro is generally considered to be about 125 years of age? They can be as old as 175 years of age. This is very impressive. They weigh six tons or more and they can be as tall as 50 feet. You're going to be hiking among some real giants, which is quite impressive, especially for a tree that thrives in the middle of a real dry land. Next is the Bahadalupe Drive, a six mile dirt road in the park that's definitely worth driving if you have the time, but because we are limited in time, we're going to drive just a section of it to get to our next stop, which is Valley View Overlook Trail. Right now we are on Valley View Trail. It's an easy, beautiful trail that you definitely should check out. It climbs all the way up just a couple of feet to an overlook where you can see vast fields of Saguaro. It's very beautiful. Now, when you start hiking on this trail, you will come to an intersection where there is a wash called Bahada Wash Trail. You can walk on that trail if you want to, but if you want to get to the overlook, you have to continue on the Valley View Trail, and they also call it the Wild Dog Trail. It's a very beautiful hike. Definitely check it out if you are in the Saguaro National Park. The holes that you usually see on these Saguaro, especially those that are higher up, are usually refused for birds, owls, bats, just to provide them with warmth that's really cold outside, or to prevent them from absorbing a lot of heat when it's hot outside. The tree right behind me here is an iron wood. They usually grow by desert washes. They are very dense and very strong. We stopped by the visitor's center and the park ranger there gave us a piece to hold in our hand just to kind of see how it feels. And we were also told that if you were to use a chainsaw to cut it, it would generate some spark. The seas of these trees are eaten by animals. They are also roasted by American Indians and eaten by people. Other than that, they are also removed and burned for fuel. Look at this here. You can see there's a twist, a pretty violent twist, because the arm originally grew up and then as it fell, it must have fallen this way, which is why you see the twist as it comes down and lands on the ground here. It seems like it's still growing, but I can't imagine why it would have lost the ability to support it. We're going to try to name as many plants of the Sonoran Desert as we can start in width. Number one, that is an okotio. That's another okotio. That's a teddy bear cholla. That's a prickly pear plant. This one is called something like pencil or pen cholla. Probably pencil cholla. More pencil cholla. More pencil cholla. Pencil cholla. Pencil cholla. The floor is pencil cholla. Okotio. More Okotio. Saguaro everywhere. That's an iron wood over there. That one behind me, I'm pretty sure it's a palo verde. That's a misquit. Saguaro National Park also has plenty of bike trails available for me. There are a couple of trails that are obviously marked for traffic only, but if you do come, make sure that you're aware of the fact that there are little spines and needles around from Taktai. So make sure you have the right tires for the job. And talking about spines and needles, when you are on these hiking trails, be very careful because some troyas will jump at you. If you're taking photos or videos, just know where you are standing. And it's probably a good idea to pack a tweezer with you should anything go wrong. I had a little accident myself and I promise you, it was not very pleasant. We chose to finish the day here with a hike on Signal Hill Trail. It's a beautiful, easy trail that takes you to a mesa or an overlook where you can watch the sunset. It's one of the most beautiful places here in the National Park to watch the sun going down and it's a nice walk in history because by the end or at the end of the trail, you can spot a lot of petroglyphs from when the ho-ho come lived or inhabited the area. So pretty interesting. Most of these petroglyphs reminds me of the hieroglyphic trail in Superstition Mountains in Arizona. But yeah, definitely a hike that you should check out. Very easy, very straightforward. Thank you so much for watching and if you found this episode to be informative and useful, please give it a thumbs up. Consider subscribing to our channel. We are trekking paths Habiba and Alex and we will see you very soon on a new adventure.