Heading to Yuma, Arizona

Our alarm went off at 3:45am on Monday October 6^th in Edmonton as we had an early flight to Phoenix.  We went through Customs without a hitch and before we knew it we were heading south.  We had a quick stop over in San Francisco and when I say quick I mean quick.  It was get off the plane, head to the board to see what gate we needed, noticed the plane to Phoenix was boarding and off we went to find our gate.  We made it, sat down and enjoyed the short flight.  We arrived in Phoenix about 18 minutes early and due to the tight connection in San Francisco our luggage didn’t make it.  United Airlines found out where our luggage was, put it on priority and Monday evening at 10:30pm we picked up our luggage at the Yuma airport. 

San Francisco from the air

 

We rented a red convertible Mustang and drove to Yuma from Phoenix, the drive was very nice as we were surrounded by desert and foothills.  It took us about 3 hours to arrive at our home away from home in Yuma.  The house we are renting is very nice and comfortable and the couple who own the home are fantastic to deal with.  The first evening here we met one of the neighbours Toni and her dog, a yellow lab named Emily.  The community is very quiet and Craig loves that the planes from the nearby military base fly over head. 

 

Craig and the 'Stang

Parked in front of the house

Love the mural on the wall 

Beauty flowers in the yard

One day I'm going to climb the brick wall and reach over

to get one of these grapefruits. haha

Hmmm what is Craig picking?

LIMES!

Landshark and Limes - a great combination

 

Yesterday was our first full day in Yuma and we ended up at the Yuma Territorial Prison.  I should mention that it is a State Historical Park and it wasn’t due to Craig driving the Mustang.  The prison was built in 1876 and operated for only 33 years, housing 3,069 prisoners including men and women.  The most famous lady prisoner was Pearl Hart, who with her boyfriend Joe Boot, robbed a stage between Florence and Globe on May 30, 1899. It was the last known stagecoach robbery in Arizona. She was among another 28 other women who called this prison home.  Each cell held 6 prisoners and sometimes in over crowding there were another one or two prisoners.  The cleanliness of the cells was horrible and the prisoners suffered from head lice and had to live amongst their own body fluids.  The Gates Riot occurred in 1887 where a group of prisoners took superintendent Thomas Gates hostage by holding a knife to his throat. Gates was stabbed in the neck and never returned to work due to constant pain, he later committed suicide.  No prisoner was executed at the Yuma Territorial Prison but just outside the prison walls lay 111 prisoners who died from mostly tuberculosis or killed by another prisoner.

 

Ocean to Ocean bridge

The Main Tower

View from the top of the tower

Entering the Sally Port

The Sally Port or entrance was long enough to fit a stage coach

 

The entrance

Now that's a camera!

One they used for the mug shots

Prisoner 1319 - Craig LeBleu

Sentenced for 5 years for being too cute

Lonely life

Cell Block

Six inmates shared these small 9 x 12 quarters

Looking out

Rock, steel bars and cement made up the walls of the prison

Of course I ran this bell - needless to say it was loud!

Prisoners feared "the dark hole" a cave measuring only 15 x 15 feet,

which was dug into a rock hill, with a strap iron cage in the middle.

 

The longest time served by a prisoner is the Dark Cell was 104 days straight.

They were fed once a day - bread and water

A luxury at the prison, a library

Doors leading from the library

CAUTION: LOW ENTRANCE

Not for me!

The yard

The gravesite across the prison 

From there we drove to Historic Downtown Yuma.  We parked in front of an antique store and second hand book store.  From the outside the bookstore looked small and quaint but once you entered it went on forever.  The guy that worked there knew his stuff and where to find any book.  All books were average a couple of dollars and Craig picked up a paperback for $1.50. 

 

From there we walked to the end of downtown Yuma, turned and walked the other side where we came across the Prison Hill Brewing Company.  The menu written on the chalk board outside drew us inside and we decided to have a late lunch and a beer.  We had the special called The Wrecker which was layers of sausage, brisket and pulled pork all piled on a dinner roll topped off with coleslaw.  Needless to day we didn’t finish the meal even though their homemade potato chips were to die for.  Since it was a micro brewery their served beer and cider which they make.  Craig had the Prison Hill Jailhouse Orange Ale while I tried their Ace Pineapple Cider. 

 

Downtown Historic Yuma

The building used to be the Post Office

We went into the small bookstore at the end of the street

Having a pint at the Prison Hill Brewing Company

Cool!

I thought this old truck screamed to use

the colour select on the camera

We decided to head home to spend a nice evening of Craig having a nap and me editing pictures.  We have no internet access where we are staying but there is a Starbucks just down the street where we can get on-line. 

 

The weather has been warm 98’f the first day and yesterday was 87’f, both days were cloudy but today it is supposed to clear and be sunny all weekend long.  We are going to stay a bit close to home today, with a visit of the Sanguinetti House Museum, a bit of shopping and hopefully watch the sunset.  Tomorrow afternoon we head back to Phoenix as we purchased season opener tickets for our hometown Winnipeg Jets.  We are sixth row up from the Jets’ bench so watch for us and here’s hoping that they pull off a win. On Friday we are heading to San Diego, where we will visit the zoo, watch the sunset at La Jolla beach and hopefully go to the USS Middway Musuem on the weekend. On Saturday we meet up with some GSP friends who I met on Facebook.  We are excited to meet Mary, Teri and John and we can’t forget Hope, Jenny and Forrest, Teri and John’s GSPs.  We are going to meet up with them at the SoCal GSP Rescue and I already had instructions from Craig that I can’t bring a dog back home with us.  We head back to Yuma on Sunday where we will spend most of the week touring and exploring the area.

 

I leave you today with some pictures of some of the cactus.

 

Talk soon!