It’s only 24 miles away from the center of Tucson, but it’s
over and hour and a half to drive there. 24 miles and over 6,000 feet of
elevation gain makes for quite the views.
Mount Lemmon tops out at about 9,100 feet, with the winding
mountain road reaching over 8,000 feet along the way. This elevation gain takes
more than 20 degrees off the 90’s on the thermometer.
The change in climate zones on the way up was awesome. Surrounding
the base of Mount Lemmon, which is essentially adjacent to the National Park,
is a dense Saguaro forest. As you climb it changes to lush Prickly Pear cactus, then dense Cholla. At the top, it turned into a dense conifer forest. We found the ski resort, grabbed a nice picnic lunch with a view.
Frequent viewpoints afford you with gorgeous views of Tucson
and the valley it occupies. And we took advantage of them all, tiring out the
pup who snoozed most of the way back down.
Back in Tucson and back in the 90’s, we tried to remember
the cool breezes on the top of Mount Lemmon. But it didn’t make us any cooler.
Talk to you soon!
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