It is mid afternoon and 80 degrees. The sun is bright, but the blue sky is half interspersed with high thin white clouds. We are waiting for dusk to walk along this long low ridge and look for owls below on the desert prairie. This will be our second and last night alone in the back country. With hunting season over we seem to be the only campers here. That could be great, and a quieter night than last we have never experienced, but being only twelve miles from the border and seeing all the signs of illegal border crossings, we are a bit uncomfortable here. It is telling when most of the cars you see have a green stripe on them.

Otherwise the site is lovely and surrounded by a pleasing mixture of dried grass and mesquite trees. Quail and coyote pass by. We are in a basin and mountain ranges rise both to the east and west. The towering spike of Baboquivari Peak is visible throughout the Altar Valley and serves to orient the traveler. West of the refuge is the huge Tohono O’Odham Indian Reservation.

Buenos Aries itself was a ranch established on grassland that could not support intense beef grazing. Drought came, as it does regularly, and the cattle starved. Worse they killed the grass, and when the rains came the soils went with it. Land that had never supported stream channels became criss-crossed with washes. Mesquite and cactus replaced the luxuriant grasses. Now the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is attempting to restore the land and its wildlife with inadequate resources.

While we have enjoyed this southern prairie, we have found little new here. We are ready to move on to our next destination. It is the town of Ajo, north of Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument.

Before our stop here we spent eight days at Patagonia Lake State Park about one hundred miles east of here. At the edge of the Patagonia mountain range, that park is at the bottom of the Sonoita Creek valley. A recreational reservoir and the free running stream that feeds it provide an oasis and multiple habitats for plants and animals. We found several new life birds including the elegant trogon, the rose-throated becard, the violet-crowned hummingbird, and the black-capped gnatcatcher. Deer and coati mundi wandered about as did huge “boef” which occasionally intimidated the birders.

Our hiking buddies settled into Patagonia Town during our stay and we shared activities on several days and most evenings with them. They hiked with us at Fort Huachuca (U.S. Army) to find a grand spotted owl roosting in the oak forest within a canyon below the snow-covered peaks. We hiked to the top of the canyon without finding the owl. Our friend Bob asked Chuck how many owls were in the canyon. When Chuck said two, he was surprised.

“Two in this whole canyon! We’ll never find them.”

Indeed it was becoming unlikely when Chuck paused on a rise and scanned the surrounding woodland. There, straight ahead beyond a turn in the trail, only ten feet above his head but twenty feet above the sloping ground was the large owl. It stared at him as he stared back. More importantly it stayed put until the group caught up and saw it.

We shopped in the nearby border town of Nogales, Arizona and accidentally crossed the border into Nogales, Sonora. Our friends turned around immediately, but their car stalled in the queue. Both of us pushed the car back into the United States. Then it started. That was a tense and hilarious incident that we hope is never repeated.

We had hoped to walk into Mexico that afternoon, but instead returned to Patagonia while the auto was running.

We are ready for spring and a few signs are appearing, but a winter drought does not promise a good one here. Only the cottonwoods are leafing out so far. Except for the palo verde and prickly pear, there is little green here. Perhaps the Sonora desert with its tree cactus will seem verdant. We’ll let you know soon.