Wed 20 Feb - Tucson, AZ

The weather prediction definitely was for foul weather in Tucson today, and yep, they were right. Snow and sleet and even hail, in Tucson, AZ!!??

We were not to be deterred. After breakfast, it was overcast and windy, but no rain or worse, so we prepared ourselves and went out on foot to explore the various historical districts of downtown Tucson.

We walked east out of the University Inn (our motel) and then walked 4th Ave southwards through the University district, a very interesting and eclectic neighborhood. This is a view of 4th Ave looking north - they are putting in a tramway to connect the University of Arizona with downtown Tucson.

Di thought that it would be appropriate for a photo of her in front of this pub.

Interesting picture, buildings, even garbage bins and bike racks... Pick Hans in the photo below...

A little bit of Easter Island on 4th...

We assume that this piece of "art" is to lock up your bike.

Walking a few blocks more we ended up in the historic Iron Horse district. You can see its becoming upmarket as old warehouses and loading docks are turned into bars and restaurants.

A railway underpass brings us downtown to the east end of Congress street. A lovely historic hotel sits here, Tucson's oldest called Hotel Congress, and most of the ground floor is as it was in the 1930's.

January 1934 this place made history...a furnace blew up and the third floor burned. Some guests were more worried about their luggage being saved and tipped a fireman $50 to save their bags and bring them to safety. Within days the fireman recognized pictures in the papers of some members from John Dillinger's gang who the police had been hunting - the big tipper. The police caught Dillinger and eventually all the members of his gang as a result. Why worry about the bags? because they held money and guns. The third floor was never rebuilt.

The lobby of Hotel Congress.

These are photos from the time showing the Hotel Congress fire, the firemen reading the newspaper and arrests. John Dillinger is photo 33.

Another photo showed Robert Plant from Led Zeppelin staying here at the time of their heydays.

Love the old, and still used, phone booths. Does Hans have a news scoop? Very Flanagan from the Ellery Queen series...

As noted earlier, Tucson central is a major construction site and they are extending the tramway throughout the city. Cranes and building work is everywhere - this is one of the United States' fastest growing cities. We applaud them for upgrading their city. Sydney, take note!

Some very cool retro buildings downtown and this music store caught our eye...

We headed to the visitors centre for information on hikes for finer weather and also a historic downtown walking tour map. The rain was holding off so we started the walking tour. First stop the Tucson Court House.

Then around the old Presido and towards Barrio Historica. We pass some retro classic motels, with great neon signage.

It started to rain but we persisted with our walking tour and came to St Augustine's cathedral, which is lovely.

 

What's unique is that they must not have had enough money for fancy tiles, cornices or windows so they wallpapered and painted this detail on. They did a great job.

These must have been completely bare walls. Even Mother Theresa features.

The rain continued and then a little hail started as we decided to walk home...And then it started to snow... Big fat wet snow.

Combined with the rain the Tucson streets flooded. We retreated to Tucson Public Library to wait it out (where we took the photo above) or work out how we could get back to our motel without getting too cold or too seriously wet. At this time, the temperature is 2 degrees Celsius. WiFi at the library meant we tracked down some local buses that left from the depot a block away towards our motel. A quick break in the weather and we headed there.

Tucson does not handle heavy rain (and snow) well. They only get about 30cm a year and most of that in summer. Drainage can be a problem for an hour or two. This is just outside our motel.

Shoes off, pants rolled up we made it ok - and yes that it snow you can see still falling.

Whilst we had lunch in our room, the snow got heavier. Almost a Christmas view through our window.

We pass the time by doing laundry and writing postcards.

A few hours later and most of the weather had passed so we took the car (sensible this time) and headed a few blocks east to the University of Arizona. They have a Centre for Creative Photography which has exhibitions for free (our favourite word!).

The current exhibition was titled "Jazz in the Loft Project" and was a fantastic collection of photos from Eugene Smith during an 8 year period 1957-1965 when he lived on 6th avenue in New York. He got into the jazz scene and took 40,000 photos and more than a thousand tape recordings of jazz musicians and street scenes. The University of Arizona owns all the archives.

Back to the motel for a while and then we took the car back to 4th Avenue for dinner at Brooklyn Pizzeria which got good reviews in Tripadvisor. We were not disappointed. Pizza was very good, and the place was seriously popular with what looked like Uni students (no surprises there) and had a roving home delivery business.

All good, back to the motel again to warm up. Hopefully a warmer and clearer day tomorrow (the weather forecast says so at least)

 

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