Tag Archive for 'Arizona'

94 Year Old Arizona Man Arrested For Sexual Indecency With A Vacuum Cleaner

Published on June 10, 2010 in Tabloid Crap. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Here comes something just completely weird for everyone:

A 94-year-old Payson man has been arrested, after being accused of molesting several young children and a bizarre case of public sexual indecency you won’t believe.

94-year-old Dale Warren Graham was arrested last Thursday after a 3-week investigation that started with a public sexual indecency report.

Police say Graham was found in someone else’s garage with a running vacuum cleaner attached to the front of his pants.

As the investigation unfolded, detectives determined that Graham had contact with young children and had inappropriately touched two of them.

Police are asking that more victims come forward. The potential victims’ ages range from 8 to 17 years.

Graham was arrested for public sexual indecency, aggravated assault, and child molestation.

Payson is northeast of Phoenix. Graham has lived there since 2004.  [My FOX Phoenix]

The most obvious question to me is why does he have to go to someone else’s house to use a vacuum cleaner?  Wouldn’t it just be easier to use your own?  Than again this guy is a pervert so maybe he gets some thrill out of using other people’s vacuum cleaners?

Aerial Pictures of the American Southwest

Published on May 5, 2009 in Southwest America. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Here are some pictures of the American Southwest from a flight I took to LA a few months ago.  Here is what the Franklin Mountains from my departure location in El Paso, Texas looks like from the air :

As the flight continued west towards my destination of Los Angeles, we crossed over the Rio Grande River which winds all the way down from its source in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado to the middle of this arid Chihuahuan desert:

This river supports a number of farms that are located near the river, however as soon as you get away from the river the terrain once again turns into sand:

However, even this wasteland of sand has some interesting sites to see such as the various volcanic cones way out in the desert that can be seen from the air:

This volcanic cones out in the desert can actually be seen from up on the Franklin Mountains as well so they are a pretty prominent feature out in the desert.  The airplane for the most part was following I-10 heading west and we passed right over the New Mexico desert city of Deming that is fuel stop along I-10:

As the airplane crossed into Arizona we flew right by the snow capped Pinaleno Mountains that I had drove by just a few weeks before on my way to El Paso from Las Vegas:

As the airplane continued to fly westward over Arizona the weather became increasingly more cloudy:

After crossing the rugged eastern Arizona mountains the plane flew over the relatively flat Sonora desert valley that is home to both Phoenix and Tuscon, Arizona:

Unfortunately as the plane flew further west it began to rain and became extremely cloudly all the way to Los Angeles, so I couldn’t take any more pictures.  As usual landing at LAX airport was like entering an airport in a third world nation.  The airport is old, dirty, and staffed with extremely unhelpful people.  After navigating through that madness of an airport I eventually found the gate to board my next flight.

On Walkabout In: Arizona’s Southeastern Desert

Published on May 3, 2009 in Southwest America. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

My wife and I woke up the next morning in our hotel in Wickenburg, Arizona after a long day of driving from Las Vegas via Hoover Dam.  Wickenburg was a nice little town not to far from Phoenix that was surrounded with nice Arizona desert scenery which of course included lots of saguaro cactus:

I have been all over the world, but the saguaro cactus continues to be one of the most unusual plant species I have ever seen.  I just love the Arizona desert views with these gigantic cactus:

These cactus only grow in the Sonoran desert that includes central and southern Arizona, a small part of California, and the Mexican state of Sonora.  Much like the Joshua Trees also found in Arizona and California the sagauros are also very slow growing.  For example the arms on these incredible cactus can take 75 years to grow.  The older saguaros are believed to be about 150 years old.  The saguaros grow to incredible sizes to include the tallest saguaro near Cave Creek, Arizona outside of Phoenix growing to a height of 45.3 feet.  That is just incredibly tall, but unfortunately this cactus collapsed in 2005 due to a fire started by lightning.

Anyway we left town and were now following Highway 60 towards Phoenix and just absolutely enjoyed the desert scenery:

We planned on taking Highway 60 to Phoenix and then continue on the highway past Phoenix to Globe, Arizona.  From Globe we would then turn on to Highway 70 to take us to New Mexico and out ultimate destination of El Paso, Texas:

Of course along the way to Phoenix we were entertained by the various shapes an sizes of the saguaro cactus:

We eventually got to Phoenix and I didn’t stop to take any pictures because I have been to Phoenix many times since I went to college in Arizona plus the fact we were driving through rush hour traffic.  However, Phoenix is a nice town, but in increasing year the drug related violence has been increasing which is unfortunate.  It has gotten so bad that Phoenix is now the nation’s kidnap and ransom capitol.

It is sad to see such crime overtaking a nice metropolitan city like Phoenix.  Anyway we continued through Phoenix on Highway 60 and once out of the city we were once again rewarded with some beautiful desert scenery:

It was still pretty early in the morning and the last colors of the sunrise I thought made a nice back drop for this lonely windmill out in the desert:

In this part of the desert there was actually very few saguaro cactus visible and instead many varieties of smaller cactus littered the desert floor:

Further down the road we came to the city of Gold Camp that lies at the base of the rugged mountains that Highway 60 would cross to take us to Globe, Arizona:

Passed this town Highway 60 then winds up the mountain side through an incredibly scenic red rock canyon:

On the canyon’s floor I was able to see the small creek that has cut out this canyon over the years:

Once on top of the mountains the highway passes through the relatively small town of Globe which has a population of about 7,000 people:

Globe is a old mining town whose economy continues to be depended on the mining industry which is evident by the number of strip mined hillsides in the area.  Globe is also home to many Native Americans since the town is adjacent to the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation.

At Globe we then turned on Highway 70 which took us straight through the Indian reservation.  The terrain along the highway is mostly all high desert shrub with many snow capped mountains in the distance:

It is not evident driving along Highway 70, but the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation is one of the poorest Indian reservations in the nation.  There is a casino on the reservation, but the remoteness of this area probably makes the profits from this casino quite limited.  Something of historical interest about this reservation is that the Apache chief Geronimo once called this land home.

For those interested PBS has an excellent series on Native Americans titled “We Shall Remain“, which shows that the Apache today actually do not have a high opinion of Geronimo which I was surprised about.  This is an absolutely excellent series that I plan on buying.

Anyway, looking at the terrain it was easy to imagine Geronimo and his men hiding out from the US Cavalry in these rugged mountains:

Eventually Highway 70 passes through the small town of Safford, which sits adjacent to the mountain with the largest vertical relief in all of Arizona:, the Pinaleno Mountains:

This mountain range rises over 7,000 feet above the floor of this desert valley and is really quite a site with its snow capped peak.  From Safford the highway continued on to New Mexico and to our ultimate destination of El Paso, Texas.

Next Posting: From New Mexico to El Paso

On Walkabout: Along Arizona’s Highway 93

Published on April 25, 2009 in Southwest America. 0 Comments Tags: .

Continuing on with my journey with my wife across the southwestern United States, we said our final goodbyes to our good friends from Australia and departed Hoover Dam.  From the dam we continued South on Highway 93 towards Kingman, Arizona.

We planned to drive the length of Highway 93 to Wickenburg, Arizona to spend the night there before continuing on the next day to our final destination of El Paso, Texas.

The mountains along the highway from the dam continued to be covered in snow with dark ominous clouds threatening to drop more snow at any minute from the east side of the road:

However, on the west side of the highway we had some stunning views of the Colorado River:

The river is really quite scenic in this area as it twists and turns through these rugged mountains that comprise the border between California, Nevada, and Arizona:

However, it didn’t take long for the northeastern Arizona desert to become scorched Earth again once the highway got away from the river:

However, even in the extremely dry areas of the desert there was always snow capped mountains that could be seen:

Even some snow capped plateaus:

As we got closer to Kingman, Arizona there was actually even more snow visible on the desert floor:

Some of the mountains along the highway were covered in a thick coating of snow:

Maybe the storm just hit here harder then other areas or possibly the elevation here near Kingman is a bit higher then further up the road near the dam?

Just outside of Kingman it looked like another storm was about to hit so I made no stop in Kingman and just kept driving south to hopefully avoid the snow storm:

Our plan was to keep taking Highway 93 south towards Phoenix and find a place to spend the night along the way.  For a short stretch we had to actually drive west on I-40 from Kingman to continue on Highway 93.  Here is what the weather looked like at the intersection of I-40 and Highway 93:

The clouds were getting thicker and more ominous, but fortunately as we continued to travel south down Highway 93 the weather improved and we were rewarded with some stunning high desert vistas along the way:

The scenery in what is known as the Big Sandy Valley was just stunning:

According to a marker along the road, this valley was first explored by the Spanish Conquistador Espejo in 1582.  The scenery down this valley just continued to get better and better the further we drove:

As to expected my wife and I found nothing of interest, in Nothing, Arizona if you can believe it:

Passed Nothing the highway became surrounded with Joshua Trees:

The Joshua Tree is actually an oversized cousin of the yucca plant that is also found all over the American Southwest.  These trees are slow growers by only growing an average of 3 inches a year.  With such short growth every year you would think the larger trees that stand up to 15 meters tall would be extremely old.  However, since Joshua Trees do not have tree rings in their trunks it is impossible for scientists to tell how old they really are.  It is expected that the bigger trees are up to a thousand years old.

They are some interesting trees to see and they cause this portion of Highway 93 to known as the Joshua Tree Highway:

The Joshua Tree Highway eventually took us to Wickenburg, Arizona which by the time we got there it was dark and we decided to go find a hotel.  It was a long day of driving, but if you are going to take a long road trip anywhere you can’t beat driving across scenic Arizona.

Next Posting: Arizona’s Southeastern Desert

On Walkabout On: Hoover Dam

Published on April 17, 2009 in Southwest America. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

After driving out of the winter wonderland that was Las Vegas, Nevada, my wife and I plus our two Aussie friends arrived at one of America’s industrial wonders, the Hoover Dam:

When driving down the switchbacks leading to the dam we pulled into a newly constructed parking garage located on the left side of the road:

From the parking garage we walked over to the visitor center and bought tickets to attend the next tour of the inside of the dam.  Before going on the tour we walked around the inside of the visitor center to learn more about the construction of the dam:

Incredibly Hoover Dam was constructed in only five years which was two years ahead of schedule.  The construction of this dam was completed in 1936 and at the time it was the world’s largest hydroelectric dam and the worlds largest concrete structure.  As impressive as the dam continues to be to this day, it is in fact only the world’s 35th largest dam now.


1921 image of the proposed Hoover Dam site.

Something I found of interest was that the main rationale for constructing the dam had nothing to do with generating electricity.  The reason for the dam’s construction had more to do with taming the Colorado River that had wreaked havoc with frequent floods further down stream along with providing a reliable source of water for southern California.  The electricity generation was just a side benefit.

Anyway eventually we met up to go on the guided tour.  The first thing they did was show our tour group of about 50 people a short 20 minute video about the construction of the dam that highlighted some of the interesting facts about the dam:

  • Construction period: April 20, 1931 – March 1, 1936
  • Construction cost: $49 million ($736 million adjusted for inflation from 1936 to 2008[26] )
  • Deaths attributed to construction: 112; 96 of them at the construction site[11][13][27]
  • Dam height: 726.4 ft (221.4 m), second highest dam in the United States. (Only the Oroville Dam is taller)
  • Dam length: 1244 ft (379.2 m)
  • Dam thickness: 660 ft (200 m) at its base; 45 ft (15 m) thick at its crest.
  • Concrete: 4.36 million yd³ (3.33 million m³)
  • Maximum electric power produced by the water turbines: 2.08 gigawatts[28]
  • Approximate power output: 4 billion KWh per year [29] (i.e. $200 million at $0.05 per kWh)
  • Traffic across the dam: 13,000 to 16,000 people each day, according to the Federal Highway Administration
  • Lake Mead (full pool)[30]
    • area: 157,900 acres (639 km²), backing up 110 miles (177 km) behind the dam.
    • volume: 28,537,000 acre feet (35.200 km³) at an elevation of 1,221.4 feet (372.3 m) .
  • With 8 to 10 million visitors each year, including visitors to Hoover Dam but not all traffic across the dam, the Lake Mead National Recreation Area is the fifth busiest National Park Service area.

After the video we then took an elevator down into the dam.  Once into the interior of the dam we began to walk through a maze of interior passages carved in the rock:

The first location our guide took us to see was the huge pipe that water is funneled through to turn the generators that create the electricity:

The water flows through the pipe and is funneled into a smaller and smaller pipe which increases the speed of the water to turn the turbines.  It was the turbines they took us to see next which are located in a huge building at the bottom of the dam:

This building is the length of two football fields and is nearly 20 stories high.  Two of these buildings are located on each side of the river with one housing nine generators and the other eight for a total of 17 generators.  However, when we visited Hoover Dam there was fact only 16 generators operating because one generator was taken out of commission for a service:

The guide told us that these generators are serviced about every 20 years which is pretty incredible when you think about it because of how much work these generators do during that time period.  Something I found of interest was that although the dam finished its construction in 1936, the power generation aspect of the dam was completed until 1961, a full 25 years after the completion of the dam.  This just goes to show that power generation was in fact not the main reason for the construction of the dam.

Besides the main generators that were operating, each of the large power generation buildings also have a smaller generator that is used solely to provide power for all the equipment in the building:

Anyway from there we concluded the tour and went back up to the surface of the dam.  From the balcony of the visitor’s center there is an incredible view of the dam:

The dam is so big that there is no way I could fit into one picture.  You need to get quite elevated to fit the dam into one picture, such as with this nice aerial image of the dam:

This picture provides a great perspective of how the dam is situated in the Black Canyon and how it blocks the mighty waters of the Colorado River to make Lake Mead.

Anyway from the visitor center we began to walk across the dam and could see some great views of the power generation buildings, one of which we had just conducted a tour of:

On the sides of the canyon you could see power lines snaking in all directions to take the electricity to all municipalities that receive power from this dam:

Here is a break down of what areas receive power from the dam:

  • Arizona – 18.9527 percent Nevada – 23.3706 percent
  • Metropolitan Water District of Southern California – 28.5393 percent
  • Burbank, CA – 0.5876 percent
  • Glendale, CA – 1.5874 percent
  • Pasadena, CA – 1.3629 percent
  • Los Angeles, CA – 15.4229 percent
  • Southern California Edison Co. – 5.5377 percent
  • Azusa, CA – 0.1104 percent
  • Anaheim, CA – 1.1487 percent
  • Banning, CA – 0.0442 percent
  • Colton, CA – 0.0884 percent
  • Riverside, CA – 0.8615 percent
  • Vernon, CA – 0.6185 percent
  • Boulder City, NV – 1.7672 percent

Our tour guide had told us that many visitors to the dam figure that much of the power goes to Las Vegas, however he said less then one percent of the dams power goes to Vegas.  Remember the dam was constructed in 1936 long before Las Vegas came to be.  The power from the dam had already been distributed mostly to southern California and Arizona.

While walking a top this great architechtural wonder, I could see yet another great architechtural wonder being constructed, a bridge across the Black Canyon:

Construction of the Hoover Dam Bypass bridge began in 2005 and will be complete in 2010.  This bridge will be about 2,000 feet long when it is completed.  This bridge should be quite a sight in conjunction with the dam.  What I find interesting though is that it is taking as much time to make this bridge as it did to construct the huge dam.

Anyway as I continued to walk across the dam I couldn’t help, but wonder how many people have committed suicide over the years by jumping off this huge dam:

Littered along the outside of the dam are few exhibits and memorials that visitors can see:

Here is the base of the flag pole at Hoover Dam:

However, these memorials and exhibits just cannot compare with the incredibly beautiful view of the Colorado River from the dam:

After finishing our walk around the dam, we all headed back to the parking garage to leave.  It was here that we would say goodbye to our friends as they prepared to head off to the Grand Canyon and ultimately Colorado for a ski trip.  My wife and I on the other hand were off to El Paso, Texas to the house we just bought there due to our recent move back to the US.  Much like with my many drives through the Australian bush, I always love driving across the American West with its dramatic scenery and open vistas.  I just hoped we didn’t get snowed on during the ride back to we could enjoy the scenery.

Next Posting: Arizona’s Highway 93