After the wine tasting it is time for our nature and history outing into the Las Cienegas NCA. Specifically we want to see Empire Ranch, an old major ranch. We have visited it before but our relative didn’t so it is a good place to spend the evening and enjoy the beautiful Arizona landscapes.
We start with the history part, you can visit the huge ranch house and we did it before and we want to do it before it might close for the evening.
The exciting part is that you can walk from room to room without anyone guarding the exhibits, it is quite surprising to our visitors and when we think about it it might be unusual. I guess we got used to it in time as it doesn’t feel that unusual to us until pointed out.
You can walk from room to room, each of them nicely mapped and explained, and you can understand how the huge ranch house was split between the main family and their rooms and other people living in the complex.
It is also interesting how many old items have been preserved here, as far as we understand there was no time when the house was abandoned which makes for a better preservation of day to day items and of the buildings in general.
There is a large cooler room and even a freezer room in another larger room which makes a lot of sense on an active ranch where they need to store a lot of meat. The stables now are empty but they are sturdily built and we can imagine that they might still be holding dances here in the evening from time to time…
After visiting the main ranch house we decide to explore the short Heritage Discovery Trail. We want to look for birds but also to enjoy the winter landscapes with the bare cottonwoods being quite scenic.
There are even some fall leaves on a few cottonwoods for some beautiful yellow colors that we admire for a while before moving on. There are no special birds on this stretch, just a few woodpeckers and a lot of Audubon’s warblers.
Before leaving the headquarters area we walk to the nearby corral to find a couple caches and to explore the seemingly abandoned corral area.
Next we go south towards the other exit that we weren’t able to visit last time as the road was flooded. Today we can make it but there are no prairie dogs out in their protected area, unfortunately, when we pass by. Likely it is too cold and they are hibernating.
We stop at a small pond along the way to find another cache and to just enjoy the beautiful sunset and colors, typical of the Arizona evenings.
Afterwards we drive to Patagonia about 30 minutes away and check in into our AirBnB. It is a great one except the fact that the floor of the second floor is quite thin which makes every movement on either floor being clearly heard on the other…not ideal.
Another interesting quirk is that there is no door on the second floor for that room. The door is before the stairs on the first floor, quite unusual.
Next we walk (!) to a nearby restaurant. It is quite cold outside so we are happy when we reach it and when we find out it is open. Most stores and other restaurants are closed and even our restaurant is supposed to close in about half hour.
We are the only people in the restaurant and are not sure if the food will be hurried out but it is quite good and filled and happy we return to our accomodation to retire for the night. On the way we use our flashlights carefully as everyone is saying that the streets are full of javelinas, fortunately or unfortunately we do not encounter any on our nightly walks.
