Up, Up Away to Mt Lemmon

After our tour of Sabino Canyon, we had lunch at a nearby restaurant and then headed up to Mt Lemmon. Here we are following Herbie.

Because the road starts in the Lower Sonoran vegetative life zone and climbs to the high forests of the Canadian zone, it offers the biological equivalent of driving from the deserts of Mexico to the forests of Canada in a short stretch of 27 miles.

This charts shows how the scenery changes from desert to semi-desert grassland to Oak woodland to Ponderosa Pine to Mixed Conifer to the very top of the mountain. The scenery changes every time you round a corner.

The rock formations are amazing.

The road below us looks like a ribbon.

Now we are into the pines.

We didn't go all the way to the top as the altitude is nearly 10,000 feet and we were running out of time but it is definitely a drive worth taking. The views are amazing.