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Galleria Palms

This is where I live in Phoenix. Galleria Palms is a series of apartment blocks, consisting of more than 500 apartments. It is situated in southwest Tempe, about 5 minutes drive from where I work.

Payson

Payson is a small town 1 hour northeast of Phoenix. I went there for their annual rodeo, which apparent is world's longest running rodeo. The photos are taken when I was hiking in Tonto Natural Bridge State Park, which is 10 minutes drive from Payson.

Sedona

Sedona is about 2 hours drive north of Phoenix. It is famous for its unique red rock formations as you will see from my photos. I went there on a labor day weekend, it was absolutely packed with people, and all hiking trails at oak creek were full. I ended up hiking at Bell Rock trail, and took some pictures from the top of Bell Rock.

Grand Canyon

Grand Canyon is one of the wonders of the natural world. The south rim of the canyon is about 4.5 hours drive north of Phoenix. It was raining periodically the weekend that I went there. On Saturday, I went to all the viewing spots on the south rim to see the canyon in all its glory. On Sunday, I hiked down the canyon through South Kaibab trail, crossed over and came back up through Bright Angel trail. The whole hike took 7.5 hours over 23 km. The last 2.5 hours was hiked in heavy rain, which wasn't very pleasant as I didn't have a rain coat.

Tucson

Tucson is about 2 hours drive south of Phoenix. Its two main tourist attractions are an air museum and a desert museum. The air museum has a huge array of military aircrafts on display, including the enormous B52 flying fortress. The desert museum is equivalent of a small scale zoo specializing in desert animals and cacti. The animals available includes coyotes, road runners, mountain lions and black bears.

Madera

Madera Canyon is a mountain area in the Coronado National Forest. The forest covered mountain scenery is a pleasant change from the typical desert areas of Arizona. The area is also a known bear country. However, through my 15 mile round trip hike to the top of Mt Wrightson, the closest thing to a bear is their excrete.

Las Vegas

Las Vegas is the city of glitz and glamour. It was a 5.5 hour trip from Phoenix. I stayed in the Stratosphere hotel/casino for the weekend. Over the weekend, I visited all the major casinos on the strip, rode on New York New York roller coaster, and went up to the top of Stratosphere tower. Las Vegas truly comes alive at night, it's a pity that none of the night pictures came out well from my camera.

Hoover Dam

I visited Hoover Dam on my way back from Las Vegas. The discovery tour took me through the history of the dam, as well as the tour of the dam's power plants. From the top of the dam wall looking down, the dam looks spectacular with its amazing height.

Camelback Mountain Revisited

Camelback Mountain is one of the Phoenix's most prominent landmarks. The peak elevation is about 1600 feet above downtown Phoenix. There are two main hiking trails up the mountain, both of which are partial hiking and partial mountain climbing. Last time I went up the mountain through Echo Canyon Trail, so this time I took the Cholla Trail.

Oak Creek Canyon

Oak Creek Canyon is one of the most beautiful place in Arizona. a scenic forest area right next to Sedona. The hiking trail I took crossed the Oak Creek multiple times. The whole area is simply spectacular with its combination of water, red rocks, and autumn colors of maple trees.

Mt Lemmon

Mt. Lemmon is 25 miles and 6000 feet above Tucson. The beauty of Mt. Lemmon is in its change of ecological strata as we drove up the mountain. At the bottom of the mountain lies the Arizona desert and saguaro cactus. The pine and aspen groves dominate the top. There are also numerous fascinating rock formations along the way.

San Diego

San Diego is well known for its Zoo and Sea World, needless to say, that's where I visited when I arrived in San Diego. The star attraction for Sea World is Shamu the killer whale. It performed all sorts of neat tricks ranging from various jumps to splashing the audience with water from the pool. The star of San Diego Zoo is its young panda Hua Mei. I was lucky enough to snap a few shots of it coming out to dine on a serving of fresh bamboos.