Bye-bye crazy wild Southwest!

My heart is bleeding and my head is protesting, but everything´s got an end: I had the honor to explore the Southwest and especially the Sonoran desert from the bottom - with all its wild creatures (humans included...). I´ll miss hiking with the Ramblers and the Hiking Meetup Group, dancing in the monsoon rain with Hilary on top of our roof, hunting rattlesnakes in Sabino Canyon with Christopher, sliding down the water slide near Hutch´s pool with the Mermaid, hissing louder than Simba, watching the 129,5th gunfight with Martin, observing barbies with Erynn, Mike and Andrew, collecting deads of the week, stalking hummingbirds in the Botanical Gardens and driving Dr. Jost crazy with my cloning issues. I´ll miss Tucson!!!! Hope you all come and visit me in Berlin or wherever I´ll decide to live!!!!

Petrified Forest National Park II

Petrified Forest National Park

Painted Desert and Pictographs

Aha! Da sehn´wir´s mal wieder: der Storch bringt die Kinder nicht, er FRISST sie!

Canyon de Chelly III

Chaos is haunting us - after we came back from our little hike, two Navajo woman (not entirely sober) were hitchhiking and, of course - I stopped to take them with us (yes, Katja was a bit overwhelmed). We drove them practically everywhere, then we lost our own way and ended up about 100miles away from the junction that we should have taken... . Shortly afterwards, we didn´t even remember the day, nor the date and er - well - completely messed up and forgot that we had to be in Tucson to pick up Tina at the airport. CHAOOOOOS!!!!

Canyon de Chelly II

Canyon de Chelly lies in the painted desert in Arizona. Most parts of the canyon are located on private land that belongs to Navajo or Hopi Indians - this is why there´s just one public trail that leads down to the bottom of Canyon de Chelly. If you plan to hike another trail, you have to hire a local guide.

Canyon de Chelly

our spontaneous buddhistification

Hey Mister Morgan, are you proud of us now???! We found this book in a motel room (yeah, it´s still too cold for the tent) somewhere near Canyon de Chelly.

no, we didn´t get sponsored by Nissan...

Hey Pilzi, die sind nur für Dich!

Guck, es gibt doch halbwegs anständige Rindviecher im Land der begrenzten Unmöglich-keiten, habs Dir doch verspro-chen, Hulilein!

on the road again - through Hopi land

Tried to save at least the surviving puppy, but couldn´t catch it. But at least it shouldn´t be hungry anymore - we fed half a bread and tons of honey-turkey-cold-cuts to it and gave it some water, too..

food I wont eat in three billion years - the sequel

I know, I know. Julia the old-school-cheese-adorer would kill anybody who would try to sell her this pus-like slime as cheese. But since she´s not here, there will be no bloody incident. But maybe a digestive one? Or are some-people-out-there-in-this-nation already immune against this crap???! And does insurance pay for the treatment of post-easy-cheese-trauma?

autographs will be given later...

happily freezing our butts off

Oh my goood, I can see my breath! And I´m still shocked by the fact that we - I mean WEEEE late risers managed to wake up at 6am. And just to crowd at the cold, dark Grand Canyon rim and wait for the sun who really took its time to rise up! Then Katja had to put up with a couple of asian youngsters with no manners who always placed their big heads precisely between Katja´s camera and the best view. ALWAYS! How impertinent! Meanwhile, I decided in favor of hibernation. Good night, cold world, I´m gonna crawl back in my cave!

sunrise at the South Rim

spoiled tourists

Our excuse: It´s damn cold outside!!!! Our tent would freeze, our noses would fall off and the world would loose its biggest fans! To cut a long story short: we stayed at a motel in Tusayan, just a couple of miles away from the south rim of the Grand Canyon, that was already resting in darkness and recovering from the daily tourist-incursion by the time we arrived.

We got addicted to asian buffets! Seriously!

I need to confess: we have a weakness for Asian buffets. A huge one! Fortunately, they´re everywhere - even in Flagstaff! After discovering that the mongolian buffet-restaurant-thingy we originally tried to invade was closed, Katja and I were luckily saved from starvation by this Asian place. This time, we didn´t get a CD from some door-seller-guy who has once played at the Jazz-Festival in Berlin, but we got so much food - with and without legs, eyes and shells - that my guts spasmodically wrapped themselves around 2 pounds of sushi, soup, rice, shrimps, spring rolls, fish and many more...

Don´t let the sun go down on me...

no lyrics, just beauty!

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom

Joshua Tree of Liberty

Tried to imitate the statue of liberty but obviously need to practice a bit more...
Katja and I went on a long hike through the National Park; always on the search for snakes, but unfortunately, little sidewinder didn´t show up - we would have built up a snake-memorial just for you, you know that!!! Why couldn´t you just show a tiny bit of your rattle to us???! What an iniquity!!!!