In my opinion, the deserts of the Southwestern United States are wonderful and beautiful places, also they are vicious and hazardous places. I've lived in the Mojave Desert in Southern California and in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona.
The Mojave (Mo-HAH-vee) is mostly high-desert (3000 feet elevation, plus or minus) and consequently it tends to have cool evenings, even after blistering-hot days. For me it has a distinctive smell, particularly early in the morning. Once you experience it, you will never forget it. It's sort of tangy and sage-like and I think it comes from the creosote plants. I love the smell of the Mojave in the morning. Every once in a while the climate will hit a sweet spot and an entire hillside will cover itself in a carpet of desert flowers for a few days, yellow, blue, shades of purple, usually just one color at a time. The seeds may have been lying dormant for years, waiting for that magic combination of moisture and temperature to germinate, and then - voila - it's party-time.
The Mojave also is home to these little fellers:
The Mojave-Green Rattlesnake has a particularly potent venom, and as I understand it, their venom has a neurotoxin
and a hemotoxin. But what makes them especially dangerous is their aggressiveness. An Air Force Survival Instructor told me that the Mojave Green displays unusual behavior for a snake - it's territorial. So the hapless desert wanderer (or unfortunate downed pilot, crawling away from the wreckage) who happens to violate the Green's territory - will be attacked.
I like a critter with gumption.
The Sonoran Desert by contrast is mostly low desert. I remember days in Tucson where it'd hit 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the afternoon and by midnight it'd only cooled down to a 100 or so. But as they say - "it's a dry heat." Even on the hottest days there, I never got sweaty. I sweated, but I was never sweaty; it evaporated too quickly. To me it felt prickly all over. Every pore of my body would perspire, but then would immediately evaporate, and a thousand tiny beads of sweat became a thousand tiny evaporative coolers and felt like a thousand little pin-pricks.
At any rate, a good book about the Desert Southwest is:
Desert Solitaire by Ed Abbey. I'd go so far as to say it's a great book, one of El Sancho's favorites.
Originally Posted by Sancho
In my opinion, the deserts of the Southwestern United States are wonderful and beautiful places, also they are vicious and hazardous places. I've lived in the Mojave Desert in Southern California and in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona.
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