Desert. What Desert?

We spend our winters in a desert--the Valley of the Sun, otherwise known as the Phoenix, Arizona, valley.  During the monsoon or rainy period during the summer, this area received 4.2 inches of rain--the third most monsoon rain in the past three decades.

The rain isn't done coming, however.  Friday, Christmas Eve, it rained all day in our resort in the east part of the Phoenix area.  Here are some pictures of what happened.

This is a catchment basin.  Since it rains so seldom, the rain isn't absorbed very easily.  These areas are built in to help keep the water.

Any ditch or wash quickly fills with a racing stream when it rains.  When we drive around in Arizona we often see signs reading "don't enter if filled with water.  It makes me wonder "why" until we experience a rainstorm like this.  

Normally, it is possible to cross this wash on a paved path.  Not Friday.

Here we see small lakes in a low-lying area.

Today, almost all of the puddles have dried up and the larger rainfall lakes are rapidly shrinking.  

We lived in Wisconsin for three years in the mid-1980s.  One year "only" 8 inches of rain had fallen by mid-summer.  That was what they call a drought.  Homeowners were out shopping for hoses and sprinklers so they could water their lawns and keep the grass alive.

The United States we live in covers so many environments, from deserts to rain forests.  Growing up in Colorado, lawns always have to be watered during warm weather months.  And that is the only way that green grass can be maintained here in the Phoenix area.  In Wisconsin, if it rains excessively, a windstorm could blow over trees with only very shallow root systems.  In the drier areas, roots go very deep to find moisture.

We have been so blessed to be able to travel throughout our wonderful country and learn about areas so different from what we grew up in.