Bear zone at Bearizona

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Today saw a departure...from the horses and goats (cue tears and long faces from children) and a mountain of food (cue tears and long faces from parents) as we left Stagecoach Trails and headed to Sedona.

Quite a significant change of countryside, as stony, sandy desert gave way to more vegetation and hills. This also meant that we were greeted with an unexpected coating of snow - very pretty and atmospheric as we drove through Williams to Bearizona, home to bears (hence the name) and jaguars (as yet undiscovered by the resident biologist in the back seat, for the sake of sanity of all participants). Alas, the map rapidly divulged this not-so-hidden gem, and the drive-through area, containing wolves, bears, bison and many deer things with sticks, was virtually ignored in the desperation to reach the big cats.

Patience was enforced a while longer as we subjected her to the raptor show (flying perilously close to poor Mummy’s head) with the kestrel falcon, Harris hawk (so yesterday!) and a couple of owls. Raced our way through beavers, raccoons, hedgehog, bears, otters, even bobcats, before we reached the most magnificent prize - two jaguars!!! Both were napping in the sun, and interestingly, despite looking completely different, are brothers of the same litter. Lucky we spent so much time in the gift shop afterwards that we were able to pick up this little tidbit.

On the road again towards Sedona, through very hilly, tortuous and beautiful countryside with a surprising amount of snow...which ran out just before we arrived, but not so soon before it could highlight the amazing contours of the red rocks on our approach.

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