Bad Trip in Tucson

Saturday we were headed for an overnight in Tucson, Arizona. We thought we might stay at a park west of town that has been recommended to us by several people. But there was a state park closer to our route that also gets rave reviews. At the last minute we decided to go to Catalina State Park, http://www.azstateparks.com/parks/cata/index.html.

But, I hadn’t done any route planning to that location so I quick called it up on Google Maps on Dave’s iPhone and ask for a route to the park.  It said we should take exit 255 from I-10 and follow state route 77 to the park. Which we did. More or less.

As we were driving north on a multi-lane, divided, suburban street a car ahead of us suddenly took a sharp left across a couple of lanes to get in the left turn lane. We manage to stop without hitting that car. He apparently was responding to a truck carry one of those electronic warning signs. The sign said, “Ina Road closed.” We would be crossing Ina but not turning onto it so we continued north.

And came to a road block. Not only was Ina closed but so was Oracle, the road we were on. We had to make a u-turn, which required the guys directing traffic to move some trafic cones for us but, at least, the street was wide enough for us to make the turn without having to unhitch our car from behind our motorhome. So, we drove back south to another major cross street, took that west to the next major cross street, and turned north again. Onto a street that was being rebuilt.

The right half of the street had no pavement so all the traffic was sharing the left half of the street. With lots of stop lights that were not timed to deal with the unusual amount of traffic being rerouted down it.

So we crept along for a couple of miles then finally turned right to get back to the street we wanted. As we were turning left on Oracle again, those directing traffic were starting to remove the cones which would have let us go straight through.

But, I am now VERY glad we did not come straight down that street earlier in the day. For where we were forced to make our u-turn was where a man went on a shooting spree yesterday. http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2011/0108/Arizona-shooting-Rep.-Gabrielle-Giffords-hit-at-meeting-with-constituents

Those people who were just making their normal Saturday morning visit to Safeway were the ones who had a really bad trip. We got off easy.

TTYL,

Linda