Sonoran Desert Snow Day

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Enjoying an unlikely visit from Jack Frost here in Southern Arizona.

Sorry for the lack of posts lately—I’m only a few weeks into the new blog and I’m already slacking! It’s really a combination of things. For one, I started taking some business classes at the local community college, and it’s keeping me surprisingly busy (enjoying it though). And then just add in the fact that I’m still stuck at home with nowhere to go and not much interesting stuff to write about. Luckily mother nature threw us a bone this week, and all of the photographers in Tucson that are stuck between Milky Way season and storm chase season had a reason to dust off their cameras and hit the trails… SNOW!

I’m sure, if you’re not from here (or really, even if you are) you’re thinking, “wait a minute, it doesn’t snow in Arizona!” And really you’d be right. We usually get a dusting here in Tucson once every 2-3 years or so that lasts until about lunch time before the rain washes it away into an icy slush. Three things are certain when we get snow in Tucson: 1. people cannot drive, 2. you find snowmen everywhere, and 3. I take the day off work to go get some coveted snow-in-the-desert photos. (If the me from 10 years ago, living in Minnesota, could see how excited I get about the snow, she’d think I’d lost my mind.)

The day started bright and early. When the snow is expected to be gone by noon, there’s no time to waste, so this night owl was up at about 5:30 to get out to Saguaro National Park (SNP) by sunrise (with time to pick up some much-needed coffee). I walked outside and there was already a dusting that had accumulated on my car, even though there wasn’t much on the ground. And by the time I was on the road and headed to Dutch Bros to pick up a caffeinated beverage there were already big, fat snowflakes falling and starting to stick to the cacti and shrubs. I met up with another local photographer and we headed out into Vail, a suburb of Tucson on the southeast side that sits about 800 feet higher in elevation (which makes all the difference when snow is in the forecast).

My first stop was a trailhead on the southern edge of SNP East just as the sun was starting to light up the landscape. I think every Tucson photographer had the same goal in mind: saguaros. We walked down the trail a bit but unfortunately the flakes had stopped falling and, apart from a little bit stuck to prickly pear cacti here and there, there wasn’t any snow to be found. After a disappointing couple of years weather-wise, it’s hard not to say, “oh, I guess that was it,” and head home defeated. But I try to be an optimist, and with the day off of work there wasn’t much to lose other than gas money, so we got back on the road and headed farther east where the elevation really starts to slope upward. That ended up being the right move—the landscape out there was covered in a light layer of bright white snow. The clouds were just starting to part, making way for blue skies and beautiful morning golden hour lighting. I was in total awe.

We hung around for a while taking in the views, snapping lots of pictures, and watching the clouds start to come back in. It was time to wait and see what the storm would do, but I had a feeling the party wasn’t over yet. Sure enough, the wind started to whip up, the mountains in the distance became completely obscured by the haze, and the sky opened up and started dumping snow harder than I’ve ever seen here in Tucson (disclaimer: I’ve only seen it snow one other time back in 2019, but still). Time to go! We jumped in the car and raced back out to the National Park for sweeping views of snow-covered saguaros.

Being extremely fortunate to have a National Park about 20 minutes from my house, I’ve driven the loop through SNP more times than I can count. But it’s never been as beautiful as it is in the snow; neither photos nor words can really do it justice. Unfortunately, the moment was fleeting. When we entered the park and started down the 8 mile scenic loop road the snow was still piling up all over the unsuspecting desert foliage. A couple miles later the snow had stopped falling and the sun made another appearance in the sky, which was getting increasingly bluer. Another couple miles and we could hear the dripping of snow melting off of cacti and bushes. And by the time we drove out through the exit gate it was already mostly gone.

Hoping for an encore, I headed up into the mountains a bit to get to a higher altitude (and also meet up with another photographer friend who assured me that there was still plenty of snow to see up there). We had a chance to capture a few more shots of the snow-covered mountain ridge lines, but by this point it was after noon and our snow day was rapidly coming to an end.

What fun would it be if that were the end of the story? After a quick check of the forecast and condition of the roads, there was really only one move to keep chasing this winter storm… so the three of us jumped on the highway and made a beeline for the land of the gorgeous red rocks: Sedona! But that’s a story for next time. 🙂