Tumacacori

19 May 2024 – Trip Day 49

We drove down to visit the Tumacacori site in southern Arizona. Tumacacori is one of the mission sites preserved from the Spanish expansion and colonization attempts of what is now the American Southwest.

The site is right up on the road and is fairly well preserved.

Unloading at the parking lot.  

The parking lot brings you right up to the museum / gift shop / ranger station / visitor center. The shop was pretty small, but it did have a nice museum attached to the gift shop.

 Garrett enjoys an apple snack on the benches outside the visitor center.

 Ducky was very excited about the diorama display where he could turn on the lights. The display recreated the church as it was in the early 1820s.

 While Garrett and I explored the museum, Randal explored the visitor center.

 We took a quick walk through the garden.

After working on their books for a bit, we took the kids into the museum to do the practical portion of their Junior Ranger activities. The church structure is visible in the backgound.  

 Out on the mission grounds, we began to take the self guided tour. At the various points around the mission, they had some symbols that indicated what or where things were at.

The view of the inside of the church, from the entrance.  The mission was intentionally abandoned, and the icons and other carvings were removed by the people at the time.

 Looking out from inside the church. The Park service had done some restoration of the structure.

 The big three kids next to the mill stones of the mission.

 We walked around the grounds and stopped by the ramada, where the natives would hang out outside their houses and cook to escape the heat. It was quite warm this day, and we took a little rest in the shade, then made our way back to the Visitor Center.

 We walked by the ruins of an earlier Jesuit church. The foundations were preserved by the park service with a coating of plaster.

 Back at the visitor center, the kids finished up their books.

The Ranger checked their work while we looked on.  

 Randal contemplated his choices of chaos at the bookshelf.

 All books checked, the kids did their Junior Ranger oath and were sword in and got their badges.

 Garrett even had a Junior Ranger program for his age group, and he got his first Junior Ranger badge as well!!

This was a nice site to visit. There was a longer walk to the river that had previously supplied the fields and orchards, but we elected to not do it due to the heat and the kids were wilting by that time.

Access to the park was easy – just off Interstate 19 about an hour south of Tucson. This site is perfect for a half day visit.