I want some coffee!

 ... is the itch you can't scratch. Our friends from Key West, collectively "conchscooter", are newly retired and free to roam as the mood strikes. They left the Benson area on the eve of the new year. They crossed the border at Naco, AZ/Naco, MEX and headed straight to the parking lot of a Sonoran winery for the night (!). Then they were off to the north end of the Sea of Cortez. But that area of the gulf of Baja is seriously cold so there was no chance for a swim in warm water. That forced a migration south till they finally found coastal water where they could swim without calling it a Polar Bear Party! So here they are in the south-of-the-border-Margaritaville enjoying the comfort of warm 90°F days and who knows how warm Pacific ocean water... about 1200 miles south of the border. Benson, AZ to Tenacatita, Jalisco, Mexico- 1,226 miles according to Google Yeah... a margarita. Jimmy Buffett would approve! The margarita & food were delivered to them on the beach- som...

 ... and I like it. I just roasted 7 lbs. of Organic Chiapas greens for us and a few others. No one is much interested in anything else and neither are we! I have to admit this has been the most consistent variety of greens I've found in nearly 20 years of roasting. So far Coffee Bean Corral has been able to maintain a stock of them but I live in fear of having them go away. I *can't* be the only one that is hooked on this variety! I was curious what the facility looked like so I poked around with Google Maps and managed to find a street level image- Not at all what I expected. I figured it would be a building about like what they have here but stuck in some industrial area. I think I could enjoy the drive to work each day in a place like this! Good on you Coffee Bean Corral !

... in Bisbee. Well... in the Lowell district. Lowell was once a separate town next to Bisbee but as the mines closed there was consolidation in order to survive. Bisbee was once a major mining center for all sorts of things but is best known today as the site of the Lavender open pit mine. The huge site is still just as it was when abandoned decades ago. The Lavender pit mine The pit was mined till it's closure in 1975. It is 900 ft deep from the parking lot elevation to the lowest point. During its day they extracted 76,000,000 tons of ore from the pit. Not of much use to anyone today, the pit is now just a hole in the ground. When I knew that the adventurers and recent custom-built van owners Michael & Layne were arriving I wanted to be sure they saw something more interesting than the re-enactment of the gun fight at the OK Corral in Tombstone. Lots of choices here in AZ (first stop was Mi Casa in Benson for lunch!) but they had just been toured around Tucson by Layne's...