30 Years of Yuma

Three Amigos

Day 1 (3/31-4/5/14)

For almost 30 years we have been taking trips to Yuma, Arizona about every five years. It started when my college friend Steve took a teaching job down there in the mid eighties. I will never forget his first impressions of Yuma which were something like, “as I stood on the old bridge across the Colorado River, bused there on a school bus without air conditioning, and looked out over the barren wasteland I asked myself what I had ever done to deserve ending up here.” Thirty years and a career later Steve is finally packing it up and moving back north. He invited us down for one last visit before he sells his condo and moves north. Most people move to Yuma when they retire so there is a bit of irony in his retiring to Wisconsin. In those thirty years there has been a lot of change in Yuma but also much has remained the same. We have watched as the downtown (old town) area was revitalized and then died again. When we first went to Lute’s Casino it was a rundown seedy dive that sold great hamburgers. Today it is still a rundown seedy dive that sells great hamburgers. I almost wondered if the same crowd wasn't there from our very first visit. Another favorite establishment is the garden café, a mostly outdoor café surrounded by an aviary which gives it an ambiance that you are not going to find in the north. Now days there seems to be more sparrows and doves then the parrots of the early days but the food is still good and service friendly. We were glad we had made reservations for a Tuesday lunch which bodes well for its future. Perhaps the most positive change that has occurred has been the changes in the Colorado River. The first time that we stood on the bridge overlooking what was left of the Colorado it was a dirty little river that was filled with shopping carts and other debris. The floodplain was riddled with pathways leading off to areas staked out by vagrants. In the last thirty years the entire flood plain in and around Yuma has been rejuvenated and in areas made into parks for public recreation. While we were visiting this last time they were in the process of purging the river estuaries with pulses of high volume water to reestablish the natural habitats that once existed. I am not sure what happened to all the vagrants but only one exists, that we saw, and he has a more or less permanent residence and has even been the subject of articles in the local newspaper. The first time we visited the Yuma Territorial Prison it was little more than a derelict foundation. On this last visit it has been totally restored and is a museum. As you look up across the Colorado River the old bridge and Indian Mission Church are still there although many of the trees are gone. I have been intrigued with the desert since reading Edward Abby’s Desert Solitaire in the early 80s. That being said I have never had to live there in the summer. Who knows if we will ever get back there but I will always have fond memories of the time I have spent there.

Lute's Casino back entrance

Lute's Casino

Yuma Territorial Prison

Six to a Cell

Indian Mission 30 years ago

Indian Mission today

Grotto 30 years ago

Grotto Today

Colorado River 30 years ago

Colorado Today

Eileen 30 years ago

Eileen today

Some things never change 30 years of Hummingbirds

Hummingbirds today

Me thirty years ago