May 29, 2011 Tombstone, AZ.

On the way we stopped on a hillside to see Our Lady of the Sierras Shrine.  It is in the Huachuca Mountains, so don't know why it is called that.  A lady kept seeing visions of these things on a hillside and eventually she and her husband had them constructed.  They had seen a similar scene in Yugoslavia.  Some neighbors opposed its making and it took 4 years to get permission to build.  The view from up there was fantastic - looking out over southern AZ. and into Mexico.

The Virgin Mary stands 31' high and weighs 25 tons.  The frame is welded steel with the exterior being concrete.  The crtoss sits at an elevation of 5,300', is 75' high and weighs 30 tons.  It has the appearance of being  carved from a huge tree, but is a steel frame with a concrete and fiberglass exterior.  There are small grottos nearby.  A stone chapel, constructed out of the river rock which was mined out of Ash Canyon and is one of the largest stone structures in southern Arizona, sits at the base of this hill

Angel of Revelation

There are also stations of the cross scattered around the area, each with a wooden cross.

From one extreme to the other:

We drove from there to Tombstone and lunch in Big Nosed Kate's saloon - she was the girlfriend of Doc Holliday in the Old West.  It was Wyatt Earp Days and the town was packed.  There was even a SMALL gunshow that Tom walked through very quickly.  There are several photo ops in the saloon and a humorous entertainer plays a keyboard and sax and sings and taunts the audience.

                                           Jocelyn, our nephew's girlfriend was chosen to pose.

                                                          Our nephew, Jay, got laid out

                                                Tom's brother's girlfriend, Sherrie, got caught

       The town is full of people in period costumes who re-enact the shootout at the OK Corral and walk around like proper ladies, sheriff, saloon girls, cowboys and Mexicans.  Warm - it was in the high 90's today.