We have been having pipe freezing weather.  In Benson, my daughter did not have water at her apartment yesterday morning because it got down to 20 degrees Saturday night.  The high for the day was only about 47 degrees but it was sunny and bright.  We left our water running all night for the last couple of nights.  It is about the only way to make sure we have running water when it gets this cold.  We cover all the exposed pipes that we can and then leave the water running.  We learned the hard way a couple of years ago when it got down to 18 degrees and our pipes did freeze and break!  Expensive to fix, not to mention the inconvenience of not having running water.  We are so spoiled and hope to keep it that way as much as possible.

Steve and I took a little road trip with some good friends to Slaughter Ranch near Douglas, AZ. yesterday.  John Slaughter was a rancher and Sheriff who established his ranch in the late 1800's.
The ranch house was a beautifully restored building that had been brought back to it's original design as much as possible.  The ranch is right on the Arizona side of the Mexican-American border.  I took pictures looking across to Mexico and we could see the border fence quite easily.  The grounds were also beautiful and quite remote.  There were several ponds, large trees and an assortment of wildlife and livestock.   

Upon first entering the property, we came across several large longhorn cattle, a couple of donkeys and a horse.  The cattle were amazing!  I have never seen such spectacular horns on such huge beasts before.  We could walk up right next to them and were separated only by a barbed-wire fence.  Frankly I was a little nervous because, if that cow wanted to charge at us, that fence probably would not have even slowed him down.  The men stayed in the car while us silly women walked up to the beasts and took lots of pictures. 

We toured the ranch house and read all about the history of the property, it's founder, John Slaughter, and how it got started.  There was also lots of info on the Army outpost that used a part of the ranch right on the border.  There were written accounts of the soldiers watching Poncho Villa raid the settlements nearby.  I loved the ranch house and the furnishings, the hardwood floors and the floor to ceiling windows.  It was very large and open.  There were several outbuildings, such as an ice house, a garage that housed a 1915 Model T, a granary and a cook's house.  I especially enjoyed a newspaper article written about John Slaughter.  It claimed that whether or not you liked Mr. Slaughter, he was a real man.  He reportedly killed 12 bad guys in his 10 years as a sheriff.  

There were also several large saddle horses on the property along with a herd of sheep and a pen full of chickens.  We fed the saddle horses a few pieces of apple that we had with us.  It was nice to have the property virtually to ourselves most of our visit.  The caretakers greeted us and gave us some literature about the property when we arrived but other than that we were there by ourselves.   We could see for miles and miles in all directions.  We tried to find "our" mountain far off in the distance, about 75 miles to the northwest to be precise.  Overall, a most enjoyable day.