Yesterday, Monday, was spent here at the campground. First item of the day was getting moved to a new site as the owners to the site we were on were coming into the park. We moved from site 70 to site 73(- and the owners on 70 are still not in the campground on Tuesday). Oh well we are moved to a site that is just as accommodating. Then a load of wash was done, a walk about the park, and a ride into town to a quilt shop and Walmart. The campground had a pork roast dinner that we went to and it was really good- large serving of pork tenderloin, mashed potatoes with gravy, vegetable medley, roll and butter and ice cream with cake for dessert- not bad for $7.50 per person.
This morning, Tuesday, we drove north about 50 miles to an open-pit copper mine, Ascarco Mission Mine. We got there about 10:30am and were able to get on a tour at 11am. The tour guide explain a few things and then we got on a bus that took us to the mining area.
At the edge of the open pit we got off the bus, watched the acivity in the mining area and took pictures.
Back on the bus we rode to the mill and again got off the bus and then went into a viewing area to the mill. Extracting copper from the rocks is quite a process as,I think I have this right, out of a ton of rock about 40 pounds of copper is obtained. Other minerals are also obtained in the process, silver being one that over a million dollars of silver is mined per month which pays for the company's electric bill.
Leaving the mine Tom and I drove to a nearby town, Sahuarita, and had lunch at El Charro restaurant. A good choice as it had nice atmosphere and good food. After lunch we drove into Tucson to get some goodies from Trader Joe's. Returning to Benson and our "home" we chilled out for an hour and then we went to the Methodist church for a spaghetti dinner which was yummy. Tonight, Tom has gone to the clubhouse to play Texas Hold 'em. Last week he came in second and is hoping to do as well or better tonight- we'll see.
