Natalie Burt, a former news reporter at the Review-Journal for 11 years, spends as much of her free time as possible enjoying Southern Nevada’s outdoors. She’s now a teacher and has lived in Henderson for 17 years.
For much of March, a light blanket of what looked like green felt covered hills and rocky fields along Lakeshore Road, where bright yellow brittlebush thrives. Very recently, Lakeshore’s abundant beavertail cactuses started their fuchsia bloom, and they should continue to dazzle for the next couple of weeks.
Over the next two months, this spring’s Nevada Naturalist program participants — that could include you — can expect to get smarter about all things Mojave Desert. The nature education program for adults, offered through the University of Nevada Cooperative Extension, begins March 25 and runs through May 25.
Each winter, once the holiday bustle is in the rearview mirror, I cherish the opportunity to pull on my warm boots and go hiking in the quiet and crisp cold of the snowy mountains near my Henderson home.
The tires of my loyal, fully human-powered bicycle had helped me log 13 of the 34 miles that make up Southern Nevada’s River Mountains Loop Trail. Sadly, that had only amounted to flirting with this paved path of challenging hills and epic views of the Las Vegas Valley, Lake Mead and Boulder City. Biking the entire loop would remain the stuff of my Mojave Desert dreams, unless I began a rigorous daily training routine. That’s when the epiphany of e-biking struck.
Food tastes better outdoors, and plenty of empty picnic tables are just waiting for you and your PBJ sandwich or homemade Dutch oven dinner or curbside pickup pasta and chicken feast.
Some art is best viewed by plopping yourself down on desert gravel under a big blue sky and gazing upward. That was my approach at the Gallery in Petroglyph Canyon earlier this fall. After a moderately difficult hike, my reward was spotting hundreds of the gallery’s approximately 1,000 American Indian designs and images displayed on two rocky canvases stretching about one-tenth of a mile.
Henderson boasts hubs of tempting breakfast eateries and the accompanying paths to lead you in their direction. Why not earn your breakfast with a ride or walk, as long as you don’t cancel out the calories your exercise might have just burned off?
Henderson’s southern edge is fortified by a dark, imposing mountain range that looks unwelcoming and unmanageable. At least that was my impression before I got my shoes dusty and started exploring the many trails of the McCullough Range and Sloan Canyon National Conservation Area. Now I’m a hiking regular in this sprawling space of rugged beauty and serenity.
Throughout the scorching-hot weeks of August and September, marching bands and color guard teams across the Las Vegas Valley have been practicing the music, marching, teamwork and pageantry that go into each school’s production.
Henderson may not be Vegas bright or Sedona red, but Nevada’s No. 2 city makes up for that with a sense of community that supports fitness goals, artistic endeavors and adventure seeking.
