Moved from AZ 20 years ago,spent 26 years there.DON'T miss it.Everything bites,pokes,sticks,and is a threat.

I lived all over the state when I worked for the Highway Dept.Some is good some is not.Northern Az was nice.the population has polluted most of the places I used to ride and hunt.

Last time I was there I hardly recognizes the place.Freeways all over.Scotsdale was all desert,Paradise valley was a dream.There was miles between Apache Junction and Phoenix.Now just signs separate them.

120 in the shade,clorox for water drive for miles to get away...found more....no gettin away..Have fun!

And when it rains...it blows sand all over,tears stuff up,and then rains so hard in a short time to flood everything.Then it's 120 plus humidity.

and cactus,you haven't lived till you get a jumpin cactus in your groin! Thats why cowboys walk bowlegged there!watch were you sit,put your hands,and always shake your clothes and shoes when you put them on if you are camping.

real fun comes when your horse gets one or more in his lips,or his belly when your riding.They are real hard to get out as they curl over in the skin.Been there done that.

wto Sahrita(think i spelled it right) by Tucson, in 98 to pick up My Arab mare,she had been a desert horse all her life and at 5 years old she was about to find out what green grass was.

When I got her home she steped out of the trailer,her foot touched grass and back up she went.

The grass was waist hi and she would only go as far as I did.she had no idea that grass was for eating,all she ate was alfalfa pellets there.

It was quite an experience to get her to cross streams,mud etc.

I had to act like I was eating the grass before she would touch it!

I, too, moved from MI to Az.  My first summer there didn't seem too bad.  (I started in east Mesa, then Queen Creek, then moved up near Prescott....NOW you could not PRY me away from MT! :)  By the following summer, I couldn't get out of the "Valley" fast enough!!  The heat was just stiffling...the traffic drove me completely nuts.  The population/building going on is crazy.  All of the farm land is disappearing, so pretty soon ALL food stuffs - human & livestock - will have to be imported & you're gonna pay the price.  You do not have to feed cubes...they raise hay there, but be ready to build up your muscles - they are an average of 110#.   Bermuda is the "local" grass hay & then there's alfalfa.  Be prepared to spend at least 3X per ton that you do in MI.  And hay is no where nice as MI.  Sand....oh yes, get funds saved up for psyllium - I was a vet tech there & we saw sand colic DAILY - big time.  'Course, alot of the problem is, these "wanna be's" put their poor horses in tiny little pens (think 4 panels, so what's that?  12 - 14" square?)  They feed them 1 FLAKE of alfalfa, a.m. & p.m. & the poor horses are scarfing thru the sand to find every little piece of alfalfa.  Soooo, plan on getting stocked up on the bermuda & FEED THEM.  I can't stress that enough.  Horses are grazing animals & unless you find a place w/irrigation, it isn't gonna happen - so you need to supply the GRASS hay.  (works good to wet it down too, helps to keep it from being a dry ball in their gut.)  Speaking of irrigation:  keep in mind, all that nice irrigation water comes from CO....who's gonna get shut off first when they stop it - CO has been having draught conditions, too & needing more & more of it.  The polution is untolerable to me.  Queen Creek was such a nice little, farming community when I lived there & it's gotten crazy there now too - building subdivisions all over (last I knew, water was a BIG problem there), farmers/ranchers getting squeezed out.  What used to irritate the heck out of me was the stupid city people that would build next to a dairy farm & then COMPLAIN about the smell!!!!   Well, simple to me: don't build next to a dairy farm!   So most of the big dairy operations are being put out of business.  I wonder if Phoenix will be the first to start making synthetic milk & cheese???  Hmmmmm.  I hated all the rattlesnakes.  And STS, you are soooo right on the cactus...those jumping chola are murder!!    In the "old days", AZ was a dry climate...but not anymore.  The humidity is bad there, too, due to stupid moves like "Tempe Lake"  & all the "fake" lakes in the subdivisions.  'Skeeters are BAD there, so if you have dogs, be as diligent w/heartworm preventatvie as you are in MI.  Also, another fun aspect of the Phoenix area is Valley Fever....such a wonderful disease for animals & humans.  Oh - & dogs get Tick Fever alot, too.  Real Estate prices are unbelieveable.....can't imagine what it's up to now.   And wages just don't match up w/cost of living there & land/home or rental prices at all.

Having said all that, AZ is a beautiful state & I rode some amazing areas.  (we usually prefered the more remote areas for privacy since there is NONE otherwise), but close in places in Mesa - our favorite was Bull Dog Canyon & Prescott was Groom Creek.  We considered moving to Flag, but fell in love w/it up here & this is "home".

Soooo, wishing you lots of luck on your impending move.  IF I had to move back to AZ, it would either be the North - NE area or SW of Tucson.  ('course, we'd have to be independently wealthy then since no supporting employment!)

Husband and myself are nearing retirement time...........hmmm, where are we going to move to?  At this point we've decided  were staying put!  I've been researching the west for years and the more I learn about it, the more I appreciate where I live.  There's so many restrictions on things, and I'm sure they are for good reasons.  But here in high dollar Maryland, we really have it made.  I've never gone without getting hay, even through a drought.  I don't even know what a hay "cube" looks like or what it costs.  I can only imagine what you people must go through when mother nature acts like an idiot.  And then there's all these water rights and mineral rights issues.............Shoot I just lift the handle on the ole hydrant (when it's working) and can water everyone's yard in the neighborhood if I choose.........my water is MY water and no one elses.......

Only the strong survive out west, God Bless ya.................

Ahhhh it aint that bad.Forget all those rumors about THE WEST were the men are men and the women are too! Thats Sanfransisco,Maybe Portland the way it's goin'.

Other than that if ya hear someone coming out of the closet.....hurry and lock the door!!

Oregon is a great place to be.  Even if it does rain for 9 months.  makes the grass green and the trees bloom.

You can be at the coast one day, at the mountain the next, and the high desert another day.

From the Valley all the way over to Eastern Oregon... This truly is, IMHO, the best state to live in the country.

If you get sick of the rain, you can just head over the cascades to Central, where they don't get nearly as much.

Now Slick..........your on the west COAST...............like I'm on the east  COAST...............WEST to me is Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada.................

And we know rain ain't a problem in Oregon..................

And as far as coming out of the closet........hell in our family we got a 6 x 6 across the door......cause if it ever get's opened the whole famned damily will fall out..........lol

It's like MOX said there is always a place to meet your likes here.

I am getting ready to go to the eastern part of the state over by LaGrande Or.to hunt elk with a blackpowder muzzleloader.Went there last year and hunted the general rifle season on My horse,had a great time.

Takin him again this year,the camp spot may be snowed in but if I can find a spot that I can get to I will definately use him.If nothing else he can carry more than I can when it comes to packing out an elk.Besides that he has fun just being there.

HA HA!!   Sounds "good", but ya didn't have to send all that dang rain OUR way!    From the weather forecast, it's looking like we're gonna have to start building our ark soon - OR, maybe one that can convert over to having skids on the bottom, too, for when the snow hits! 

Snowflake - a very beautiful area, but last I heard, real estate is purdy high since it's one of the big "get away" areas when it's so stinking hot in the summer in Phoenix area.  Then, in the winter, there's tons of snow skiing up there, so the "visitors" keep right on coming, no matter what time of year.  I know at one point, they were having BIG problems w/water up that way.....east of Payson & towards the border.  So, if land seems really cheap compared to the majority of the others, it's probly impossible to get water - or won't perk.  Not much at all in jobs around there, either, but if you're retired, then you don't have to worry about that.  Since you mentioned NM too - have you ck'd out the Silver City area?  Not gonna be any cheaper, but I hear they don't have the water problems.

I'm not to far from Silver City and compared to where I came from in S Tx prices are high, but compared to everywhere else they aren't bad.  I've only driven through there once and it its nice We've had lots of rain this year and there was quite a bit of grass.  Also NM is an open range state and basically if the land isn't fenced you are free to ride it.  (watch for cows on the roads!)  I have about 1000 acres of open desert next to me that I am riding in.   

I have  problem driving in the mountians so I haven't been up in them much and not with the horses.  But it is beautiful.