"Organ Pipes - Another special species " a Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument Travel Page by gubbi1

During my planning of the trip I was not sure if I should come to this place as I often read about the refugees coming from Mexico over the border using the remote park as 'gateway' into the north. Also on VT tips said that there is a lot of border controls, which I actually met later on, and this makes you think twice. Anyway I decided to head to the park and as usual I contacted the local Visitor Center. On my concern about saftey she told me that the problems mainly occur during nighttime and that it is no problem in the northern part. So I got a recommendation for the Ajo Mountain Drive, which is a oneway gravel road loop of about 20 miles. It brings you into a fantastic mountainous desert landscape with a dense mixture of Sonera and Organ Pipe cacti. The Visitor Center has a small booklet with explanations to several numbered sights on the loop drive.

For coming and also leaving the park I recommend you to have your passport (for Europeans: passport NOT ID-card) at your hand as the border control checks people leaving the park. I was stopped and could not find my Passport as I did not expect to need it. It was somewhere deep down in my luggage. But the people of the border control were really kind and even called a colleague who could speak a little German, not because I speak bad English, but just for fun. Well, things went fine then and a pretty embarrassed Christian continued his trip westwards... :)