After more than 40 years of wandering in the forest, we finally found our way to the desert.

We came looking for sand dunes and desolation, and found a lush green landscape of stunning variety and vigor. This isn't a desert, it's a garden!

The Sonoran Desert supports greater biological diversity than any other desert in the world. Mild winters and two annual rainy seasons provide two extended growing seasons. Mountainous terrain supports representatives of all of the world's "biomes," from tundra to tropical forest, within the Sonoran Desert region.

As if to welcome us home, the Sonoran Desert put on its most spectacular display of spring wildflowers in more than 20 years.

We set out to explore the desert, beginning with the Santa Catalina and Tucson Mountains, and eventually extending our range deep into Mexico. Wherever we travelled, we took time to draw, photograph and write about what we saw. Those images filled up our sketchbooks and journals and photo albums and finally overflowed onto a web page that now includes well over 100 photos and drawings.

The desert has its own palette. Whatever colors humans apply will be remixed by nature to something softer, subtler and infinitely more refined. The common collared lizard looks "gray" at first glance, but on closer inspection, he displays bands of fluorescent yellow, olive green and black.

Many of us are newcomers to the Sonoran Desert, and we don't remember that water once flowed almost year-round in our rivers. Even the Santa Cruz was lined with mature cottonwood and sycamore trees. Irrigation and runaway development -- not drought -- lowered our water table and emptied our rivers.

BTW, the average golf course consumes enough water every year to supply 35,000 homes, and Tucson has more than 40 golf courses.