Wow, betcha didn't know about this.

Here's something you don't see everyday. This is an Aerostat blimp operated by the USAF. There are about eight of them along the southern border of the US, all equipped with radar and probably a few of those cameras that can count the dimples on a golf ball. They're used by many agencies, but mostly by Customs to help fight the war on drugs. It seems that in the old days, it was pretty easy to fill up your Cessna with a ton of reefer and fly it to a remote desert landing strip where you could unload it and not have to deal with that whole border crossing smuggling thing. Then these blimps came along and changed all that. I'm sure they do a whole lot more than catch planes on radar as they can carry payloads of about 1200 pounds.
Yeah, the picture isn't that great. But while it looks like it's just over those trees, it's actually pretty far away. That means this blimp is a lot bigger than it looks in the picture. According to the fact sheet, it's roughly twice the size of the Goodyear Blimp. Maybe it's because I haven't seen the Goodyear Blimp since I was a kid, but that seems pretty big to me.
You can check this website for more info about the blimp...

http://www2.acc.af.mil/library/factsheets/tars.html

This one is just north of Yuma, Arizona. I've seen the ones above Fort Huachuca in Arizona and Deming, New Mexico. I've seen the Yuma blimp several times, it's no big deal. But this was only the second time that I saw it moored to the ground like that. Maybe they had it down for the thunderstorms last night, or they were installing some new kick-butt piece of equipment makes drug smugglers shake in their boots. :-)
What was I doing in Yuma? Well, I was bored and had a full tank of gas. The real purpose of my trip was to find some of the glyphs near Pilot Knob in very south eastern California. There are supposed to be some glyphs there, but I didn't find anything. The rock was very brittle, and would have been a poor surface on which to carve rock art.
I went up on the west end of the hill because the east end is on a reservation, and I didn't want to step on any toes. I think I'll contact the Quechan Tribal Government and ask to see the glyphs. Hopefully they'll be a little more open than the Gila River folks.