WILLCOX, AZ — Willcox is many things.
It's been a former station stop for the Southern Pacific Railroad to the gateway to the 'Old West' in Cochise County. And who could forget the home of the last of the singing cowboys, Rex Allen?
Homer Hansen really should serve as the unofficial ambassador to what is also my hometown.
"Did you ever go to the Pioneer Cemetery," Hansen asked as we walked by Cochise Lake.
He's the chairman of a festival that's attracted countless crowds of bird lovers for more than three decades: "Wings Over Willcox." And the impressive wings belong to the nearly 40,000 sandhill cranes that call the Sulphur Springs Valley home during the cold winter months.
"Even now I sometimes get goosebumps when I sit here and watch them or listen to them or something happens... I watch their interactions and it's just enjoying being there with them," Hansen said.
Homer's not alone in his enthusiasm for these cranes that wing their way from the nation's breadbasket in Nebraska, the Sandhill Region, that gives them their name. But that 1,100 mile journey is nothing compared with the range Game and Fish agents have tracked from as far as Canada, Alaska or even Asia.
"It spent the summer in Siberia, flew those thousands of miles. All the way back here and spent the wintertime as a snowbird, you know, in Southeast Arizona here," Hansen said.
Just like their snowbird counterparts of the human variety, these birds bring big business to a small town that throws out the welcome mat each January. And if you can't spend the night in this corner of the state, on of the top three birding locations anywhere in the U.S., a day trip from Tucson should suffice to snag a sunrise or sunset view of the sandhill cranes.
"You see the birds and you're watching them and you really do become focused in the moment," Hansen said.
"Wings Over Willcox Birding & Nature Festival"
January 16 - 19th
Willcox Community Center
312 Stewart St
Willcox, AZ
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