Biosphere Reserve: Pinacate and the surrounding Gran Desierto de Altar dune fields were given Biosphere Reserve status under the United Nations in 1993 and are now administered by the Comision de Areas Naturales Protegedas. Their headquarters is at Ejido Nayarit near the Highway 8 bridge over the Rio de Sonoyta. There is even a spiffy new visitor's center, Schuk T'oak, on the Ives flow south of Sierra Blanca. Very bureaucratic.

A rough oval drawn around all of the Pinacate volcanoes and their attendant lava flows, including those out in the sands of the Gran Desierto, encompasses 2000 square kilometers. The area most densely covered with lavas is about 1600 sq km. Beneath is the zone of magma generation in the mantle. The diagonal yellow line is the international border and the N-S line is the Pima-Yuma county border.

Gazetteer: This KML file shows the named features of Pinacate. Using kml files requires that you have Google Earth on your computer, you can get it here.

Annus mirabilis 2010: "Any showers bring the flowers." A tour through the flowers in the spring of 2010.