When I was in Thailand a few years ago I kept hearing the saying 'Same, same but different' which means it's nearly the same, but not. It was usually used in reference to fake goods which were the 'same' as the 'real' thing, but obviously not the real thing.

This phrase came into my head today as I realised that just as each of us would create different things given the same materials, at any moment each of us can be at the same event but experiencing it in such a different way. Or creating the same thing but have it mean different things to us.

My day in still sunny Tucson begins with essential shopping. Although I have brought 5 pairs of shoes with me, for 12 days, of course I haven't packed anything sensible enough to actually walk in. So a trip to Target is in order and I return home with shoes, a shirt and a hat which Kate has managed to convince me looks good.

Now, I have a lot of history with hats (I even spent some time making them). For some reason over the years I seem to get 'hat amnesia' or maybe some form of 'hat blindness' where I ignore all history and evidence to the contrary, and suddenly think hats suit me. They don't. Never have done and never will.

But at that moment, in that shop, I am at it again and before I know it I'm buying a hat. Partly I think it's just the shock at finding one that fits ok on my big head and hair that leads me to enter 'hat coma' and be buying it before I come to my senses.

Purchases made, once home I dress sensibly (a rarity for me) and the returning Jeroen and Gabriella join Kate, Dustin and myself for a walk.

I am looking forward to the walk as it seems exciting, but my joy is tempered by the fact the gorgeous Gabriella has the same hat as me! Guess which of us looks elegant and glamorous in it whilst the other has already been asked if they are a Monty Python character? Hats are not my friend.

Onwards and upwards we head off to Sabino Canyon where I spend the next few hours thinking, and saying, 'Wow' at just about everything I see.

The flora and fauna are so alien to my eyes. All around are strange plants and animals that I have never seen before and which amaze me. I feel like a neanderthal in a silly film who has been woken up in the new millenium and stares wide-eyed and points at everything around them going 'What's that?'. To be fair though I am often like that.

Fortunately my companions are accomodating of this and respond to even my most basic of queries ('Yes Jean, that is a plant', 'Yes Jean, that is a tree. Yes the same tree you saw earlier', 'Yes Jean that is cheese'. That one was two days ago which shows just how patient they have been. And let's not discuss the whole 'Where is East? How do I know where East is?' discussion).

I have discovered on this trip that Kate McKinnon seems to have an inexhaustible knowledge of matters animal, vegatable and mineral and she continually astounds me wth the facts and interesting details she replies to my often stupid questions. She may of course be lying, but I don't really care as she weaves a good story and gets me thinking either way.

All through the walk I feel as though I am an explorer discovering new territory and can't help but think what it would have been like to really be wandering this land heading for a new life. It is only every now and then that small details, such as the fact we're walking on a tarmac road and not a dirt trail, bring me back to earth. But I choose to mostly ignore them and walk on with my trailblazer delusions.

As we walk we come across other walkers and cyclists and I realise that for all of them this is not unexplored territory, but just their local place for a stroll or ride. Just as I would walk to my local shop for a newspaper. The idea that this place, which seems so wild and alien to me, should be someone else's common ground brings me up short.

The icing on the cake is the woman I see walking and chatting on her phone. She is so used to these surroundings that she isn't even looking at them. I am tempted to run after her and shake her, imploring her to look around at all the beauty there is, but then realise I do just the same walking around my local area and she would be just as baffled by my behaviour then as I am by hers now so I don't. That, and also the realisation that being attacked by someone wearing a bad hat (or just wearing a hat badly) might not make her day.

Soon our walk begins drawing to an end but not before I spot one of the most amazing things I have seen on my walk, or the whole trip, a duck. A plain, simple, mallard.

I grew up in London and my memories of my childhood consist almost entirely of visits to Clissold Park to play in the playground, run around and feed the ducks. Somewhere in my mind I had decided, without even knowing it, that ducks were a completely English thing, possibly even London based. Obviously I guessed other countries had ducks of some sort but not plain old mallards. Surely they all had exotic ducks with fabulous plumage that put our London ducks to shame? Nope- same old ducks.