On a Sunday morning, my wife and I left our house, drove out to the Denver International Airport, and caught a short flight down to Phoenix, Arizona. My initial thinking when I booked this vacation two months earlier was that by mid-December, it would be cold in Denver and much warmer down in the desert southwest.
We picked up our rental car and drove to our Mountain Shadows resort to check-in. We were both pleased with the hotel we chose to stay in, and once again, I was glad that I used Costco Travel to book our vacation. They always have extra perks - on this vacation, we saved the daily resort fee ($42), and a nice bottle of wine was delivered to our room. On other vacations, Costco has included a daily credit of $100.
The following day we went to Old Scottsdale to wander around and see that area. Then I took my wife by an apartment complex that I lived in back in 1992. From there, we drove up to Cave Creek and walked around that area of shops. We found a great place to have lunch with a lovely patio to eat on.
The next day we motored down to the Desert Botanical Gardens and were happy to find out that Dale Chihuly has an exhibit of his work on display.
Desert landscape.
Another fun thing we did was to go to Cosanti and take a one-hour guided tour. This is the gallery and studio of an Italian-American architect Paolo Soleri who, after receiving the equivalent of a PhD. in Architecture in Italy, came to Arizona to study with Frank Loyd Wright at Taliesin West.
After a year of working together, the two men parted ways because they had drastically different opinions about what to design.
Taliesin West is where architect Frank Lloyd Wright made his winter home and school in the desert from 1937 until his death in 1959 at 91.
Today it is the headquarters of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation. If you go to the Phoenix area, you can take a tour of Taliesin West.
Cosanti is open and has terraced landscaping, experimental earth-formed concrete structures, and its sculptural wind-bells. One of the concrete designs was used as a guide for a part of the set in a Star Wars Film.
In the above picture, this is a vessel containing liquid bronze that the workers heated to 2200 degrees F to melt the bronze.
In this picture, the workers are pouring the liquid bronze into molds to cast the various sizes of bells they are making.
I found it interesting that other than a large ceramics factory in Italy that architect Paolo Soleri designed and built, most of his work was designing and selling bells to fund his workshop. Today there is a partnership between an Architectural school and Cosanti, where the students live in residence while they pursue their studies.
Here I am on one of our many walks around Paradise Valley. Behind me is the backside of Camelback mountain. On the right side, when you are positioned correctly, you can see the praying monk rock formation.
One day we ventured into a Paradise Valley neighborhood and walked up the hills to get a good view of the surrounding area.
If you enjoy playing golf, there are many golf courses in the Phoenix metropolitan area to choose from.
Back when I lived in the Valley from 1987-1992 I was stationed at Luke Air Force Base while serving in the Air Force Reserves.
Happy Holidays Everyone!
Take Care.