Scottsdale & Phoenix

My brother Norman and his wife Lallee left for home in great weather.  The local news channels has been saying that Phoenix is experiencing warmer weather than normal for January, which is good news for us.  Back home in Virginia, they are getting hammered by snow and cold weather (might have a record snow fall).  Norman and Lallee are heading to Oklahoma where the weather is at it’s typical January, cold and wet. Needless to say, Denise and I are very happy to be in Arizona right now.

We drove out to a town southeast of Phoenix called Queen Creek and visited an Olive Farm and Mill. The farm and mill is totally dedicated to making extra virgin olive oil. We toured the property and the milling area and learned the process of making EVOO (extra virgin olive oil).  Denise did oil tastings while I chased a fat road runner with my camera (a farm pet).

Saturday, we drove out to Old Town Scottsdale and visited a very big outdoor farmers market. I guess because of the nice weather, the place was packed and a lot of people brought their dog(s). It was hard to see little dogs down at your feet.  I was worried that I might step on one. So I just hung out in the sun while Denise shopped.

Old town is just that, it’s old Scottsdale Main Street with the same old buildings that were their during early 1900’s but with tourist minded stores. We just did the sight-seeing, visited museums and watched a free showing of Phoenix’s Native American dance.

Not too far from Scottsdale is Phoenix famous Camelback Mountain.  We drove up and around the mountain and saw some really expensive resorts and homes.  The view of Phoenix was worth a picture but I didn’t take one.  I was too busy managing the hair-pin curves at 15 mph. We were hoping to find a trail to walk, but we found no easy trail.  We decided to go to the “Hole in the Rock” , a small mountain close to Phoenix Zoo.  A perfect ‘let your kid loose’ mountain. There were trails galore and they were more to our liking.

Usery Mountain has a famous landmark.  It’s a rock sign with the word “Phoenix” and an arrow pointing to the direction of the Phoenix Airport. In the early 50’s, an eccentric WWII pilot wanted to make sure that pilots would know the direction of Phoenix Airport. So he recruited the local boy scouts to build this sign.  The letters are 100 feet tall and it took five years to build.  It is still maintained by the boy scouts. Every few years, they use garden sprayers and apply about 500 gallons of white paint.

We Are Staying At:

Usery Mountain Regional Park.  This is a very popular public park for hiking and serious mountain biking. We paid $30/night and stayed at site 67 with our patio side facing Usery Mountain. The scenery is great.  It is a little cooler and breezier at this higher elevation than Phoenix.  We have 50amp electrical and water service.  The sites are spacious. We would stay here again.