Travel Tuesday: Remembering Prescott, Arizona

Travel makes the world smaller. It turns places on a map into people; their kindness and your experiences remembered long after the trip has ended.

Prescott’s Courthouse Square – gathering place for families and friends

For that reason, our hearts today are back in Prescott, Arizona.  Our travels have taken us to this warm and welcoming town three times in the last two years.  Prescott is a vibrant college town draped in old west history about an hour and a half north of Phoenix.

By now, you’ve probably heard of it. Prescott has been in both national and international headlines the last two days because the community is mourning the deaths of 19 firefighters based here – 14 of whom were in their 20’s. They were highly trained members of an elite team, known as  “Hotshots” and were killed on Sunday while battling a blaze that today continues to defy efforts to contain it.

So on this Travel Tuesday we want to pay tribute to this wonderful town, while joining with countless others who are sending prayers and condolences to the entire community.

Prescott captures you with its old west hospitality.  No matter who you meet there or why, there’s a warm feeling about the memory of that encounter. 

For example, one evening last December we paused to look at the menu posted at a café near the Square. We chatted with the owner briefly, saying we’d already eaten.

The next morning though we returned and she called out, “Oh, it’s good to see you two again! Glad you came back for breakfast!!” (It was a hearty plate of Huevos Rancheros we were served, I might add.)






It is a town that normally this time of year is focused on its July 4th rodeo.  They’ve held one here every year for more than 125 years.  This monument to rodeo riders is outside its City Hall. 


The town’s filled with public art that is  touching and whimsical – you never know what you might discover when strolling its sidewalks or entering a store.

These two were inside a small mall, and we found the delightful fellow below guess where?

Outside the public library!

You might recall a post I wrote about Prescott last December when I declared it PC: Pure Christmas!  Prescott is Arizona’s self-proclaimed Christmas City and we believed them after watching one of several Christmas parades they have each December!

What really struck us was the ‘neighborliness’ of the townsfolk. Although a vibrant, growing community there still exists a small town feel; the kind where neighbors know each other – they celebrate the good times and help each other through the bad. 

And that may be what helps this town get through the coming days.


How You Can Help:
A Facebook page has been created honoring the firefighters. Click the link and ‘like’ the page.
NBC News Los Angeles reported on several ways to donate to funds for the firefighters’ families. Click the link for article.
Huffington Post has also listed ways to donate. Click the link.

Summer in Scottsdale? Say, Spa-aahh!

The  air was thick – a 111-degree blanket enveloped us – as we made our way across the expansive grounds of the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess to the resort’s Well & Being at Willow Stream Spa, an air-conditioned 44,000 square-foot oasis of health and beauty. A place so large, there’s a greeter who escorts you to your destination within its spacious confines. It’s like a resort within a resort.

 

The Well & Being concept -- introduced just last January -- combines health, wellness, nutrition, integrative medicine, skin care and fitness. Folks here say they are the first luxury resort in the United States to implement such a comprehensive approach.

So health-serious are they, there’s a full-time doctor (a real M.D.) on staff at the spa. 

We toured the facility that offers a demonstration kitchen and workout areas as well as some 30 treatment and consultation rooms, (some of which open  to the patio pictured above). We watched a class doing exercises on surf board machines while a video of waves was projected on a large screen behind them.

 

One feature neither of us were inclined to try was the Aerial Yoga where yoga poses are done (think upside down yoga) with the support of these suspended cloth slings (which, they say, allow for greater stretching).

Say Spa-ahhh. . .

Following the tour I headed to the large and luxurious dressing/locker room and, while sipping some Prickly Pear lemonade, suited up in a fluffy robe and slippers. I was about to have my first-ever facial. Rose Marie, an aesthetician who’s worked here for 11 years, introduced me to its wonders.

Because I’d never had a facial before  I chose it over a list of seemingly endless spa treatments.  Mine, a 90-minute treatment, began with an up-close and personal face photo (Brace yourselves! The images on that computer below are me and quite frightening). The two images, Rose Marie said, show sun damage and capillaries – I think they showed age as well!

The ‘reality show’ was followed by applications of  the ‘lotions and potions’. It was a botanical bonanza that included, but not limited to, an aloe cleansing, mists of lavender honey and rose geranium, a sweet cherry enzyme peel and a carrot seed soothing serum.  . .you get the idea. . .

 

One thing to keep in mind about spa treatments in resort settings like this one, is the cost of the treatment gives you access to all the other spa amenities and features on the day of your treatment (come early, stay late; a resort within a resort). 

Here those amenities include: steam rooms, saunas, a eucalyptus inhalation rooms, a private rooftop pool, and a three-story therapeutic waterfall, inspired by the real thing in the Grand Canyon, Havasupai Falls.

If you are like The Scout and not ‘in to’ spa treatments,  you can purchase a day pass here to use the non-treatment facilities.  (Free access is included with those booking the Fairmont Gold option).

TravelnWrite regulars will recall we nabbed a good deal on November’s Black Friday for our stay here last December. The new spa concept was introduced about a month after our visit. Now that we’ve tried it, we can’t imagine a stay that  didn’t include significant time at their Well and Being Willow Stream.

The Scottsdale Spa Experience

Whether a long-time spa enthusiast or a newbie to the spa world, summer in Scottsdale is the time you’ll find both great hotel rates and good deals on spa packages and treatments.

To see a few of this summer’s deals: click on Experience Scottdale’s link:  Summer Spa Series

For information about the Well & Being at Willow Stream Spa, www.scottsdaleprincess.com or call 480-585-2732.

An example of their Seasonal Offerings is this, one of  their June specials:

• 45-Minute Treatments Monday - Thursday
  Need a quick mid-week spa fix? Choose from these 45-minute energizing spa treatments designed for the person on the go. Available Monday – Thursday all day long. 45-minute Energizer Massage or Customized Facial. $129 each

That’s it for this week’s Travel Tip Tuesday!
If you have a tip about spa treatments or where to find deals that you’d like to share with other readers, please write a comment in the section below or send us an email to travelnwrite@msn.com   Small print: We want to thank the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess for hosting our spa visit and treatment.

If you’ve not yet signed up to receive TravelnWrite posts, please do so on the blog’s home page, top right hand corner.  If you want to follow us on Facebook, click this link!  And, as always, thanks for stopping by today!

On The Road to Arizona’s Summer Deals

Pssstt. . .did you know that when Arizona’s Valley of the Sun (Phoenix and Scottsdale) starts heating up in the summer you can nab some of its coolest hotel deals? 

Think 5-star luxury . . . pools . . . spas . . . fine dining. . . at prices so low you could stay three or four nights for the cost of one night in the same room during the winter.

Places like at the Four Seasons Troon North in Scottsdale. That’s their pool area pictured below.  Can’t you imagine yourself sunning there while sipping a cool one?

I wrote about the drop in prices in an article that appears in today’s Seattle Times.  You will have to click this link however, to see what kind of deals I am talking about (believe me, it is worth your time to do so).

And if you are contemplating a road trip to Arizona, I have another article in the Seattle Times  today in which I point out  some ‘not-to-miss’ stops and things to do in the North Central part of this Grand Canyon State (beyond the Grand Canyon, you might say).  To see those, you’ll need to click this link.

And for those of you who do click the links to the Seattle Times, you might recognize the guy in my photos with the orange shirt. . .

Hope to see you back here again this week because we are introducing a Travel Classics series featuring some charming historic hotels we’ve happened upon and we will also be taking you to Amsterdam for a night on the town!  
Until then, ‘Happy Travels!’

TP Thursday: Did You See That?!

We tell you about the destinations, but don’t always mention those entertaining sights (and sites) along the way. Those brief snapshots in time . . . so fleeting. . .so unexpected. . .but oh, so memorable, like in:

Tuscany, Italy


We had been, for some time, the only ones traveling this two-lane road through Tuscany last fall.  Yet, we stopped and waited at the red light. . .and waited. . .and waited, to the point we started thinking it might be some sort of joke. When, finally, it turned green, we found major road construction just around the corner had narrowed the road to a single lane.

Eastern Washington State



We’d passed through a number of picturesque small towns as we drove from Spokane, Washington to Joseph, Oregon but none had as clever a welcome sign as did the town of Anatone, a tiny spot  in the southeastern part of the state.

Nothing, Arizona



Nothing, Arizona is just that these days. The sign on US 93 between mile markers 148 and 149 is six miles north of the junction of Hwy 97.  It once was the site of an operating rock shop, and a gas station and even a pizza joint.

Sfakia, Crete

That is a roadside guard rail at the top of the photo, framing this beast of beauty we spotted sunning itself one fine day on the southwestern coast of Crete.  This laid-back sunbather could have been posed there for the attention he gave to my phototaking.

Nevada’s Extraterrestrial Highway

State Route 375 is a long, lonesome 98-mile stretch of highway in remote southern Nevada. Like other similar roadways  in Nevada and Arizona, it provides immense stretches of vast, barren high desert-scapes. 
What sets it apart from those other roadways – besides the fact it’s near ‘Area 51’ which was for sometime a top-secret government research and test facility within the Nellis Air Force Base’s Bombing and Gunnery Range -- is that in 1996 it was officially named the Extraterrestrial Highway because of the UFO and other paranormal activities recorded here.

We’d chuckled about not seeing anything extraterrestrial or otherwise as we drove between Crystal Springs and Warms Springs, on that particular morning. About then, this is what we saw in the distance:

                                 Alien Research Center- Jackie Smith photo

We drove past, but I insisted I had to take a photo, so we returned to the parking lot so I could take the above shot. It was then we saw the sign "Alien Research Center."   Hmmm, not a person in sight, although the sign read, ‘museum and gift shop now open’. 

That was two years ago. I Googled it then and again this week and found no more information on either of my investigations than I have told you of this place located at:  100 Extraterrestrial Highway, Hiko, Nevada: It is simply there.

That’s it for this week’s Travel Photo Thursday. Hope you visit Nancy’s Budget Travelers Sandbox today for more fun photos. And if you’ve not yet checked out TravelnWrite’s Facebook page hope you’ll drop by there as well.

How about you? What have you seen on your travels  made you exclaim, “Did you see that?!”

Aboard The Southbound Polar Express

When the High Plains Drifters set out on our Winter Road Trip early Thanksgiving morning, I’d silently decided we were taking a holiday from the holidays (like that John Grisham book/movie a few years ago about a vacation from Christmas).

As the Pacific Northwest forests gave way to the barren Southwest high plains, I ticked off the list the things I wouldn’t be doing: seasonal decorating, shopping and cooking, cards and gifts, ahh, yes. . .no holidays for us this year!

What I didn’t realize at the time was that we weren’t escaping from the holidays; we were hurtling toward them aboard our own  Polar Express, (it’s the other book/movie that convinces the Scrooge in all of us that the magic of Christmas is alive and well).

We were headed to Arizona - Christmas Central -  the best place in the world to experience this season, …well,. . . with perhaps the exception of the North Pole.

The Sugar Plum Stations along our route left holiday visions dancing in our heads . . . visions like those in. . .











Prescott



Christmas Spirit enveloped us within hours of our arrival in Prescott, “Arizona’s Christmas City”.  This is its Courthouse, a centerpiece in the downtown, which by now is lit up each night just like the Christmas Tree next to it.

Phoenix



We had a week-long stay in Marriott’s Desert Canyon Villas, five-minutes from the J.W. Marriott Hotel where Christmas decorations began appearing the same weekend we arrived.

With each day the decorations seemed to expand throughout the hotel’s massive lobby. Poinsettias lined the stairways, festive green and red decorations seemed to sprout – as if magically – during the night.

I didn’t think the Land of Oz could be made any more wonderful than the Emerald City that welcomed Dorothy and her friends. But thanks to the Marriott’s culinary team this land of Oz was a Confectionery Convention Center where gingerbread pavers lined the Yellow Brick Road.

We spent three nights – thanks to a Cyber Monday deal – at the Fairmont Princess Hotel in Phoenix –a place that in December could be mistaken for the North Pole.

Scrooge would have had a difficult time here but not those who are still kids-at-heart. 

Much time was spent watching their four-story tall Christmas Tree change colors; the changes synchronized to the Christmas Carole’s that ring out over the hotel’s plaza, located just outside its elaborately decorated lobby. 



Then, down a path to the skating rink. . .yes, real ice, six-inches deep, in the heart of the desert. A large truck/generator  hidden behind one of the buildings brings this frozen wonderland scene to life.  (The rink is open to the entire community, not just hotel guests.)
They rent skates at the hotel.










After a bit of time at the rink it was time to follow a luminaria-lit path through a fairy land of lights and scenes that appear each evening. Any other time of year, the same pathway leads through a beautiful – but not particularly magical – lagoon area.

And if the kid within you allows you to do it, you can hop aboard a miniature train to tour this enchanted land.

In Arizona where everything seems big – even the Christmas decorations are enormous.  The tree below at  the Desert Ridge Shopping Center towered over the palm trees around it.



Scottsdale

At Scottsdale’s iconic Pinnacle Peak Patio restaurant we found Santa’s sleigh being hauled by cattle.



And just down the road this big ol’ bronze mountain lion was decked out for the season as well.

Each evening at the Troon North Four Seasons the pathway between the Hotel and Residence Club wound through a daytime-desert that each evening gave way to a seasonal showcase.


By the time we reached the Four Seasons I was much like the kids on the Polar Express – I was a believer again.  We may have left the holiday hustle behind, but we’d re-discovered the Magic of Christmas!
 
Have you visited any magical places this year? What made them magical?

Where ever your travels take you this holiday season we hope you’ll also find some Christmas Magic ~ it’s Travel Photo Thursday – don’t forget to visit Budget Travelers Sandbox for more armchair travel.  I’ll resume the High Plains Drifters tales this weekend with a stop in Ely, Nevada . . .

Raindrops and Rainbows~ Sunshine and Snowflakes

I sat reading a book Thursday evening in front of the fireplace as rain lashed the windows and the wind howled outside our adobe casita  - winter was announcing its arrival in Scottsdale, Arizona.


It was time for High Plains Drifters to head north.  We’d lucked out on the weather since our arrival the weekend after Thanksgiving as most of our days had been sunny and unseasonably warm in Arizona. As we headed out of town Friday morning  Black Mountain near Carefree was hidden behind a thick cloud cover.

Scottsdale roadways were covered in places with water and desert sand that had washed across the asphalt.

We would follow a route  that took through the small hamlet of Wikiup, past Hoover Dam and loop us around Las Vegas  as we headed to Highway 318 which would take us. . .

on a near magical journey through Nevada’s Great Basin.  If you’ve never visited this stretch of country we highly recommend adding it to your bucket list. 

One of its many highlights is about 90 miles north of Las Vegas,  the  8,400+square-mile Paharanagat National Wildlife Refuge, which was created in 1963, to provide habitat for migratory birds, especially waterfowl. The lakes and marshes are a rare sight in this part of Nevada.



Our plan was to reduce our travel time from four nights on the road to three – if road conditions permitted.  So far, so good, we thought.



From expansive vistas to winding our way through towering cavernous walls we sped north. . .


We planned to spend our first night in Ely, Nevada, a small community where mining provides the economic foundation, where the third generation pharmacist works in the independent pharmacy that opened in the 1940’s and where the County Courthouse that belongs in a Norman Rockwell painting, serves three of the sparsely populated counties around it.


It wasn’t until we were within minutes of  Ely, that rainbows and raindrops and sunshine gave way to snowflakes.  As we crossed Murray Summit, elevation 7,312-feet (more than twice as high as Washington’s Snoqualmie Pass) we encountered the first snow of the trip. Luckily Ely was only minutes away. . .

Eight hours, 609 miles later we concluded Day One’s in Ely –  I'll take you there later this week and then we’ll set a course north through Oregon as we wind down the Winter Western Roadtrip.