Phoenix Art Museum

The Phoenix Art Museum - Steve and I met my brother, Mark, at the Phoenix Art Museum in downtown for the Wednesday free admission day.  It was amazing, frightening, and beautiful.  [The frightening part was the You Who Are Getting Obliterated in the Dancing Swarm of Fireflies by Yayoi Kusama.  The moment I stepped into that pitch dark room with only the tiny disembodied lights I felt like I was going to fall, so I backed out slowly and left.  Apparently some of us have issues and I seem to be such a one.  Kusama, I understand, has a mental illness that causes her to see patterns everywhere, particularly polka dots.  This is her way of sharing her world.  There is a polka dotted pumpkin sculpture elsewhere in the museum that she created, as well.]

There were old masters' drawings and paintings, though.  Since photographs were allowed without flash, I can share the ones I liked best.

Not sure why, but this was directly in front of the museum.

Monet's Flowering Arches at Giverny

Close up, you can see the pointillism, the pixelation of its day. 

I like this one best of all - Girl Playing Guitar.  The light is so beautiful.

Steve noticed that the next two paintings have tiny holes punched around the gilt halos.  It must have been part of the gilding process.

This tree was fascinating the more you looked at it.  It was set in a huge room with three white walls. It appeared to be covered in black velvet and had delicate, blue glass birds sitting on the branches and snow-like material at the base.  After a while, you realize that there are faint shadows cast on the floor surrounding the tree and they are just as beautiful as the tree itself.  It really grew on you, pardon the pun.

As you know, there had to be horse art and I liked it.

The piece below made me laugh.  It's made by an American artist and is called Shuttlecock Concert.

The fresh flowers are Ikebana that are replaced regularly.

After Mark and I looked unsuccessfully for Steve, we said goodbye and my brother left for home A short while later, I found Steve at the restaurant's outside seating ensconced at a shady table.  The temperature was a balmy 103 degrees, but what a gorgeous courtyard.

Odd sculpture saying goodbye on the way back to the parking lot.

Tomorrow, it's laundry, cleaning of our quarters, and family dinner with Mom and Dad.  We may even throw in some apartment hunting to plan for our return from Europe.

Friday may be church exploration day.  I understand that St. Francis Xavier (Ignatius) has a lovely cathedral and St. Mary's Basilica is a beautiful example of adobe construction.  I think we need to see them.

Desert Botanical Gardens in Phoenix (oh, my!)

Desert Botanical Gardens - We finally forked over the $$ to go to the Phoenix botanical gardens.  They are located inside Papago Park (the Phoenix city park, one of the largest urban parks in the world), along with the Phoenix Zoo and some interesting hiking and picnicking options.  The stated entrance fee for the Gardens was $25 each, so we waited until we thought our stamina in this heat and my broken toe were ready for the necessary walking in order to get our money's worth.  Thanks to dear AAA travel club, we got a whopping $10 discount and spent a fascinating, if uncomfortable, 3 hours at the Gardens.  (This, of course, was interrupted about half-way through by a stint in the air-conditioned Gertrude's Restaurant on the premises, for drinks and a nibble, because our endurance was not quite as good as we thought.  The waiter entertained us with information about how to recognize someone who is about to suffer heat exhaustion - red in the face/splotchy, looking disoriented - and how to help them - under no circumstances give that person ice water; they will go directly into shock and real heat exhaustion.  Cool their skin with tepid water, help them drink tepid water for a few minutes, then as they cool down follow with ice water.  Steve and I may be ready for the desert soon.)

The desert plants are a cultivated taste, but they can be beautiful.  Judge for yourself:

Creeping Devil cactus; something just isn't right.

I think of this as a Medusa Tree; creepy.

The ranger thinks this is a form of marigold.  What do you think?

Prickly Pear

Tomorrow we visit St. Mary's Basilica in Phoenix and then the Phoenix Art Museum with my brother, Mark.

Old Town Scottsdale, AZ

Scottsdale again, even though I swear I don't like to shop... really.  This time, we visited the outside of an aquarium, stopped at a couple jewelers, walked around photographing fascinating sculptures, visited the Scottsdale Public Library, and ate some tasty barbecue.

I know I criticized Scottsdale for it's ubiquitous shopping, but it does have some other attractions.  Steve wanted to look at the Butterfly Wonderland and OdySea Aquarium in Scottsdale.  This does not appear to be a non-profit like Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium in Tacoma, but a full-on for-profit park.  We discovered upon arrival that to get into both attractions the Senior pass would cost us $100, just for the two of us for the day.  Needless to say, we were much too frugal to buy tickets, but we wandered around the central complex for a few minutes musing about how it came to this - so much so that we forgot to take a single photograph.  It was a two story central area with chain shops, food, outside tables, and signs like you would see at an amusement park.

Old Scottsdale, though, didn't disappoint.  We walked around Old Town and found so many hidden treasures.

Yes, the same horses as before in the plaza, but Better.

Bischoff's at the Park gallery, which was unfortunately closed.

But, the outside of Bischoff's was fantastic.

Outside a store across from the gallery.

 However, I did bring a few pieces of jewelry that were in need of repair, a pair of silver and malachite earrings that were actually purchased in Scottsdale about 3 decades ago and an inlaid bracelet that was a gift from my folks.  One of the hammered "fins" on the earrings had broken off of the dangley bits of the earrings again, so I took it back to the place I purchased it several decades ago to see what they could do.  As you can see in the photo, the jeweler cut off the paddles and made very nice little rounded-flattened ends on each dangle.  I can wear them again!!  I love the color of malachite, that deep dark green.  Unfortunately, my inlaid Zuni bracelet will take a little longer, so we'll go back in a couple days to get that.

The dangles each had a long flat paddle and they kept breaking off.  Problem solved!

Last, we visited the Scottsdale Public Library - partly to cool off (the humidity was hard to deal with after all that walking, even at 95 degrees) and partly because I like to see libraries wherever I go.  This one was special, I thought.  They had a coffee shop (carry your drink and food anywhere but the computers),  a separate Youth room, and a play area for the kiddies.

There was a huge quill pen outside the front door.  Of course, we didn't come in that way.

The library has a large collection and some beautiful artistic touches.

These support columns ingeniously include air conditioning vents.

In the basement parking garage, the palms grow up through the roof! There must have been 10 of them.

Yes, and we topped it all off with a delicious meal at Bootleggers Modern American Smokehouse, a great barbecue restaurant and bar.  The food was great - Steve had chopped brisket sandwich and I had the pulled pork.  It was pretty darn dark in the place, though, at 5pm.  I literally had to turn on my keychain flashlight to read the menu.  If they hadn't had such great reviews, I might have thought they were trying to hide something.

Unrelated to the restaurant, we really want to know what kind of bush this is.  They are EVERYWHERE!

Tomorrow, our itinerary is unknown.  Apache Junction, Flagstaff, Tortilla Flat, and Tombstone have been bandied about.  We'll see...

My parents' lovely home in the Phoenix area

 My parents have chosen a beautiful place to live.  I enjoyed sitting on their patio talking and watching the Arizona sun go down last night.  My dad cooked a wonderful spaghetti dinner. It was so good and I ate so much.  I haven't had the Gestson spaghetti for way too long. Mom dressed up and looked so pretty.  Here are a few photos of their lovely home.  It makes me happy to know they are cozy and comfortable here.

The back of the house, facing onto a small golf course.

Monsoon season in Phoenix

After a lazy morning at the BnB, we visited with my parents in Sun City West again had a delicious dinner, prepared by my Dad.  He is really an excellent chef and has many recipes that he prepares for the two of them.  He plans, shops, and prepares such tasty, nutritious meals.  Leave it to an engineer to get all that down to a smooth running machine.  He's an inspiration.

While there was still some daylight, Steve and I drove around Sun City West and Surprise, AZ to see what kind of possibilities there are for renting.  We are considering settling here for a couple years after returning from Europe.  There are quite a few condos (so there must be a few for rent) and some apartments.  Rent price will probably determine how close we can be to Sun City West and my folks. We'll be talking with a realtor to get a better idea of what can be done.

We already know that, if we have decent air conditioning, Steve and I can handle the Arizona summers.  This is monsoon season.  There are very hot days; mingled with windy days that include some rain and lightening.  The rain cools the day off and makes it more bearable.  Today, on the way to the folks house it was 105 degrees, but it cooled down to 98 degrees with the rain that seems to come and go.  It's 9:30pm now and the temp is down to 92 degrees.  All of this makes from some pretty sunsets.

Can you see the rain coming down?  We drove down a dry corridor between showers.

Sunset from Surprise, AZ.

The thing is that during this monsoon season people (mainly tourists) need to be very aware of their surrounds.  There are flash floods during this time and in a split second you can be facing a wall of water and debris when you though you were just walking in a dry river bed or, as in a recent incident, paddling around in a small swimming hole.  An extended family went to their favorite swimming hole on a hot day the day before we arrived here.  They were celebrating a young woman's 26th birthday.  They were hit by a flash flood and 9 members of their family died: the young woman having a birthday, her husband, and their 3 children were all among the dead.  This is not a rare occurrence and we are being extremely careful.

We drove through a pelting rainstorm yesterday to get to Sedona and passed flashing "Watch for flooding" signs several times.  Because the road pavement gets so dry here, when the rain comes down especially that quickly, the water just beads up and creates puddles and runoff.  It was alarming to see some drivers not seem to take that into consideration and still drive 75 mph, as the law allows under normal circumstances.  With a few sharp curves, it was a pretty hair raising leg of the journey.

Of course, I didn't take a pic while we were trying not to skid on the curves, but this is how it looked.

Tomorrow, we hope to arrive early in the Peoria, Surprise, Sun City West area and do some more exploring.  Then, it off to the Gestson's house for my Dad's super specialty - Spaghetti and meatballs.  I craved this meal for much of my childhood.  It took a very long time for him to make, so it only happened on special occasions.  This spaghetti is like nothing I've tasted anywhere else.  It has such delicious, tender meatballs; mushrooms, bay leave, and cloves.  It is a secret recipe, known only to the men in my family, so I couldn't make it for myself.  And... tomorrow I get to taste it again.  I just can't wait!  I promise spaghetti pictures in tomorrow's post, but don't ask me for the recipe.  It is guarded by Gestsons and cannot be revealed.