Week 4 - Las Cruces, Scottsdale, Indio

   We left El Paso and drove an hour to see my Marietta College roommate of two years, Jan, in Las Cruces, New Mexico.  We had a lovely visit with her, complete with tea and croissants, as well as seeing Gambel's Quail, desert wrens and thrashers in her yard.  All too soon, we had to leave and drove Route 10 to Scottsdale, Arizona.
    Scottsdale:  Mark booked us, via Priceline, into a Hilton Resort hotel in Scottsdale.  It was much more luxurious than our usual accommodations!  But, he got us an amazing deal of less than $100 per night.  Our balcony overlooked a palm tree courtyard.  The first night, we went to an amazing sushi restaurant called Roka and had a superb meal.

Barbara at Phoenix Botanical Garden

Verdin, Phoenix

Ground Squirrel...in the air!

Gambel's Quail, Phoenix

Anna's Hummingbird, Phoenix

Old Scottsdale downtown

     Our second day in Scottsdale was wonderful. It was definitely good enough to be added to one of the "Thirty" for our anniversary year.  We started with a morning walk in the Phoenix Botanical Garden where we walked every  trail.  The weather was perfect - sunny and warm, but not hot.  This time, we recognized many of the desert plants, but also focused on the birds.  We met up with a couple of birders and they kindly helped us to identify:  Anna's hummingbirds, desert wrens, Ebert's towhees, verdins and more quail.  We had a late lunch at Dick's Hideaway, the unsigned restaurant that we ate in two years ago.  Still no sign!  We had an excellent lunch:  I had fish tacos and Mark had enchiladas with a chili flavored twice-baked potato which was excellent.  We then went back to the hotel and basked in the sun by the pool.  (But, it wasn't very warm.)  And, for dinner, we ate some groceries we got at Trader Joe's.  A lovely day!
    Our third day in Scottsdale was also very nice.  We ate at just a standard breakfast place which was much more expensive than it needed to be.  That wasn't a great start to the day, but it got better.  We found a fabulous farmers' market in Old Scottsdale - maybe one of the best markets we've ever visited. Too bad we were so full as there were many things to sample which we passed by.  We did buy some cider which had been pressed the day before.  Then, we had a really, really relaxing day...basking by the pool.  Mark met a lovely retired man from Canada who actually lives with his wife at the hotel for 2 1/2 months!  They had two long philosophical talks about life, retirement and noticing the things around you.
    Alas!  The resort life had to come to an end for us.  Just a hint of the high life for us!  We drove, again in the wind, to Indio where we checked into a timeshare where we've stayed before.  It is very modest, more our style, I guess!

Greta Arn

Julia Cohen

Michael Yani

    We have been here for 2 1/2 days.   We have not gone out to eat at all - it is good to have a kitchen again.  We went to the two days free days of tennis qualifiers at Indian Wells.   We saw just one match on the first day - Paula Ormachea (Brazil) beat Katrina Bondarenko.  (Ormachea lost the next day, so did not make it into the draw.)  The second day, we watched an intense and long match between veteran Greta Arn and American Julia Cohen, which was won by Arn.  Then, we saw a veteran American male, Michael Yani beat Roberto Mello.  We don't yet know whether either Arn or Yani made it into the main draw.
   Otherwise, we have just enjoyed sitting in the hot tub and reading.  ("Noises Off!")  We did go to see one of the movies that was nominated this year for the Oscar's Best Picture, "Hugo" by Martin Scorcese.  We enjoyed it, but agreed that "The Artist" was better. They both, curiously, were tributes to the silent film makers.