Scottsdale to Sedona

We left Scottsdale around noon. The morning was more of the same- quiet, followed by a flurry of activity, as we went from it being just me, then me and Ronnie, then everyone and breakfast and the daughter having to leave back for college but not without raiding the refrigerator and supply closet for food and paper towels and the like. We left at pretty much the same time and headed north towards Sedona. I was sorry that we didn't take the scenic route, though parts of the way we came were nice. The highlight was when we passed a sign that read, "Entering Prescott National Forest" at a time that there was not a single tree anywhere in sight. Arizona can be like that.

Sedona has plenty of trees. It's in an area called Verde Valley, and it's certainly more verde than where we'd been. There's a large creek (I know that sounds like an oxymoron but it's big enough to be shown on maps) that runs through the center of it, which made it a major agricultural area before rising real estate prices drove the farmers out. Now they harvest tourists, here to see the red rocks and experience the energy fields. We haven't visited any of they vortexes (vortices, anyone?) but we might on our way out of town. Supposedly there's swirling energy coming out of the earth in a few places.

I'm not sure what gives, but it's plenty scenic here. This is the view from our hotel room balcony if you bend uncomfortably and look in the right directions (hey, better than nothing).

The hotel we're staying at, (I make good English, eh?) is called L'Auberge. I don't know what an auberge is and am too lazy to look it up. But it's a nice little place right on the stream, 80 rooms or so, a kind of cross between a luxury resort and a summer camp. It's got a great spa (by reputation and based on what I had done to me) and a terrific restaurant (again, based both on reputation and experience).

The town itself looks kind of iffy. Tough to see anything there except for t-shirt shops, tour operators, crystal vendors and frozen yogurt places. And very busy and crowded. The hotel is just down the hill from the town but is very quiet and pleasant.

We had a great dinner and then completely crashed right afterwards. Out hosts in Scottsdale are late night people, which we are too, but we did not want to get switched over to Pacific time. We'd been eating dinner at 9, which is midnight eastern. Here, we ate at 8. Best we could do. But asleep by 11, thank goodness. Tomorrow will be time to visit the area and maybe venture into town.