TUCSON

Rhonda had a relative named Tucson, pronounced Tuck' Son, with a nickname of Tuck, but this is about the city not the man.  We recently spent several days in the Tucson area, Oro Valley to be specific. 

A View from the Oro Valley

We headquartered at the home of a couple of friends from our Goshen College days, and the view above could easily be their back yard!  We had never visited any place in Arizona, so everything was new-to-us, from the restaurants to the local sights and sounds.  Of course food is always high on our agenda, and thus we usually had a light breakfast so that we could expend all of our 'points' later in the day.  All of the eateries were very good, and included the El Charro Cafe, Noble Hops, Sauce with a bit of gelato at Frost, Choice Greens and Caffe Torino. You can get a feel for each place by clicking on the links, but the Italian fare, bottle of Malbec and a bit of sorbet at the Caffe Torino was particularly special.

Other highlights included a visit to the Tohono Chul Park (outstanding desert botanical garden), a tram ride and walk in Sabino Canyon, a walk-about in the town of Tubac, and browsing at the Mark Sublette Medicine Man Gallery.  A special part of the gallery is the Maynard Dixon Museum, so any of you who are afficiandos of Native American and Southwest art, this is a must-see place.  Dudley and I did a 5.5 mile RT hike to the Catalina Mountains Romero Pools - very nice!

And we learned the proper pronunciation of Saguaro!