Off to the Sun: An Unlikely Oasis for Thoroughly Covered Ladies

Interior of St. Anthony's Church - note "standing room only". Only children and the elderly sit during a service

My friend Michele took the lead on my last day in AZ and drove out to a most unlikely oasis: St. Anthony's Greek Orthodox Monastery in Florence, about 15 minutes outside of town. Miles of sand, dust, scrub punctuated by the occasional saguaro gave way to a place that appeared to be air-lifted whole from Greece. The plantings, the fountains, the chapels, the acres of citrus in full bloom - it was almost hallucinatory. 

The latest in Ortodox fashion

After pulling into the parking lot, we walked under the arch and filed over to the gatehouse where attentive Greek women (covered head to toe) dressed us up over our garments, making sure that 1. all pants and legs were covered by skirts, 2. no bare arms or neckline were on view 3. hair and neck were completely covered and 4. no bare feet were exposed. I have to give them credit; from a trunk of skirts, scarves and shirts, they managed to put together some semblance of a matching outfit for every female visitor. Naturally, male visitors just breezed right through (though long sleeves and long pants were required). We ladies were warned to not look at, photograph or speak to any of the monks, and to avoid them whenever possible.

Though the requirements for entry seemed excessive, they were merely hot (it WAS over 80 degrees), and so worth it. The grounds were like a fairyland of semi-tropical plants: flaming bougainvillea, palms of all sorts, jasmines and more all anchored by pleasant sitting areas and a variety of fountains. The citrus fields were in full bloom, scenting the air with each breeze. The grounds were also home to St. Anthony's church and six different chapels, each dedicated to a different saint, all unique in materials and decor. It was here that I adopted two more saints (I'm already a big fan of St. Jude, patron saint of impossible causes). Welcome St. Nectarios the Wonderworker and Nicholas the Wonderworker. Who could resist a few wonders worked?

Icons everywhere

This was a special treat for me, as my grandmother was Orthodox (though from the Russian branch), and I recognized both the style and identity of many of the icons in the chapels. I always thought the babushka (headscarf) my grandmother wore most of her life in public was a fashion statement, not a religious requirement. In Russian, babushka is another word for "grandmother".

 

The Monastery was founded in 1995, when several monks were brought from the Philotheou Monastery on Mt. Athos in Greece. They built the main church, living quarters for monks, a dining hall, and guest quarters. The Monastery has since expanded to include the chapels, gardens, citrus and olive orchards. The monks and novices hold all things in common and follow a strict daily schedule of prayer, work and spiritual reading. Orthodox guests are invited to the Monastery to spend a few days in contemplation. The front "wall" of the church and chapels (pictured at left and in the top picture) is actually a screen - the priests perform sacred parts of the religious ceremony behind it during the service.

Chapel ceiling

Speaking of Mt. Athos, after our visit to the Monastery, we stopped at the Mt. Athos Resaurant in Florence, keeping with the mood of the day. Started by a family of New Yorkers who fled west after 9/11, the food is quite good - especially the traditional Greek dishes. It was a bittersweet goodbye to Florence, Arizona - the next day I was boarding an American jet to San Diego.

St. George chapel's resident pussycat

All images by Joanne Orion Miller unless otherwise noted

Off to the Sun: A Really BIG Cave, and Daisy Mae's Revenge

Now that's a BIG cave! Image courtesy of Michelle Thompson, Karnchner Caverns State Park

We have soda straws, columns, birdsnest needle quartz, totems, heicites, rimstone dams - and, in case you're hungry, brushite moonmilk, turnip shields, popcorn, and bacon. Unfortunately, none of these are edible, but all are truly incredible. I'm mostly a dry cave connoisseur, like the ones I visited in my trips to France and Spain to see the cave art in 2013. Dry caves are just that - open to the air, and dried out, therefore no longer growing formations such as soda straws and moonmilk. Karchner Caverns is a wet cave, and the water coming from the land above the cave continues its slow path through layers of limestone and earth to create a fantastical underscape in a series of large rooms. The formations take millions of years to solidify; first the hollow soda straws aggregate calcium and other minerals, growing down from the cave ceiling, filling out over thousands of years to create stalactites. Sometimes they break from their own weight, other times water drops on the floor below to form a cone, a stalagmite -they meet, and a column is formed. In the picture above, the massive column in the middle of the large room is one of the biggest in the world, named Kubla Kahn, six stories high.

Karchner Caverns is the most popular State Park in Arizona, and with good reason. Heroic measures have been taken to not only preserve the cave interior and its timeless work, but to make the cave accessible to everyone. It's a triumph of conservation and education, and the rangers on duty clearly love the cave and can't wait to share it with visitors. The cave was discovered by a couple of amateur spelunkers in 1974, who wriggled through coat-hanger-sized holes from room to room in complete darkness. The pair kept the cave secret until 1978. Its transformation into a State Park reads like a suspense novel. It truly is a wonder for all ages. In addition, the park is designated as a dark sky site - no ambient light topside at night for you stargazers.

Image courtesy of Michelle Thompson, Karchner Caverns State Park

And just in case you're in the market for a new stuffed toy, this ancient cave sloth (about the size of a refrigerator with legs) was found in the cave - just the bones, of course. Small openings on the hills above the caves came and went over the eons, permitting animals - generally smaller than this guy - to wander in.

No visit to the area would be complete without a stop at a cowboy (cowgirl, actually) bar. Daisy Mae's Steakhouse is a local favorite in Tucson, the kind of place that has dollar bills pinned to the walls and a thin yellowish veneer on the 1960s wood paneling, from the years when people could actually smoke inside. Now the smoke is relegated to the mesquite barbecue pit outside. Did I mention the meat? It was GOOD. My friend had the pork chop and I had ribs, both served with all-you-can-eat beans and cowboy toast, plus baked potato with butter and sour cream. Oh yes, a chopped salad to start, but that hardly put a dent in the carb/protein fest that is Daisy Mae's. A local told me the place used to be named L'il Abner's (the professional matress-tester husband/boyfriend (?) of Daisy Mae in the old comic strips). I guess Abner snoozed his way out of the partnership and left Daisy to mind the pit.

All images by Joanne Orion Miller unless noted

Off to the Sun: Paint, Pour, Pour, Pour

Climbing up to 83 degrees on April 3rd. Ah, spring in the desert

It's not all fun and games. Wait! It is! After our astonishing night at the Desert Botanical Garden, we needed to (sort of) rest. So the next day it was off to Paint-N-Pour, an event put on all over the area by a couple of local artists at the Windmill Winery in Florence. The winery is set in a very cute little farm and pours wines from all over the world, though the website is a tad misleading - lush as it looks, it's in the middle of miles of desert. The $35 fee included our first glass of artistic lubricant, and a good time was had by all. Completed artwork included interpretations of Native women in blankets, crazed yurts, surfboards, deranged hot dogs, and in one case, "My Mother's Apron".

Image courtesy of Paint N pour

 Our creative senses alight, we went home to sleep it off, and to prepare for the next day's two-and-a-half-hour drive to Karchner Caverns State Park south of Tucson.

 At home, Coco patiently awaited the unveiling of our new works of art, slated to be hung in the world-famous garage gallery. Or was it dinner she was waiting for...?

 All images by Joanne Orion Miller unless otherwise noted

Off to the Sun: a Day of Art in Scottsdale

Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art  (SMOCA) Moon viewing installation

 Thank goodness for friends in far-flung places. When the dampness in Northern California results in a fine layer of mold on things that should never see spores (and it has been one rainy winter!), my thoughts stray to sunnier climes and my good friends who are smart enough to live there. And who are willing to put up with me for a few days...

First stop on this trip: Michele, who lives just outside Florence, AZ, midway between Greater Phoenix and Tucson. Florence is one of the oldest towns in Arizona, a typical dusty desert town, I always thought it didn't have a lot to recommend it; but on this trip I learned how wrong I was (more on that in a later blog).

Michele picked me up at PHX (also known as Sky Harbor), and we hit the ground running. Or rather riding. Scottsdale is one of several smaller cities that has been encompassed by Greater Phoenix, but retains a distinctive identity, and one of the coolest things about Scottsdale is the free trolley that buzzes around Old Town, where a lot of the museums, galleries and shopping extravaganzas mix with dozens of restaurants and cafes. It runs every 15 minutes, and yes folks, it's free. So we parked and picked it up, taking in the big art pieces that dot the landscape


Our appetites whetted for more visual candy, we hopped off the trolley  and walked a couple blocks to Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (better known as SMOCA), currently celebrating its 20th anniversary with a series of world-class videos.






 
The museum is a success story in every way. Resurrected from an abandoned, run-down warehouse, the space is gorgeous. Sleek modern architecture surrounded by sensitive desert plantings abound in Scottsdale, and this is another fine example. The high ceilings make for vast installations that wouldn't look right anywhere else.

I've never been to a museum where the docents (who look nothing like the typical idea of a docent, by the way) are so enthusiastic about the art, they can't help but share their excitement about the artworks and the artists behind them - definitely an education in contemporary art.

The objects in this picture may look like giant pushpins, but they're actually chairs that rock from side to side - a little disorienting at first, but then, it's a party!

After our contemporary art tour, we drove down to the Desert Botanical Garden in Scottsdale for a truly magical experience.

All images by Joanne Orion Miller unless otherwise noted.

An Amazing Musical Suprise: MIM

What's in a name? I admit, “musical instrument museum” did not inspire me. I pictured a dusty set of cabinets with tarnished saxophones, even though a couple of well-traveled friends raved about the place. How right they were!

I have mentally renamed the Musical Instrument Museum (MIM) “The Amazing Museum of World Music” (the acronym isn't as clever but this place is so uplifting, illuminating and inspiring to everyone, not just musicians, it deserves a name that should have people flocking to it.

First, the building itself is elegant and handsome. Second, visitors experience the best of technology with portable headsets that automatically pick up transmissions when they approach any of the hundreds of video/sound screens that explain and demonstrate various musical styles etc. The exhibition rooms of mechanical music machines and play-it-yourself instruments on the first floor are just plain fun, and the “world of music” on the upper floor is nothing short of fantastic. Talk about seductive! As you pass from area to area, country to country, section to section, snatches of songs and sounds call out to you to stop and examine the unique costumes, cultures, musical styles and instruments from, say, Burkina Faso in Africa, or Latvia, or Israel ( the floor is roughly divided by continents - the US has a room of it's own).
Check out this YouTube video from MIM. The white-coated restorers are a little surreal, and this demonstrates only a minor part of their automated collection of tweeting birds, automatons and giant orchestral machines - a tiny part of everything you'll find here.

The variety is astounding, the depth and breadth of research impressive. But most of all, you will come away entertained, educated, enlightened, and yes, uplifted with the knowledge that wherever a human lives on the the planet, we all speak the language of music.
AND you'll have a new appreciation of the beauty of all sorts of instruments. Tickets run from $10-20, and the museum is open most days, with specially scheduled concerts.

Musical Instrument Museum

4725 E Mayo Blvd.

Phoenix, AZ 85050

(480) 478-6000 

https://mim.org/

Down Home Wright - Taliesin

Every Frank Lloyd Wright space I've seen prior to this one has been built for someone else: private commissions like Fallingwater and the Kentuck Knob home in Pennsylvania, or public spaces such as the Marin County Civic Center in San Rafael, California. They we're designed and built to please others. Taliesin is all about Wright himself: it was built for and by him and his family as an escape from Wisconsin winters.

Every inch of the site reflects FLW, from the height and narrowness of his doorways and low ceilings (some of which were modified after his death to accommodate those taller than Wright’s 5’8”) to the use of cheap, plentiful building materials: local rock, sand, cement, canvas, and plywood.

Wright is often cited as the father of site-specific architecture; Tallesin is a fine example of that, and also very telling about the man. The impression is of a powerful personality, highly egotistical and self-referential, more interested in form than function. By Wright's own admission, he banged his knees more on his own furniture than anything else. The rooms are showcases for interesting, if somewhat awkward, furniture and seating arrangement angles. Views took precedence over comfort, as did the way the piece looked rather than felt.

Wright admired and used plentiful, available materials, evidenced by his appreciation of simple rocks, turned red by centuries underground or sun-blasted black for an equal amount of time. Apprentices - his students -  labored beside him to hoist boulders into cement and sand forms to create dramatic walls while all, including Wright and his long-suffering wife - lived in tents among the scorpions and sagebrush.

 


All the Wright-designed properties I've visited have significant structural flaws (often water-induced leaks), as does Taliesin. The relentless Arizona sun and dust have combined to weather the property, rendering it a bit shabbier than expected, though Wright's placement of viewing sites and water features remains flawless. His sound design in the small cabaret is nothing short of brilliant.

The school of architecture, which still exists today, was Wright's wife's idea - an income source that utilized the site and gave opportunity to the eager young students who saw the value in Wright's idea of creating human habitations as art that enhanced and blended in with the nature around it.

Don't expect a polished property - this is a desert dwelling in every sense of the word, as eccentric and unique as Wright himself. 

Taliesin
12621 N. Frank Lloyd Wright Blvd.
(if using GPS, the address is 12345 N. Taliesin Dr.)
Scottsdale, AZ 85259

http://franklloydwright.org/taliesin-west/

Another Phabulous Pharm in Phoenix - OK, I'll stop now. Phinally.

A view of the groves

“Former Detroit auto industry worker becomes olive farmer”
Isn't that a headline for the ages? Lucky for visitors to the area, That's exactly what Perry Rea did. After a period of study in Italy, the Rea family (wife Brenda and four and a half kids - Brenda was expecting) moved to Queen Creek (southeast Phoenix), planted olive trees and began their own business eleven years ago. Now, Queen Creek Olive Mill is a thriving concern, selling three grades of excellent quality olive oil, flavored oils, tapenades, and lots of other goodies, including beauty products (Olivespa) as well as edibles.
Olive oil lip balm, how do I love thee? Here in the desert, humidity is hard to come by – even in this fertile area, prunes not only grow on trees, but humans can turn into one with very little effort. The new line, created by one of the Rea kids, is fabulous.

Take the tour to find out how olive oil is made, the processes, differences in quality (you may never go to Safeway again), and how to really taste the stuff (hint: you warm it up before you swish it around). The Rea family has also published a pretty and practical take on Italian cooking with plenty of EVOO, of course.

Then order at the counter and wander out to the front shaded area to enjoy a tasty, inexpensive Italian-inspired meal among the groves: lunch every day, dinner on weekends. The Estrella pizza is sublime, the warm olives a meal in themselves. Good-sized portions, casual atmosphere and…most European of all… no tipping unless you force it on the busboys. It’s no wonder the Olive Mill has grown over the years and remains a local favorite.

We tried to leave some food on the plates, but it wasn't easy

The Olive Mill is not far from Schnepf Farm, so make a day of farm stops. Just try to avoid S. Rittenhouse Rd. during commute hours; The former 2-lane farm road hasn't kept up with all the new development in the area, and delays are unavoidable during those times.

Queen Creek Olive Mill
25062 S. Meridian Rd.
Queen Creek, AZ 85142

480-361-9860
https://www.queencreekolivemill.com/

Pharming in Phoenix - Not a Contradiction: Agritopia and Schnepf Farm

Wines from Garage East, Agritopia

Like most cities, Phoenix is composed of once-separate villages grown together into a mishmash of streets and neighborhoods - a fact that's easy to verify if you look at a map of Phoenix and discover Seventh Street and Seventh Avenue running parallel with each other a few blocks apart. Downtown is as urban as it gets, but as one moves farther out from the center of town, differences begin to appear. The area around Mesa, Gilbert, Chandler and Queen Creek in the southeast quadrant of the city is dotted with small farms interlaced with suburban developments. In fact, the overwhelming majority of farms in Arizona are small, locally owned family operations (under $20,000 a year, according to the USDA) that still manage to produce most of the lettuce consumed in America, and an equally hefty quantity of cotton.

Ag stats aside, few of us are lucky enough to witness the birth of a new hip area, but southeast Phoenix is happening, and signs are everywhere. One of the coolest spots to visit in the area is Agritopia, the brainchild of the Johnston family, who began farming 160 acres in Gilbert in the early 1960s. Instead of selling off parcels to developers who had successfully pressured other small landowners, the Johnston clan developed it themselves, creating a planned residential community of 450 unique houses on 90 acres surrounding 11 acres of urban farmland, a chef-driven restaurant, coffee shop, winery and creative craftsman spaces. All the shops and restaurants are open to the public. The Johnstons gathered a consortium of other producers and makers to create Agritopia, reimagining the existing buildings on the property as housing various hand-made and locally related businesses, all in the most pleasant, grassy, tree-lined setting. The original family home, Joe's Farm Grill, is packed at lunch. The Coffee Shop offers fresh baked goods and local coffee, and a pay-it-yourself shop for produce and products from local businesses features tea, flour and crackers from local grower and grinder Hadley mills, coffee, chocolate and more.
 

Barnone (variously called barn one, bar none, or bar no knee, depending on who you talk to) houses a group of craft businesses such as paper makers, and a brewery, 12 West.

My FAVORITE stop on the property, however, is the winery in Garage East, run by Brian and Megan Ruffentine. It's a bright and welcoming tasting room for Arizona wines (grapes are grown in the Tucson area), ranging from tart whites to the deepest Tempranillo, reminiscent of Spain. 

Served with a delicious platter of locally cured meats, cheeses, medjool dates, honey and those Hadley Mills crackers, it's easy to while away hours here, either in the very hip and light interior, or on the shaded outdoor patio.

For a more traditional take on farming, There's Schnepf Farm. Other than the pure pleasure of saying “schnepf” while attempting to keep all your saliva in your mouth, there’s plenty to be found here for the whole gang. Breakfast is a big fave, thanks to the little patio on the side of the store and the hearty farm breakfast menu and baked goods. The store itself stocks a treasure trove of jams, salsas and local products. Schnepf’s is a real farm, 75 years in the business and run by the fourth generation of the family; they offer just-picked produce as well as u-pick whatever is in season in the fields. Thanks to this area’s unbelievably long growing season (September to July) and double harvest, there’s plenty to be found; however, most people come to Schnepf’s for its most famous product: organic peaches. The farm is the biggest producer in Arizona, and they ship all over. When out of season, there are always jams, salsas and what-all based on the fuzzy fruit. Schnepf's has special events most of the year; check their website for what's available to pick. They're closed July 5 through Labor Day.

As the city continues its relentless march (and the population continues to grow), these types of farms may shrink and disappear - so go now, when the going is good. More to come: another great local farm with a slippery twist...and a place with miles of aisles....

The Farm at Agritopia
3000 E. Ray Rd.
Gilbert, AZ 85296
(480) 988-1238
http://thefarmatagritopia.com/

Schnepf Farms
24810 S. Rittenhouse Rd.
Queen Creek, AZ 85142
(480) 987-3100
http://www.schnepffarms.com/