Sleek Style

Just a short distance from yesterdays home, I found this sleek modern ranch style home. The side streets along Central Avenue discourage traffic with their narrow lanes and almost hidden entrances, but if you venture in, there is a treasure trove of amazing architectural styles hidden inside.

Along Central Ave

This is one of the homes along Central Avenue and just across the street from Murphy’s Bridle Path that I featured yesterday. If you are driving along Central Avenue, these grand homes are very hard to see. When the weather gets a little cooler, I’m going to take a walk along the Bridle Path and see if I can get some more photos of the grand homes in this area.

Murphy’s Bridle Path

Along Central Avenue between Bethany Home Road and Northern is dirt path named for W. J. Murphy a pioneer in the development of Phoenix and more specifically the citrus business. He brought California citrus trees to Arizona and started an orchard. Since Arizona fruit ripens before the Southern California fruit, he was able to get his produce to the eastern markets ahead of the California harvest a move that made Arizona one of the country’s largest citrus producers.

This path has been designated a historic site and today is used almost exclusively by joggers and bike riders. The homes along this stretch of Central Avenue are beautiful with varied architecture making the scenery on this path very pleasant.

Powder Puff

A powder puff of a flower being visited by a bee.

Tall building and tall trees

One of the Central Avenue high-rise buildings framed by some tall palm trees.

Cutler-Plotkin Jewish Heritage Center

This building was built in 1921 and served as the first synagogue in Phoenix. Sometime after 1949 it became a Baptist church. When that church moved, the Arizona Jewish Historical Society restored the building to be used as a museum and cultural center.

Greenhouse

This is a house located in the Encanto Palmcroft historic neighborhood. I love the way those vines have completely covered the front of this two-story house.

Korean War Veterans Memorial

Here is another memorial located in the Wesley Bolin Plaza near the state capitol. It was erected in 1990 with a pagoda that shelters a brass Korean bell.

9/11 Memorial

This is a portion of the 9/11 Memorial located in the Wesley Bolin Plaza in front the Arizona State Capitol. It consists of a concrete disc topped by a ring of steel. Phrases have been laser cut into the steel so that the reflections appear on the concrete and can be read. This memorial created huge outcry in Arizona over some of the quotes that some people thought were unpatriotic. The intent of the memorial was to express the wide range of views that Americans have about the attacks the US response to it. Personally, I find the memorial quite moving.

Pink Fire Truck

I spotted this pink fire truck parked in the parking lot where I work. It’s part of the “Pink Heals” campaign started by a group of firefighters, police officers, and community leaders to raise awareness and money for the fight against cancer for women. From what I can tell, this truck and others like it around the country travel from community to community for appearances in parades and rallies where cancer awareness and fund raising is happening. Here is a link to their website.

Cute license plate "Pink Ribbon Tour".

From Shopping to Learning

This area in downtown Phoenix started its life as The Mercado, a shopping and dining place. Now it is part of the downtown campus of Arizona State University. What a pleasant place for learning.

Early Morning Surprise

I was out yesterday morning for an early morning walk when I was dazzled by this cactus in a neighbor’s yard. I immediately hurried home to get the camera and went back to get a photo. This is a night blooming cactus so it’s rare to see these flowers wide open and I don’t think I have ever seen one with so many blooms all at once. What a wonderful surprise.

Here is a close up of one of the flowers.  What a beauty.

Hey Simon….

......watch out for this lady over here with the big camera!

America’s Tacos

This is a new and very popular taco shop that just opened near where I live. I heard some rave reviews from several people so weekend before last, I stopped in for a bite. The Carne Asada burrito was so good, I went back the next day and got another. The shop is named for the owner, America Corrales, the youngest of six children born in Culiacan, Sinaloa in Mexico. America and her husband opened their first restaurant in 2008 and now have three locations across the valley.

Ancient Egyptian Flowers

These are blooms from the cactus in my back yard, but they reminded me of the Egyptian flowers you see in hieroglyphic paintings.

Isn’t there a similarity?

Attracting the wild love birds

Someone told me that the wild love birds who are living in the Phoenix area are attracted to those seed clusters that you can find in the pet stores so I bought one and hung it in the tree in my front yard. They found it quickly and it was gone in 5 days. I’ll have to get another one because these birds are fun to watch.  The are such clowns.

Butterfly…..and friends

I didn’t know when I was photographing this butterfly that he had a few friends in the photo too. Look closely at the far left and far right of the photo.

Here's a little close up.

Tempted

This fruit tart was so beautifully crafted that it stopped me in my tracks on a recent trip to the grocer. It was certainly tempting, but I restrained myself and simply took a photo instead.

Climber

I took this photo the day after I got my new telephoto lens wanting to do some test photographs. This is the very top of one of the mountains of the Phoenix Mountain Preserve taken from the Biltmore golf course. I didn’t know until I downloaded the photos and started examining them that I captured a climber. He is really hard to see in the small photo above, so I added an arrow to point to him.  I cropped the climber out of the photo above and put it below so you could see him better.  I think I'm really going to enjoy this new lens.

Telephoto

Downtown Phoenix from a long distance using my new 300mm telephoto lens.

Oh the joys of new toys!

Perch

The remains of a century plant bloom makes a perfect perch for the birds.

Welcome Diner

I found this cozy little diner in the Garfield neighborhood.

Morning Dove

In search of a drink of water.

Penthouse View

The view down Central Avenue from the Penthouse at One Lexington. I think I could live here!
And, for my local readers, this penthouse is going to be the grand prize in the newest Health & Wealth Raffle.

Bees know….

.......that Echinacea is good for you.

Hanging cactus

I love the entrance to this home with its hanging cactus out front.

McCune Mansion

The McCune mansion was built in the 1960’s by Walter McCune who made his fortune in the oil industry; Pennzoil to be exact. The home has 12 bedrooms, 37 bathrooms, 6 kitchens, a bowling alley, movie theatre, indoor skating rink, recording studio, and a ballroom. It sits on 6 acres of land at the top of a knoll in Paradise Valley. The outdoor amenities include an Olympic size swimming pool, tennis courts, a racquetball court, and a heliport. It went on the market for $25 million in 2007 and is currently listed at $15 million. It apparently needs quite a lot of work to bring it up to date so I would call it the ultimate "fixer-upper." There is a rumor that before the heating and cooling system was updated, the monthly electric bill came in around $17,000.

The Ultimate Rock Garden

This rock garden is so huge I couldn’t even see the house.

Finch

Every now and then I click the shutter just at the right moment.

Nature’s Bright Colors

Here is another bright colors entry, this time using the real colors created by mother nature.

Theme Day: Bright Colors

A little over a month ago, my good friend Julie (Scottsdale Daily Photo) asked me to join her and her husband Dave (Tamarindo Daily Photo) in a summer arts project. The project includes a small group of people in a wide range of ages and an even wider range of artistic training and talents. The project is supposed to last over the summer and give us something to do other than bemoan our excessive heat. Every three weeks, a member of the group gets a turn at supplying a theme for our creative outlet and we all go off and create our little work of art based on that theme. Our most recent theme was “Mountain Moods” using our own Camelback Mountain as the inspiration. Friday night, we all met to look at each other’s work and discuss our creative process. The above photo is my entry and since it is full of bright colors, I thought it would be perfect for today’s theme. (You might notice that it’s the same photo I posted on July 26th.)

I can’t begin to tell you how much fun this has been and this is only our second project. As Julie said last night, “this is way better than a book club”.
By the way, if you want to see the results of each challenge, click here.
Click here to view thumbnails for all participants