Photo Reflections on a Vacation in Arizona

Prescott is a red dot in the center

I just ended my Christmas vacation—the last one of my Georgetown career—and for the first time, I did not go home to Ketchikan. Instead I went and stayed with my girlfriend and her family in Prescott, Arizona, and I had a wonderful experience. (In past blogging, I've written negatively about Arizona here and here, but positively here.)

I spent a lot of good time with my girlfriend's parents and much of her extended family, and we also went on roadtrips to Sedona (northwest of Prescott) and to Phoenix (to the south). Instead of getting all prosy about my three weeks of relaxation, though, I will now attempt to choose just eight photos to represent my time in Arizona. I have over 500 photos from the vacation, so the ones I chose here are ultimately, of course, just a partial reflection.

I hope you enjoy the pictures!

Left: We went to see The Hobbit at the theater! (as I wrote about here). Note how she's picking Bilbo's (Martin Freeman's) nose.

Right: Here we are outside the house. Look at the landscape!

Left: Stockings for the four of us are hung over the fire on Christmas morning. Not shown is the stocking for Pooka, who is a lovable Yorkshire Terrier.

Right: Here I am on New Year's Eve with pear sparkling cider, wearing a t-shirt I got from my girlfriend for Christmas that has a London Underground-style map of Tolkien's Middle Earth.

Left: Here's some of the red rock scenery around Sedona, Arizona. What's really powerful is driving through all of it.

Right: This is an evening view from Jerome, Arizona, a partially-abandoned former mining town that now has lots of cool shops and art studios. The sun is setting, and the shadow of the mountain lies across the Sedona-area landscape.

Below: Here are two courses from a dinner my girlfriend and I made, on the left a green salad with pear, blueberries, walnuts and an asiago frico, and on the right Asian-style pasta with expertly-broiled Alaska halibut.

And finally, here we are in the Phoenix area on one of our last days in Arizona.

Cactus hug!