Tucson in February is magic - the weather is warm, with temps in the 60s and 70s and before the heat of summer kicks in, with abundant sunshine and little rain.

It's a perfect long-weekend getaway that combines easy access to tons of hiking, a vibrant restaurant scene - the US's first City of Gastronomy for its fusion of Mexican, Southwest and indigenous flavors - and some world-class spas. There's also a concentrated art scene that's well worth a look. After an extended cold stretch in Philadelphia, I decided to check into one of the original destination spas - Canyon Ranch - for a mental and physical reset. 

Canyon Ranch

Canyon Ranch was one of the first real 'destination spas' in the country and it shows. The grounds are amazing - low slung adobe-colored building spread out over a massive campus of pools, hiking trails, spa, gym, a lodge and rooms. The cacti, palms and flowers are all mature and blend everything together in a superlative southwest setting. For my stay, a Canyon Ranch representative reaches out a month ahead of time with a questionnaire, several tracks to choose from (weight loss, outdoor active, spa focused, etc) and you get a look at the daily activities being offered to help plan your day. I really liked the balance of 'preplanning so you come in with some expectations and goals' and 'OH! there's Qi Gong in 20 minutes, I'll go check that out' spontaneity. My plan was to front-load all the activities in the morning and leave the afternoon and evenings free to explore Tuscon. So I was up early and headed to yoga, meditation or cardio circuit by 8am. 

For nightlife in Tucson, you'll end up at the Hotel Congress at some point during the night. In the newly opened Century Room, the hotel added an intimate jazz space slash cocktail lounge that has a full roster of jazz, fusion, singer-songwriters. I was lucky enough to get tickets to a second show for Howard Alden's trip - he of "Sweet and Lowdown" fame - that did a great set of jazz-influenced songs featuring Alden's virtuosic guitar playing. The vibe was straight out of Birdland and stood in contradistinction to the Insane Clown Posse show that was directly across the street at the Rialto theater...but I thought that was as good an analogy for Tuscon nightlife as any. There were several good restaurants in the downtown district, including an awesome steak house Charro Steak & Del Ray (loved the local mesquite wood fired grill) and some spots fairly overrun with University of Arizona students on the Historic 4th Street corridor..but I liked Ermanos Bar, kind of a gastropub, and Boca Tacos for tacos and tequila.

Art Museum around Tucson

The University of Arizona has several art museums on its campus, including the main museum which houses everything from renaissance art, to the art of the Southwest to a finely edited contemporary collection - including a great Mark Rothko and my favorite piece in the collection, Joan Brown's abstract "Things in Landscape #1" (here, upper left). The small but terrific Center for Creative Photography is directly opposite and features some Ansel Adams works alongside some more contemporary photos that deal with the subjects of race, immigration and climate change.

Tucson Museum of Art

Take a Hike!!

The facilities were really terrific - from the zen yoga studio with its singing bowls, the most beautiful sauna I've ever seen, to a massive men's locker room with plunge pools, steam, showers and chill space. My treatments were all great - nothing superlative - but the list of classes, workshops, lectures and the sheer variety among them all, was the real highlight for me. The food was decent - breakfasts of avocado toast, mid-morning antioxidant green veggie smoothie and lunches had a pretty awesome homemade pizza selection. So it was all about balancing rest with intense activity, food with burning calories outdoors within the resort's really calming and chill ecosystem. Since I was traveling solo, I made an effort to head off the campus each afternoon or evening to see what Tucson had to offer...and I was pleasantly surprised!

Century Room, Hotel Congress

The Tucson Museum of Art is right downtown and featured an exhibition by Swiss-born, Tucson-based artist Olivier Mosset, whose large scale, monochromatic works reminded me of Barnett Newman's mural-sized work. Occupying much of the top floor's exhibition space The museum is built around a central staircase, reminiscent of the Guggenheim in NYC, that displayed a wide variety of works from Rodin sculptures, contemporary paintings - including a Sterling Ruby work (here, upper left) that I really loved - as well as a very well done presentation of indigenous artwork and decorative works. 

Tucson Museum of Art - Oliver Mosset

Tucson is proximate to dozens of hiking sites, ranging from the paved and popular Tumamoc Hill (more like a stairclimber substitute) that's 10 minutes outside of town, to world-class hikes that can be several hours out into the Sonoran desert and back. I tried two different spots and thought they were really challenging and so worthwhile. Tanque Verde (here, pictured with double falls) was a great hike that led down to a small beach (clothing optional, as I came to find out) that has a pool fed from mountain springs. The water winds its way through a beautiful gorge ending in a series of waterfalls. The cliffs were a dramatic couple of hundred feet above the riverbed and it took some intense scrambling to get back up to the top over some boulders and rock outcroppings. You could pick a different hike every day and still not exhaust the easy access to Rincon mountains, Ventana Canyon and Catalina foothills trails. 

Tumamoc Hill

Parting Shot:

The enduring image of the Southwest, the Saguaro (suh-WAH-ro) cactus grows only in the Sonoran Desert and can be upwards of fifty feet tall and live for hundreds of years. The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is a (mostly) outdoor museum that features the animals and flora and fauna of the desert. Far from a stuffy museum, this place is part zoo, part nature preserve, part garden. The desert hike is a half-hour walk into the landscape that dates back to the prehistoric era and has over 1,200 species of plants to see. Well worth it and the drive into the wide-open desert of the Saguaro National Park is simply stunning. Gracias!