The Lobby from SPG: Arizona Archives

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Starwood Insider - Lucy Williams - Linger for a Lifetime Within The Phoenician Resort

Monday August 4, 2008

Lucy Williams is an Orlando-based writer for Starwood Vacation Ownership and thelobby.com's expert on the subject.

Nestled at the base of Camelback Mountain in Scottsdale, Arizona is The Phoenician resort, a luxurious oasis where you may relax in unrivaled accommodations amid serene desert beauty. And now you can enjoy a lifetime of exquisite experiences within The Phoenician resort with a unique fractional ownership opportunity. As a Member of The Phoenician Residences, The Luxury Collection Residence Club, Scottsdale, the distinctive pleasures of The Phoenician become yours to savor. Exquisite two- and three-bedroom floor plans are currently available. Select features include imported Irish linens, rich hardwood floors, a travertine fireplace, a private plunge pool, LCD televisions and an outdoor summer kitchen with gas grill. Amenities vary from Residence to Residence.

Here you may indulge in an outstanding array of amenities and pleasures. Enjoy three nine-hole championship golf courses surrounded by the rich colors and textures of the desert. Play an invigorating match at the Tennis Garden, with eleven lighted courts and four unique surfaces. Or simply unwind at one of eight shimmering pools, where you may enjoy private cabanas and a 165-foot water slide.

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Starwood Insider - Lucy Williams - Hunt for the Roaming Gnome

Friday July 25, 2008

Lucy Williams is an Orlando-based writer for Starwood Vacation Ownership and thelobby.com's expert on the subject.

The Travelocity Roaming Gnome is on another adventure, and this time he has been seen at several different Starwood Vacation Ownership resorts. When you stay at one of these resorts in 2008, you can go on a Roaming Gnome scavenger hunt for a chance to win prizes. Roaming Gnomes will be hidden in secret spots around the resorts. Participants will receive a clue sheet with hints as to where they are hiding. Once you complete your clue sheet, you can redeem it for a prize at the resort. You will also be entered into a grand prize drawing to win a five-day, four-night resort stay, plus two airline tickets worth up to $750 each. The contest began on May 1 and will continue through the end of 2008. The grand prize winner will be chosen at the end of the year.

Participating Starwood Vacation Ownership resorts are: Sheraton Vistana Villages and Sheraton Vistana Resort in Orlando, Florida; The Westin St. John Resort & Villas in St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands; The Westin Ka'anapali Ocean Resort Villas in Maui, Hawai'i; The Westin Princeville Ocean Resort Villas in Kaua'i, Hawai'i; The Westin Mission Hills Resort & Villas in Rancho Mirage, California; Sheraton Desert Oasis and The Westin Kierland Villas in Scottsdale, Arizona; Sheraton Mountain Vista in Avon, Colorado; Sheraton Broadway Plantation in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina; Sheraton PGA Vacation Resort in Port St. Lucie, Florida; and Vistana's Beach Club in Jensen Beach, Florida.

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"Love Your Luggage" Package at the Sheraton Wild Horse Pass Resort & Spa

Friday July 4, 2008

Sheraton Wild Horse Pass 200.jpg Do those new airline checked-bag fees have you down? Do you find yourself cramming everything you can into an overstuffed carry-on just to avoid the hassle and extra expense of checking a proper suitcase? If so, you're going to love the "Love Your Luggage" package at the Sheraton Wild Horse Pass Resort & Spa in Chandler, Arizona. Go ahead and check a bag, because guests at this luxurious resort need only to show proof of a luggage charge to be reimbursed $25 per person, up to $50 per guest room. You might appreciate the extra luggage space, because the Sheraton Wild Horse Pass has it all. You'll want your lucky golf pants for a round on one of the resort's two championship golf courses. A swimsuit is essential for a dip in one of the sparkling swimming pools with waterfalls and a 111-foot water slide designed to resemble the nearby Casa Grande ruins. Western wear is always in fashion at the nearby 1880's Western Town, Rawhide, which is accessible from the resort by boat (pictured). And dinner at the signature restaurant Kai - which serves food grown right on the Gila River Indian Community - is a perfect occasion to flaunt some of your more stylish evening wear. Offered from $169, the package includes one night in a traditional guest room and is valid through December 31, 2008. To take advantage of the "Love Your Luggage" package, click here or call 602-225-0100 and mention the LUGGAGE promotional code while booking.

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Explore

Hit the Beach in Tempe, Arizona

Monday May 19, 2008

Tempe%20Lake%20200.jpg The city of Tempe, just to the east of Phoenix, is generally thought of as a pretty arid place, but you can find plenty of aquatic action if you know where to look. One of the jewels of this trendy city is Tempe Town Lake, an artificial lake fed by the waters of the Rio Salado (Salt River). Visitors flock to Tempe Beach Park for all kinds of outdoor activities, including bike riding, picnicking, and splashing around in Splash Playground, but it would be a shame not to take advantage of the opportunity to go boating in central Arizona. I don't know what it is, but there's just something special about boating in the desert. The Rio Lago Cruise company offers rentals of all kinds of boats, from tiny pedal boats and kayaks to electric-powered runabouts and cruisers, so you can either get your daily exercise on the high seas, or kick back and chug along in silent, environmentally-advanced comfort. Normally I'm a kayak guy, but I might have to take a spin around the lake in an electric runabout, just to see what it's like. Starwood has properties throughout the Phoenix/Tempe area, including the Four Points by Sheraton Tempe, and will welcome its newest Tempe property, aloft Tempe, on April 1, 2009.

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Starwood Insider - Lucy Williams - Celebrating Super Bowl XLII: Football Fever in Arizona

Friday February 1, 2008

Lucy Williams is an Orlando-based writer for Starwood Vacation Ownership and thelobby.com's expert on the subject. Today she takes us to Arizona for Super Bowl weekend.

Soon, throngs of football fanatics will flock to Arizona, eager to watch two talented NFL teams battle for the Super Bowl XLII title. The event will be held February 3, 2008 at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, a unique venue featuring a retractable roof and retractable natural-grass field.

If you would like to get closer to the action for Super Bowl XLII, consider visiting Scottsdale, Arizona. Even if you're not a football fan, you'll discover plenty of ways to entertain yourself in the Southwest. Sheraton Desert Oasis (pictured) and The Westin Kierland Villas, both located in Scottsdale, offer spacious villas amid desert splendor. You can enjoy spectacular scenery while riding horseback through the desert, biking through the craggy mountainside or taking to the sky in a hot air balloon. Or simply relax and savor a break from the everyday in the comfort of your resort.

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Savor

Destination Spotlight - Arizona - Cowboy Up in Tucson

Wednesday December 12, 2007

Despite the rampant development, it's still pretty easy to imagine what Arizona was like back in the days of the frontiersmen — especially at the Westin La Paloma Resort & Spa out in the Catalina Foothills of Tucson. Looking out toward the mountains, surrounded by saguaros and sagebrush, you almost feel like a cowboy — even if you are standing on the 9th green, driver in hand. You can hold onto that cowboy feeling at a couple of local steakhouses.

Sure it's a little hokey with its "authentic recreation" of an Old West town, but Trail Dust Town also happens to be home to two of the best steakhouses in the city, if not the country. Pinnacle Peak is famous for its generous steak portions and its "no neckties" policy — wear one and it'll get cut off and hung from the rafters. (Needless to say, kids love this place.) El Corral is a bit more upscale but still family friendly, specializing in prime rib. The Adobe Mud Pie dessert also gets high marks.

At Daisy Mae's Steak House, the steaks are huge, the sides are standard (baked beans and potatoes, true cowboy style) and the hospitality is warm and friendly. The walls here are decorated with hundreds of dollar bills with comments from guests (add your own if you like). Though the steaks are excellent, the stars of the show are the mesquite-smoked baby back ribs. Succulent and smoky, you'll be hard-pressed to find a better barbecue sauce. Save a little room for the house-made apple pie.

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Celebrate

Destination Spotlight - Arizona - The Wonder of Kartchner Caverns

Tuesday December 11, 2007

In the natural world, I often think of state and national parks as America's ancient institutions, part of the geographic vernacular of regions. What would California be without Yosemite or Wyoming without Yellowstone Park, Arizona sans Grand Canyon? While it's always fun to revisit a favorite one, it's a pleasure to learn about a new addition to the natural world. Next time you're in Tucson, staying at the Sheraton Tucson Hotel & Suites, plan a day trip and visit one of Arizona's treasures: the limestone caverns of Kartchner Caverns State Park. The caverns, discovered by accident in 1974 by explorers Randy Tufts and Gary Tenen, sit at the bottom of a sinkhole in the Whetstone Mountains and are nothing short of dazzling. Although nestled between the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts, the cave is known as a wet living cave, and maintains a moist 99% relative humidity microclimate that has allowed for abundant calcium carbonate growth. In recent years, scientists have discovered that the Kartchner formation grew over millions of years, after rainwater penetrated through the cracks, dissolving the natural limestone blocks of the mountain. The meticulous droplets of rainwater over 200,000 years helped created speleothems formations, the colorful mineral deposits that make Kartchner Caverns such a unique attraction. To keep the cave and its delicate conditions intact, the founders spent 14 years protecting it until it became designated as a state park. Now open to the public, entrance is through an airlock (pictured). Daily guided tours showcase such wonders as the world's longest soda straw stalactites and Kubla Khan, a 58 foot tall column and the largest natural attraction in the state.

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Offbeat

Destination Spotlight - Arizona - Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin West

Tuesday December 11, 2007

Vernon Swaback told azpbs.org, "to be a Taliesin apprentice, you needed a hammer, a sleeping bag, and a tuxedo." The Arizona architect studied at Taliesin West, Frank Lloyd Wright's school, in the 1950s. During those glorious decades when Wright and his family called the desert compound home, students not only learned the tricks of a magnificent trade, they built their own dwellings, and feasted at black-tie dinners. Today, apprentices continue to uphold Wright's grand, yet organic tradition, but they also give tours of the 600-acre compound, build from the sand and stone found in the surrounding McDowell Mountains.

The rough surfaces and sharp angles of Taliesin West blend into the Sonoran Desert "as though it had stood there during creation," as Wright liked to say. Construction began in 1937 and even today it evolves. Gardens, and terraces offer panoramic views of the breathtaking landscape. See the room where Wright designed the New York Guggenheim, examine the furniture he created, and peak inside the shelters where his apprentices dwell. Says Swaback on azpbs.org, "at night, I walked out into the blackness, quiet...mystical. And when I went to sleep in my little tent, I was part of all of that. I will never live that well again." Ponder that from your luxury room at The Phoenician Resort. One of the few spots that rivals the mystery and beauty of Wright's desert masterpiece.

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Celebrate

Get Your Green On at the Arizona Irish Festival

Monday October 8, 2007

While the Irish communities in places like Boston and New York gets most of the attention, plenty of other cities throughout the U.S. have vibrant Irish populations as well. Arizona, for example, might seem an unlikely place to find a hub of Hibernia, but the southwestern desert will become a sea of green this fall, when Phoenix hosts its seventh annual Arizona Irish Festival.

Yes, the sandy, cactus-dotted town of Phoenix seems about as far away from the Emerald Isle as you can get, but on October 27, Irish people from throughout the area along with those interested in Irish culture will converge at the Irish Cultural Center and Margaret T. Hance Park to enjoy Irish music and dance, arts and crafts, and all kinds of great food. Top-notch Irish entertainers for the day's festivities include the Brazen Heads, the McMorrows, and Celtic Spring, who are known as the "Van Trapp family of Celtic music" and were recently finalists on America's Got Talent. Meanwhile, four different Irish dancing organizations, including the Bracken School of Irish Dance, will perform their tightly-choreographed routines on the main stage. So feast on a hearty plate of corned beef and cabbage or fish and chips from the food court and revel in the grandeur of Ireland under the Arizona sun. And at the end of the day, enjoy a pint of Guinness or a wee dram of whiskey at a local Irish pub like Rosie McCaffrey's, Rula Bula, or Skeptical Chymist, which was deemed Arizona's Best Irish Pub 2007 by the Arizona Republic.

Starwood has nine properties in and around Phoenix, including the centrally-located Sheraton Crescent Hotel and the award-winning Phoenician, a member of Starwood's Luxury Collection.

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Inside

Starpick the Westin La Paloma Resort & Spa

Wednesday September 5, 2007

Westin%20La%20Paloma%20200.jpg The desert southwest is beautiful during the fall, with mild temperatures, gentle breezes, and plenty of sunshine. And if that's what you're craving, then you might consider taking a little trip out to Tucson, Arizona. The Westin La Paloma Resort & Spa is one of this week's participating Starpicks properties, with last-minute rates of at least 20% off regular rates for stays during the next six weeks.

The Westin La Paloma is one of the premiere spa resorts in the southwest, with 27 holes of golf, five swimming pools with a 177-foot water slide, and a world class, 9,300 square foot spa. At the Elizabeth Arden Red Door Spa, guests can choose from treatments such as a purifying seaweed body wrap and desert stone hot massage, and relax in eucalyptus saunas, heated Jacuzzis, and therapeutic steam rooms. But the pampering doesn't end when you leave the spa: a cocktail at the Desert Garden Lounge is just the thing to usher in the evening gracefully, and for dinner, Janos can't be beat. This Four-Star, Four-Diamond award winning restaurant has been Arizona's highest-rated restaurant since 1983, with French-inspired southwestern cuisine that uses locally-grown produce and the finest fresh seafood and meats available anywhere. A couple of days at this desert oasis is just about as good as it gets, so visit the Starpicks site today and see if the west is calling to you.