Catherine Hollis

Arizona and beaches do not usually belong in the same sentence, yet longtime residents of one small La Paz County town know better. Tucked along a wide bend of the Colorado River, this county seat has quiet sandy stretches, warm water, and a laid-back rhythm that feels far away from the freeway crowds. Locals here […]

Central Phoenix hides a leafy retreat where cacti, houseplants, and neighborhood cats share the same sunny lot. It sits just off a busy street, yet the moment you wander in, the city noise seems to fade behind rows of greenery and unique pottery. Longtime plant lovers keep coming back for the healthy selection and the

Arizona has a beach with white sand, calm blue water, and shade trees, and plenty of people who live an hour away have no idea it is there. It sits tucked below a busy resort town, quiet enough that longtime residents drive right past the turnoff without a second thought. That means room to spread

Arizona has a sneaky superpower: some of its most memorable trips barely touch your wallet. You do not need a resort budget to stand at the edge of a canyon, cool off in a mountain creek, or wander a historic mining town frozen in time. A lot of the best spots are free to enter,

Along the Colorado River in Mohave County sits a spot that longtime residents once treated as a quiet fishing outpost, a place where the biggest news was the water level and the temperature reading. Times have changed. What used to be a small riverside stop has grown into one of Arizona’s busiest warm-weather destinations, with

Tucked along the Colorado River at the far western edge of Arizona sits a community so small that the last official count put its population at just two people. Most drivers on Interstate 40 blow right past it on their way to bigger destinations, never realizing what waits just off the highway. That near-empty feeling

Arizona hides some seriously good fabric shops, and most of them are far more than a wall of bolts and a cutting table. Whether you quilt, sew clothing, or just love running your hands over crisp cotton and wool, these stores turn a quick errand into an all-day adventure. From longarm studios in Phoenix to

Arizona just got a whole lot bigger on the map for Asian grocery lovers, and the buzz has been building for months. A brand new supermarket in the Phoenix suburbs stretches across 66,000 square feet and tucks seven different restaurants under one roof. Longtime shoppers who grew up with this chain in other states have

Some people book flights not for a vacation, but for a doctor’s appointment. Across Arizona’s largest desert city, a cluster of hospitals, research labs, and specialty clinics has quietly turned into one of the country’s most respected places to get well. Patients from distant states and even other countries land here hoping for answers that

Some weekends call for a slow wander through hundreds of little shops, and one spot in the East Valley delivers exactly that without asking a single dollar at the door. More than a thousand vendors line the aisles here, selling everything from western rugs and jewelry to hot tubs, golf carts, and hardy desert cactus.

Every hour, on the hour, a column of water climbs so high it once out-measured the Washington Monument, and half the people watching have no idea it sits right here in Arizona. Locals have been quietly claiming this spot for decades, timing their evening walks so the show goes off just as the sky turns

Just a short drive from Flagstaff sits a curved canyon where entire neighborhoods were carved into stone walls roughly 800 years ago. A one-mile loop drops you down a series of stairs and delivers you right beside about 25 cliff dwellings, close enough to peer into rooms that families once called home. Plenty of longtime

Tucson keeps a few secrets tucked away in the least glamorous corners, and one of the best sits inside a plain building in an industrial pocket of town. People drive four hours from Pinetop just to fill their bags with real Italian olive oil, fresh deli meats, and pans of lasagna they can heat up

Just west of Tucson sits a place that packs a botanical garden, a zoo, an aquarium, and miles of desert trail into one sun-washed loop. Longtime Arizona residents sometimes forget it is right here in their own backyard, mistaking it for a dusty roadside stop instead of one of the state’s most celebrated natural attractions.

There is a spot in Flagstaff where regulars fill an entire cart for around the price of one restaurant dinner, and they walk out grinning. Tucked on a quiet residential street, this shop only unlocks its doors three days a week, which makes every visit feel a little like catching a rare showing. Longtime locals

Somewhere in southeast Mesa, a country-style shop sits behind big roadside signs and a dirt parking lot that longtime Arizona locals have quietly loved for decades. Some families have been shopping here for more than 20 years, drawn by fruits and vegetables that often cost less than the big grocery chains just up the road.

Nothing beats waking up in Arizona, unzipping the tent, and reaching for your fishing rod before you even make coffee. Across the state, from cool high-country lakes near Flagstaff to desert reservoirs outside Phoenix, there are campgrounds where the water sits just steps from your picnic table. That means no long hikes, no boat launch

Summer in Arizona can feel like living inside an oven, and sometimes the only reasonable plan is to sit in cool water and let a slow current do all the work. Lazy rivers and tube floats give you that relief without the effort of a hike or a hard paddle. Some are natural desert streams

If you sew, quilt, or just love running your hands across a good bolt of cotton, Arizona has a few fabric spots that feel more like warehouses than shops. Some of these places stock thousands of bolts, whole rooms of quilting cotton, and enough thread to keep you busy for years. Walking in without a

Somewhere on the west side of Prescott sits a nursery that has been coaching high-country gardeners for more than 60 years, and it does something most garden shops never bother with. On Saturdays it opens the doors to free classes where anyone can learn how to keep plants alive in tricky mountain soil. Longtime locals

Most people think you need a passport to see a castle carved into a cliff, with a river winding below and centuries of history stacked up in stone. Turns out one of the best examples of that hides right here in Arizona, tucked into a limestone wall along a quiet creek in the Verde Valley.

When Phoenix hits triple digits and your car feels like an oven, Arizona still hides pockets of cool air just a couple hours up the road. Thanks to elevation, our state has real mountain towns where summer days stay mild and evenings actually call for a light jacket. Most locals forget that Arizona is not

Arizona summers can feel like an oven, so waking up a few steps from cool water is one of the best tricks we locals have. Across the state, from red-rock creeks to high-country lakes, there are campgrounds where your tent sits close enough to the water that you could roll out of the sleeping bag

Somewhere above the desert heat, at nearly a mile and a half higher than Phoenix, sits a tiny community that most Arizonans have never bothered to find on a map. Locals who need a break from traffic and crowds keep quietly driving north until the pavement climbs into cool pine forest and the noise of

Somewhere in the East Valley, quilters clear their calendars, top off the gas tank, and point the car toward a strip of Baseline Road as if it were a destination worth crossing the state for. And it is. Word travels fast in the sewing world, and this particular shop has built a reputation that pulls

Tucked into the desert north of Scottsdale sits a place most Arizonans drive right past without knowing what waits down the dusty road. Behind the quiet fences, mountain lions stretch in the sun, wolves call across the acreage, and a black bear licks peanut butter off its paws like it hasn’t got a worry in

South Phoenix hides a place where kids scream down a three-story slide while grandparents float a lazy river without breaking a sweat. When the calendar flips to August and the pavement feels like a griddle, most families give up on the idea of splashing around outside. There is a spot near Broadway Road that solves

Somewhere along a quiet dirt road north of Tucson, capybaras lounge around while people scratch their bellies and feed them lettuce by hand. This is not a petting zoo you drive past on a highway. It sits on a working ranch where the world’s largest rodent shares the property with warthogs, porcupines, emus, and a

Every longtime Phoenix resident has a memory of pressing buttons and yanking levers at a downtown science hall as a kid. What most of them do not know is that the same building now throws a grown-up party where the crowd is capped at 21 and older. No small hands beat you to the best

There is a spot in Arizona where red-rock walls climb into a bright blue sky and pine forests soften the desert edges. For decades it was a quiet retreat, the kind of place longtime residents felt they had all to themselves. Now the parking lots fill early, the shops multiply, and the trailheads see more

Somewhere in East Mesa, tucked behind a plain door most people would breeze right past, sits a room where the 1980s never packed up and left. Rows of glowing cabinets, flashing pinball tables, and walls stacked with old toys wait for anyone willing to trade one flat fee for a whole night of unlimited play.

Living in Phoenix means you are surrounded by some of the most jaw-dropping scenery in the country, and most of it is only a tank of gas away. You do not need to book a flight or burn a whole weekend to see red rocks, pine forests, old mining towns, or water you can actually

There is a spot on the west side of the Valley where longtime Phoenix shoppers load up their carts and walk out grinning. It is the kind of place where a solid armchair can cost less than a fast food dinner, and where Mondays turn into a full-blown treasure hunt. Racks stand sorted by size,

Somewhere in the Verde Valley, there is a stretch of old brick storefronts where the pace drops the moment you park the car and start walking. No freeway rush, no big-box sameness, just a short main street packed with local shops, small cafes, and art galleries run by people who actually live nearby. Longtime Arizona

Southeast of Tucson, past the last stretch of open desert, there is a racing circuit where a single lap feels long enough to make you forget the heat waiting outside. Karts here hit real speeds on a wide outdoor track that rewards anyone who loves the pull of a tight corner and a long straightaway.

Summer in the Valley can turn even short walks into a test of willpower, yet a long ribbon of green cuts right through the middle of Scottsdale where water runs alongside the path and trees fill in the gaps. Locals have been riding, walking, and running here for years, often stringing together several parks in