Not long in the past, Jerome was one of Arizona's richest town, due to its copper mines. Jerome is perched in the mountains, so it wasn't practical to transport the ore directly from Jerome to a big foundry. Instead, they did a quick transport to Clarksdale below, and then railroad was built to bring copper on long distances. Clarksdale, founded by rich man William Clark is a pleasant small town. You can visit the railway museum and also do train tours of the surroundings. Climbing to Jerome is quite abrupt. The day we went, weather was really gray with fog, so it added some "ambiance" when we visited the ghost town. Jerome was in the 40s and 50s, a town with several dozens of thousands peoples, but then population decreased rapidly when the mines closed. It's ... read more

To see completely different things in my trip, we decided to visit some archealogical sites. The Sinaguas, were indigenous people living in Verde Valley and North Central Arizona. They seem to have thrived between the 1100 to early 1400 AD. They made buildings well adapted to the environments, like the Montezuma castle, neither built by Montezuma, nor a castle. The location of this site is perfect: Surrounded by a vast desert, they dig and built a structure on a cliff, facing South, warmer in winter, and shaded in the summer. They had a river below where large trees grow and where agriculture was good. The building complex, if 5 five stories high, and was accessed by ladders. They knew the desert very well and used any resources available for food, clothing, medicine, etc.... It is still ... read more

Second time in Arizona. Last time was in the south, in Tucson region to mainly visit the Sonora desert. This time, I stayed in Sedona's region and visit the surroundings, including a trip to grand canyon. The small city of Sedona is surrounded by mountains of all shapes and having many colors, but red is the dominant color. Plenty of accommodations in the region. There are 2 main aspects defining the region: a-nature, landscapes, hiking trails, jeep and atv. b-Arts galleries of all sorts, yoga, and other "cosmic things". For me, first aspect is the draw. City is surrounded by hiking trails, going in desert, forest, around or on top on mountains. We spend 10 days there, and we didn't do a third of all trails!! Trails are well maintained and maps are available. The views ... read more

It was our last part of the trip. We decided to do a little road trip. We went to Zarcero. On the way we stopped to Grecia, to see the church made of metal plates. We also stopped at Sarchi to see and buy some handicrafts. In region of Zarcero, views are splendid and reminds a bit of Switzerland. In Zarcero city, there's a nice topiary in front of the church. The church itself has 2 towers that look like missiles, (!!). On the way back, we went South to Atenas, one of the places that was tagged as one of the most ideals weathers of the world. In the "zocalo", like all other spanish cities, there's a beautiful park, and we sat there a little while to see people go by and eat some ice ... read more

What is the ideal climate? It depends on everyone's preferences and metabolism! For me that enjoys animals of all kinds and plants a lot, I like a place that is green all year round. This is in the tropics mainly, but not a sea level. an altitude of about 1000 meters in the tropics, is perfect. It's like normal days of summer but with no extremes. That's what you have in all of central valley Costa Rica, but some places have the wow factor, like Atenas in the West, but also the very beautiful Orosi valley , South-East of Cartago. The Orosi valley is surrounded by little mountains that grow coffee on the slopes. The city of Orosi it not too big, and nature is very close on all sides. In same region, we visited the ... read more