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Grandparents on the Go!
Perhaps taking your grandchildren around the world in 90-days might be a lifelong dream of yours. However, if you don’t have the time or the 401K to do so, we believe we’ve found an alternative right here in Phoenix, at least from a musical perspective.
This museum has something for every age group. Children as young as three can see, listen, touch and feel instruments, experience various live theater performances and listen to famous artists on stage. The Geo Galleries showcase instruments by regions of the world, including audio and video. Each Geo Gallery has its own curator, placing the MIM on the level of European museums. The artist gallery has video concert footage, photos, and costumes.
The Experience Gallery affords hands on playing of instruments including drums, harps, guitars, and an enormous gong. Our 4 and 5-year-old grandchildren spent close to an hour there, sharing instruments and starting their own GEO band. What a rare opportunity for your grandchildren to experience the joy of making music, without the ‘don’t touch’ admonishments. The children are encouraged to experience and learn about the origins of the musical instruments, and the people in each country. The Geo Galleries’ videos in each display show native artists playing the instruments that are in front of you. Our grandchildren were mesmerized by them.
There is an education team at MIM that seeks to inspire learners of all ages and abilities by offering a wide range of educational programs. Check out their museum tours, artist residency programs, lectures, classes for adults, and workshops for children.There is even a Family Center for infants and parents to rest with books and toys for all ages.| Adults Seniors 65+ Youth 6-17 Under 6 |
$15 $13 $10 FREE |
4725 East Mayo Boulevard, Phoenix, AZ 85050 | (480) 478-6000 | www.themim.org
Cathy Droz and Cathy Burford are writers, businesswomen and grandparents who love to share what this world has to offer with their seven grandchildren combined. Whether on a train to the Grand Canyon, or a cooking class at a friend’s home, their motto is: Intergenerational Fun. For more go to www.twofortheroadusa.com click on Grandparents on the go.
A great place to get your kicks on Route 66
TUCUMCARI, NEW MEXICO
Somehow, Bobby Troup missed this one – or maybe he just found it so delightfully special he simply wanted to keep it a secret.
“Well,” the composer wrote after his drive to the West Coast at the end of World War II, “it goes from St. Louis down to Missouri, Oklahoma City looks oh so pretty. You’ll see Amarillo and Gallup, New Mexico; Flagstaff, Arizona, don’t forget Winona, Kingman, Barstow, San Bernardino…”
“It,” of course, is the famous American’s Mother Road, Route 66.
For some reason, Troup didn’t mention Tucumcari. Perhaps it had too many syllables for his tune or maybe it not only was too difficult for the rhythm but also too hard to rhyme. Regardless, Troup’s lyrics leap from Amarillo, Texas to Gallup, New Mexico, which means they bypass Tucumcari – a precursor to Interstate 40 that would bypass so many of the towns along the way.
Fortunately, the people from Pixar drove the old road a few years ago. Their experience inspired the movie Cars and the movie shared the road’s legacy with a new audience, a new generation which, hopefully, will come to appreciate places such as the Blue Swallow Motel here at 815 East Route 66 Boulevard.
I first noticed the Blue Swallow last fall when I was driving from the Midwest back to Phoenix. It was dusk when I pulled off I-40 and I stayed at a chain motel close by the exit.
But early the next morning, instead of simply getting back on the Interstate, I drove at dawn the old road through town and there it was, sitting in the shadows on the north side of the road, one of the most unusual motels I’d ever seen. What made it so different was that each of the rooms appeared to have its own garage.
This year, on my way to the Midwest, I spent a night at the Blue Swallow. Fortunately, when I arrived, there still was one room available – usually, the place fills with reservations made by those who already have discovered its charm (and that includes the producers and animators of Cars and those making their personal Route 66 pilgrimages).
W.A. Huggins built the Blue Swallow in 1939, when motor courts frequently included garages for the cars as well as rooms for the people. Huggins sold the motel as WWII began and gas and rubber rationing halted tourist travel.
Lillian Redman bought the place in 1958 and ran it for nearly four decades, but finally had to give up because, just like Radiator Springs in Cars, the Interstate system took so much traffic around town rather than down the old route. Sadly, several other Mother Road vintage motels in Tucumcari remain empty, establishments of brick and mortar (or stucco), but no people.
The Blue Swallow’s current caretakers are Bill and Terri, who bought the motel in 2004 and not only have returned it to all of its glory, but have enhanced the story with some wonderful antiques in the dozen rooms and with murals inside and out.
By the way, that’s “inside” as inside the garages, where a friend of the proprietors who also is an artist in Los Angeles has painted various scenes, from the characters from Cars to vistas like those you’ll see as you do, indeed, get your kicks on Route Sixty Six.
Larry Edsall
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