The Highlife in Carefree

Today’s blog features scenes from a very unique neighbourhood, just north of Scottsdale, Arizona. It’s part of the Town of Carefree and its uniqueness is its location on the very rocky, lower slopes of Black Mountain. The area is located just north of the Carefree Highway. (Does this ring a bell with any Gordon Lightfoot fans?)

I took these pictures for an upcoming meeting of the Canmore Camera Club. This monthly challenge is to take all pictures using a telephoto lens. All the pictures you’ll see in today’s blog were photographed with a 100-400 mm lens.

The home captured in this first photograph is a perfect example of what a visitor can expect of architecture in this neighbourhood. Another unusual characteristic one can expect in Carefree is the street names. Street names are derived from the laissez-faire characteristic implied by the town name. Typical names in the neighbourhood include, Whileaway Road, Leisure Lane, Meander Way and Restin Road.

The area is also known for its elegant homes and luxuriant gardens.

I took a few pictures of the gardens and I particularly like this next photo, focused on two barrel cacti and a blue agave plant. Landscapers express their artistry through arrangements such as this.

My last two pictures seek to display the rugged terrain where these homes are built. This is typical of the mountainous, desert scenes in the Phoenix area. Residents of this area of Carefree have chosen to perch their homes amid these rocky surroundings.

This image is a close-in view of the bottom area of the previous scene. It features the Saguaro Cactus, symbolic of the Sonoran Desert, stretching from the Mexican state of Sonora to north of Phoenix. The desert encompasses a large area of Arizona, including the cities of Tucson and Phoenix, and its surrounding communities including Carefree. These rocks and this cactus are located above residences along a street winding through more boulders below.