Level 5 Rooftop Restaurant – Albuquerque, New Mexico

For a nearly four-hundred year period, the Anasazi civilization which preceded New Mexico’s Pueblo cultures achieved the pinnacle of its technological and cultural advancement at a magnificent,  deep gorge called Chaco Canyon. Within the walls of Chaco Canyon, construction of multi-level buildings sprung up, some structures accommodating as many as  800 rooms. Not surprisingly, lower walls had to be made massive in order to support heavy stone walls up to five floors high.  It took remarkable planning to locate doors, passageways, kivas and other architectural features.  At five stories high,  Pueblo Bonito was the largest structure and the inspiration for Hotel Chaco’s spectacular restaurant Level 5  in Albuquerque’s Sawmill District. In 2017, local developer Heritage Hotels launched Hotel Chaco on…

The Farm at South Mountain – Phoenix, Arizona

There are two indulgences we miss when we visit Tempe: New Mexico’s incomparable cuisine and the coffee we wake up to every morning.  My sister Anita assures us there are now several restaurants in the Valley of the Sun which serve New Mexican cuisine that is more than passable though we have yet to visit any of them.  While our landlords graciously provide a coffee pot, we don’t ever seem to remember to pack our beloved Douwe Egberts coffee from the Netherlands.  Okay, maybe that’s just an excuse to visit Black Rock Coffee in Tempe which serves a very good Mexican mocha. Aside from the coffee, what we enjoy most about Black Rock is being able to sit out on…