Things to do in Phoenix?

[JonT]

Heading to Phoenix with the fam soon and staying at the Arizona Grande. Kids are 9,7, and 2. Any suggestions on fun stuff to do or maybe car or guy related I can sneak away and do while the wife is shopping at the American Girl store with the girls?

Thinking about catching a Suns game or maybe doing a Supercar Experience at the local track.

Any suggestions for restaurants or other would be welcome!

Jon

[OldSpool87]

Aquarium as Botanical garden in Phoenix/Scottsdale are great. Also, we had a great time on a Jeep tour of the desert. Never heard my daughter laugh so loud in the back of a Scrabler.

[1990C4S]

Drive the Apache Trail. Hike the thumb. Go to Sedona.

[vash]

Pizza Bianca? The be never gotten in to see what the fuss is about b

[Eric Coffey]

Yep, the new Odysea aquarium is pretty cool. Lots of music/food/beer/art festivals this time of year as well. Baseball spring training games are another option. Car show every Saturday at the Scottsdale Pavilions.
Penske Racing Museum in N. Scottsdale. PHX 500 NASCAR race coming soon, if you are into that. Maybe a tour of Taliesin West (Frank Loyd Wright).

If you want to put some miles on a rental, then you might head up to Sedona, check out our section of Route 66, or even make the trek down to Tombstone.

[Eric Coffey]

Originally Posted by vash

Pizza Bianca? The be never gotten in to see what the fuss is about

Bianco is decent, but highly overrated IMO. If you go, hit the newer one off of Camelback Rd. The one downtown can be a mad-house and parking sucks.

Personally, I'd go to Pomo or La Piazza before going to Bianco.

The Musical Instrument Museum is awesome. There is a special electric guitar exhibit that I spent hours in.

[derek murray]

a few more suggestions...

Frank & Lupe's (great mexican food)
Arizona Phoenix Desert Botanical Garden (has a butterfly garden as well)

[Jims5543]

Is Amy's Baking Company still open, that is a do not miss dining experience.

[Rick Lee]

Originally Posted by Eric Coffey

Bianco is decent, but highly overrated IMO.

If they had used a gun on me, I'd have felt less robbed. Never ever again. That place sucks and I'd rather burn my money at home for warmth.

[Eric Coffey]

Originally Posted by Rick Lee

If they had used a gun on me, I'd have felt less robbed. Never ever again. That place sucks and I'd rather burn my money at home for warmth.

LOL, yeah, I've heard many say it can be hit-or-miss. I though it was just "OK", but definitely over-hyped and over-priced. I was near the newer one and there was no wait, so thought I'd at least give it a shot.
I won't be back either, especially now that I am almost within walking distance of Grimaldi's @ Market Street.

[stealthn]

Slide rock

[Brian 162]

If you like old planes check out the Pima Air and Space Museum. It's roughly 2 hours from Phoenix.

[JonT]

Well I just wanted to follow up on my experience in Phoenix and thank everyone for the suggestions.

We had a really fun family vacation at the Arizona Grande I would recommend this hotel for families. Our kids are 9, 7 (girls) and 2 (boy). The pool area was great - 2 big high speed water slides, 1 smaller twisty slide, hot tubs, water volleyball area, wave pool, and really good servers bringing food and drinks. We spent several days at the pool area for most of the day. There are nice shaded areas so we could get out of the direct sun for most of the day.

We also went to the Children's Museum downtown which was pretty good for the kids and was chaotic due to several busloads of 5 year olds on a field trip. My son ran around as fast as he could and just couldn't take it in fast enough. My 9 year old got bored fairly quickly and was probably reaching the age where this kind of place isn't as interesting. My 7 year old loved it and was in the sweet-spot age-wise. I'd say 2 to 9 would be a fair age range for enjoying the Children's Museum.

Coincidentally we could walk to Pizza Bianco from here. As it turned out this may have been my least favorite pizza I've ever eaten. Oddly my two girls loved it and ate 3 pieces each. It's a very traditional Italian thin crust so one adult could eat an entire pizza and feel about as full as eating a half of a sandwich. I'd give it 1 star. Just not my style.

On the other end of the pizza enjoyment scale, someone locally recommended we try out Oregano's pizza. The deep dish may be my fave pizza of all-time. Crazy good!

We also spend several hours at Pangea which is a animatronic dinosaur exibit. The kids loved this but were upset they couldn't climb on the dinosaurs.

Of course we couldn't leave without going to the American Girl store. What a money-sucking place that is. Don't ever introduce your daughters to American Girl dolls. Keep them happy with $15 Barbies.

We decided against driving to Sedona since the kids are too small and 4 hrs of driving didn't seem worth it. The weather forecast was rain/snow so that would have made any jeep tours miserable. Maybe when the kids are a little older I've heard its beautiful there from several sources.

Other restaurants we tried were Aunt Chiladas which was right next to our hotel and I thought it was fair not great, and also Garcia's which is more Americanized Mexican but my wife and I enjoyed it more. Thumbs up on Garcia's.

Overall great family spring break vacation. Phoenix weather in the spring is amazing and putting shorts on after our awful Nebraska winter was worth it alone.