Photo Credit: paradisevalley.gov
Paradise Valley is unquestionably a special town. A destination for the successful, defined by beautiful scenery and truly unique zoning rules…one of a kind. And while it will never (and should never) be developed and promoted as a tourist attraction, that doesn’t mean that it does not have some amazing hospitality options.
The secret has gotten out, however. Travel and Leisure recently compiled a list of the 500 top hotels in the world (yes, the entire world), and Arizona had five entrants in that list. However, an astounding three out of five were located in little ol’ Paradise Valley.
Considering the population of the town (shoot, even the fact that it’s a town, not a city), that is stunning, even for huge Paradise Valley fans such as ourselves. The other Arizona resorts that made the list were rather random, underscoring how thorough and well-researched this list was: one is in Morristown, which embarrassingly we had to look up where that was (it’s on the way to Wickenburg, by the way) and another in Tucson.
Populating the list from Paradise Valley were The Hermosa Inn, Mountain Shadows Resort, and Sanctuary Camelback Mountain. As for how the rankings were developed, Travel and Leisure was light on specifics but “their rooms and facilities, location, service, food and overall value” were the factors that were considered.
One thing that isn’t explicitly mentioned but most certainly had to play a part is the scenery: with beautiful mountain views and unique desert landscape, it’s understandable why these locales would be utterly captivating for someone who is not from the area. You can’t replicate that.
Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised. But we would never expect a town that has fewer than 13,000 residents to get truly international recognition. It just underscores how special this jewel of a town truly is however, and we should be thankful that it’s ours.