Leslie Prest, Owner, Assoc. Broker, ePro Prest Realty, Payson, AZ

If you come to visit in Payson or Pine, consider a side trip to the old school house in Strawberry. This is a restored, one room school house which is open to tour on weekends through mid October. The school was built in 1884 to service families in the area.

Strawberry is a small town about 20 miles North of Payson, on Hwy 87. It is nestled RIGHT below the Mogollan Rim. If you head North from Strawberry you begin to climb immediately until you are on top of the Rim. There are not a lot of businesses in Strawberry, but there are many houses and cabins scattered in the trees. Stop off for lunch at the Strawberry Lodge, they have great hamburgers.

Come and let your children see what it used to be like to go to school!

Here is a link to the web page about the school, complete with pictures.

Pine is an attractive, small town about 15 miles North of Payson, on Hwy. 87. Pine is home to many antique shops, craft shops, and art galleries. On Holiday weekends in the Summer the Pine-Strawberry Arts & Crafts Guild features a craft show on the grounds of the old school house, with many and varied booths selling all sorts of interesting items. The shops along the highway are open, some people put up booths along the street. People park wherever they can, and walk up and down the street looking at everything. It makes for a very ferstive time.

This coming weekend the show is 8 to 5 on Aug. 3oth (Sat.) and 8 to 4 on Sunday, Aug. 31st. According to the Chamber of Commerce page it will feature over 80 booths, they usually have a pancake breakfast on Saturday, there's something for everyone!

The weather right now is lovely, cool temperatures, big white clouds. But remember, if you visit, that we are still in the Monsoon, and an afternoon thunderstorm is likely. Those big, white clouds can produce heavy downpours, and even hail. Come prepared.

The Northern Gila County Fair will be held this year on September 5th through 7th, with the fun starting at 9:00 in the morning.

The Fair had been a longtime event for the area, but after the retirement of Walt and Wilene Smith as the coordinators there was a two year hiatus. The Fair was revived in 2005. This is an old-fashioned County Fair which draws participaption from adults in the community as well as from schoolchildren and 4-H and FHA members in the area.

Among the attractions which are entered and judged are quilting and sewing, cooking, flowers and produce, crafts, fine art, photographs, and even livestock. Something for everyone!

The livestock events will be at the Payson Event Center, across the Beeline Hwy from the Mazatzal Casino (South of Payson), while the exhibits will be at the Tonto Apache Gym (turn next to the Casino, the gym is a little ways past the Casino on the right).

There will be live entertainment (by Junction 87) from 7-10 on Saturday night, a horse show, and even a Demolition Derby on the 7th starting at 1:00 pm (gates open at 11:30). Come have a good old time!

graphic by me

This is the season (the Monsoon, officially) for clouds and storms in Northern, Arizona. In past years we have been in a serious drought, but this year we are actually ABOVE the 30 year average for precipitation.

We talk to rental Owners in the Phoenix area, and they haven't gotten much rain this Summer.

I thought I would share some pretty shots of our storm clouds.

These pictures were taken from our deck. We face North/Northeast, so we have a great view of storms coming down off the Mogollan Rim.

Yesterday evening we had visitors from out of state, and we ate on the deck and watched another storm slide around and miss Payson. Our guests couldn't believe how cool Payson gets once the sun is near setting. They were actually shivering and we had to go inside.

No matter HOW hot the day (Payson may get near or slightly over 100 degrees) the evenings are always cool. The nighttime temperatures now are in the 60s.

These pictures were all taken at the same time, panning from West to East. Its not unusual to have large storm clouds ringing Payson on a Summer's day.

The trees in the picture are Alligator Juniper. These, along with Pinyon Pine, cover the "higher and dryer" parts of the town. There are other parts of Payson which are covered by taller Ponderosa Pines.

We think Payson is a gorgeous place to be. We've lived here for 15 years, and love to help new residents settle in to our town.
For more information, and more pictures, visit our Payson Page at Prest Realty.

OK, SO I'm exaggerating. But it does totally amaze me how many people seem to find Payson, Arizona, and are interested in buying homes here. Payson is a very small town. When we moved here 15 yrs ago the population was 8,000+. The last I heard we are now near 16,000. When I am down in the Phoenix area, and I mention I'm from Payson, the universal answer seems to be "Oh, really? Where is that?". And yet we have/have had rental Owners from literally all over the US; Massachusetts, New York, Michigan, Kansas, Alaska, Nevada, Montana, Utah, California, as well as from AZ: Tucson, Phoenix, Tempe, Yuma. Some of these Owners are looking to retire in Payson "down the road", some used to live here, some are purely investors. Some are drawn to Payson because they have relatives in the Phoenix area, some just like the closeness to the metro area while still being cooler weather/lighter traffic, and some I have no idea how they found Payson! Our tenants come from all over, also. We routinely get calls and emails from other states, people looking at our web site at rentals because they are moving here. Now I understand that we are a nation of rolling stones, people like to try new places. But when so many people in our own state don't know where Payson is, I can't quite understand how all these other people are finding it.

Not that I'm complaining. Payson has almost doubled in population since we moved here, but it is still a small town. People are friendly, we run into people to talk to all over town, and we can still get from one end of the town to the other in 5 to 10 minutes. And with the increase in population has come more businesses and improvements. We now have a Home Depot, A Chili's, a Starbucks (in Safeway), several non-chain restaurants which are very good, Walmart has gone "Supercenter", we have a multi-screen theatre, a larger public library, an off-leash dog park, a pretty good electric light parade, two shops showcasing local fine art, a coffee house with occasional live music. None of that was here when we moved here.

So I'm glad that people are finding Payson. How ever they're finding us, a small town seems to be very attractive to many buyers. We've seen many people over the years move here from larger cities, they seem to just slow down/calm down and adjust to the atmosphere. Payson is surrounded by National Forest, so we can't grow out on the edges the way the Phoenix area has been doing, so we can't get too big. May we stay a friendly, small town!