Your resort destination: majestic Madera Canyon south of Tucson.
Your innkeeper: the U.S. Forest Service.
The federal agency is opening the rustic and restored Kent Springs Cabin to public rental, beginning today.
The six-room cabin - on a secluded parcel of national forest land with a creek flowing nearby - can accommodate eight people. Rental fees are $150 a night.
The opening comes just as the weather is reaching spring-green perfection and bird-watching is at its best in the canyon 40 miles south of Tucson.
"It's a beautiful cabin site in juniper and oak woodland - an amazing place where we think people will love to stay," says Don Marion, a recreation manager with the Forest Service. "And it's right in the middle of one of the top birding sites in the country."
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Kathy Makansi, a Forest Service archaeologist, says the stone-and-wood structure dates to the early 1950s. It's near the site of a much older cabin, built about 1910, that fell into ruin long ago.
Guests at the restored 2,500-square-foot cabin will find themselves in rather luxurious digs, given its location on an unpaved road about a quarter mile off the main canyon road.
The accommodations include a fully equipped kitchen, large living room with a dining area, sun room with a fold-out bed, two bedrooms and a bathroom with a shower. Among the other features are a fireplace, boulders and a tree trunk incorporated into the building, electric heating, an expansive deck overlooking the creek, a horseshoe pit and a large barbecue grill.
The popular Bog Springs Trail is about 0.2 of a mile from the cabin.
The Forest Service purchased the mile-high property from private owners in 1970, and the former owner was permitted to live there until her death in 1987.
In the ensuing years, the place fell into serious decay.
"It was rodent-infested; the roof was leaking; windows were broken out; and the interior was a mess," says Marion. "It was like a ghost town house."
A group called the Friends of Madera Canyon performed renovation work on the cabin in the 1990s. Marion has supervised the more recent work, doing lots of it himself.
Makansi notes that the cabin will be part of the Forest Service's "Rooms with a View" cabin rental program. It includes 13 other cabins around Arizona.
To reserve the cabin and get directions and entry information, go to www.recreation.gov or call 1-877-444-6777.
Contact reporter Doug Kreutz at dkreutz@azstarnet.com or at 573-4192.