Due to advancing age and arthritis I downgraded from a Canon 5D Mk III DSLR to a Canon M5 mirrorless interchangeable lens camera a few years ago. Total weight is about a pound (down from over 2 lbs with the 5D Mk III).
The M5 is no longer made, having been replaced by the M6 (the last time I looked). The M5 has a built-in digital viewfinder while the digital viewfinder is an add-on with the M6. I've never for an instant wished I still had the 5D Mk III. With cataracts and such the digital viewfinder is a blessing.
The M zoom lenses are pretty good and fairly economical. A good zoom won't cover a very wide range (image issues arise if a zoom covers a too large focal range). So you might need multiple zooms to cover your shooting goals.
Personally I shoot with one fixed focal length lens and crop if I need more reach and stitch if I need wider. I use a 28 MM macro M that also gets me extreme close-ups as well as sharp landscapes and low distortion for good stitching. This lens is equivalent to a 45 mm full-frame lens.
I'd suggest maybe picking up a used camera along the lines of the M5 and see if you like it and the extra effort such a camera requires (though some newer cell phones are getting complex and not exactly easy to use). The automatic mode in most of these ILC mirrorless is pretty good, so they aren't necessarily more work than a cell phone. For sure you will get more honest images.
These photos are about half from the 5D Mk III and half from the M5. However, there's negligible difference in image quality given the smaller sensor in the M5 is as good as the older larger 5D Mk III sensor.
https://hclarkx.slickpic.com/gallery/?viewer