48 Hours in Phoenix
Spring Break — the sole opportunity for students to get a little R & R between Christmas and Summer Break. A large percent of the college population flocks to the crevices and corners of packed Florida beaches for six days of all around mayhem. If that’s your vibe and how you want to spend your break, all the power to you, to each their own- this is a hate-free blog space! However, my plans for spring break were a little bit different.
Keep in mind the fact that I have yet to have a “spring break” throughout my college career. My freshman year, our spring break turned into COVID quarantine and ended up lasting months. Sophomore year, due to the extension of winter break (again, due to the pandemic) my university decided that in order for us to end the semester on time, they would just take away spring break. So this year was the first time that I had a designated week of time to spend however my heart desired.
So, my best friend Maura and I decided we would take a trip out West to the desert. We settled on Arizona because neither of us had ever been there before and there are a ton of national parks and forests for us to go out and live our best “Outdoorsy Gals” lives! We booked an Airbnb in Flagstaff and our flights shortly there after. Fast forward to the weekend before we leave, we have everything set in place, we are ready to go!
We started off our travel day at 5 A.M. in order to arrive on time for our 7 A.M. flight from D.C. to Denver — where we had a four hour layover in each direction. Spirits were high! We were excited! Our flight to Denver went smoothly and we enjoyed an amazing lunch in the Denver Airport while waiting for flight number two — which also went well. Pretty much everything went well until we arrived at the rental car center outside the Phoenix airport. Now, at this point it is 4 P.M. Rocky Mountain Time, so 6 P.M. Eastern Standard Time. Spirits are still high, but we are tired. Long story short, we find ourselves sitting outside the Phoenix airport without a rental car, crying, frantically calling our parents in an attempt to somehow figure out what we are supposed to do since we can’t figure out how to get to our Airbnb in Flagstaff (which is two hours from the airport). PSA: If someone “knows a guy” that can rent you a car, and the guy that shows up is wearing bedazzled True Religion jeans, and talking on what appears to be a burner phone, DO NOT GET IN THE CAR WITH HIM. Don’t worry, we took one look at this guy and decided that we would rather walk to Flagstaff than do any sort of business with this person, who didn’t even have a business card by the way!
At this point, the sun is going down and we are running out of options, which is when we decided to throw in the towel for the night and ended up sitting in an empty hotel restaurant, scarfing down pasta by the pound. At this point we had pretty much two options: keep trying to find a way to get to Flagstaff and have one day exploring the area, or stay in Phoenix and have three-ish days to explore. Ultimately, I would argue that the deciding factor rested on the fact that the high temperature in Flagstaff for the two days we would be there was 14 degrees, and the high in Phoenix was 80 degrees.
We opted to stay in Phoenix — and despite the fact that nothing stresses me out more than a change in plans, we had a damn good time in The Valley of the Sun! We ended up leaving the hotel and staying in a quaint and well-furnished Airbnb in Central Phoenix, and spent the first morning there exploring (and being in awe of) the Arizona State University campus. We even got our first ever Dutch Bros coffee — and the barista gave them to us for free! I ordered the “Golden Eagle'' coffee with cold foam on top and would rank it a 9.5 out of 10!
After a morning of exploring, we quickly realized that we were about two layers over-dressed for the desert heat and Ubered over to Scottsdale to visit their Fashion Plaza mall and desert-ify our wardrobes. From this thirty minute Uber ride we were able to validate the fact that Scottsdale is boujee. There is a stupid amount of money in that little valley. These houses are insane, especially the ones that are nestled up right into the side of the huge desert mountains there. The mall was massive and filled 75% with luxury and designer stores, obviously tailored to the homeowners of the area. We spent an hour or so walking around and observing the Phoenix locals before we decided to call it a day.
What turned out to be a blessing is the fact that both of us were still operating on East Coast time, so the next day we were already up and at ‘em by 7 A.M. We decided to start our morning with a hike. We took a quick ride up to the Phoenix Wilderness Area, or as our Uber driver informed us that the natives call “Camelback Mountain,” and began our trek. We were completely taken aback by how pretty the valley was. The mountains that surround Phoenix are only around 5,000 feet in elevation but the valley sits so low in comparison to the peaks that you can see for hundreds of miles. One of my favorite things about hiking in a new place is looking at all the different types of plants, animals, and rocks on the trail and this hike was unlike anything I had ever seen before. The rocks looked like they had come from a volcano, and the greenery was all very unique to the valley. One fun fact we learned from our first Uber driver of the trip is that the valley only gets 9 inches of rain each year, so chances of us stumbling upon a cool creek or even a puddle were nonexistent. Instead, most of Phoenix’s water comes from an elaborate canal system that we saw crisscrossing across the entire city.
The hike we picked was supposed to be around a mile and a half with only about 600 feet of elevation gain. We are almost positive that all 600 feet of elevation gain came from one final push at the peak of the hike that left us huffing and puffing quite a bit. On our way back down, we were enjoying the warm weather and the desert sunshine so much that we actually hopped on a different trail to extend our hike a bit longer.
When we finally made it back down to the city, we made our way over to Downtown Phoenix where we got the best iced coffees and sandwiches from a place called Spoonz Deli. If you ever find yourself in the area, I highly recommend stopping in and grabbing a bite to eat. This is also when we began our hunt for local shops and markets to see what the area really had to offer in terms of shopping. The vintage stores in Phoenix are chock full of old-school Levi’s denim and basketball tees, but like most vintage stores nowadays the prices are through the roof! We were definitely pretty impressed by the ones we went into, but we couldn’t bring ourselves to buy anything from them. There were also tons of cute boutiques and local stores that had really unique pieces and desert-inspired clothing.
After a few hours of urban hiking around the city to different shops, we headed back to the Airbnb to get ready for dinner. Upon Maura’s sister's recommendation we went to Postino for dinner, where we sat outside and enjoyed some amazing food. The ambiance and the music were incredible, and all around we loved the place. However, the fact that Jack Nicholson’s doppelgänger from his character in The Shining was sitting next to us for half of the meal was quite off-putting. I’m not kidding when I say that he was the spitting image of Jack Torrance, “Here’s Johnny!”
And that’s the wrap on our 48 (give or take) hours in Phoenix! All in all, despite our plans taking on a different shape, I was really impressed by our ability to make the most of our time. It was the perfect amount of exploring a new city and taking some time to relax and unwind. Plus, during our 20 hour travel day on the way back, we were able to binge-watch the entirety of the Netflix show Pieces of Her, which is absolutely amazing. If you’re looking for a new show to invest your time in, I highly recommend it. So, between the food, the sunshine, and the friendliness of the locals — I would give our Phoenix experience a solid five stars!