Phoenix with Friends

I was very excited to get to Phoenix, Arizona to see all of my girlfriends that were meeting us there. Leaving St. Thomas was sad because that meant that the Caribbean portion of our trip had come to an end and I absolutely love spending time in the Caribbean with all of the warm tropical breezes, the beautiful colour water and all of the beauty that surrounds you with the flowers and trees. It is pure relaxation. But I was ecstatic to see all my buds that had flown all the way from Saskatoon. It has been a long and dry 8 months without them.



All of us flew in late on Friday, May 6th. We were close to the Arizona Mills Outlet Mall and they had a hotel close to the Phoenix International Airport. Our plan was to meet up the next morning at the mall. It was so good to see them that I was getting a bit verklempt with all of the solid hugs and I had missed them so much. Good, trustworthy friends are ultra important to me. Not to mention that these chicks are bags of fun. We said our hellos and had our hugs and our quick chats but let’s get serious there was some extreme shopping to do and time was wasted. I had not been to Phoenix in over a year and Phoenix is the Mecca of all shopping in the world. I come here once a year as a non-religious sort of pilgrimage of vanity and greed. A girl has to look and feel good about herself and Phoenix helps me to do this. Hopefully, I have introduced this Phoenix concept to my girlfriends and they will feel the need to pilgrimage once a year as well.


We all made our way towards Marshalls which is a store like Winners in Canada but much better with cheaper deals. Leann and Mardi were a bit overwhelmed with Marshalls which is kind of a Rambo-style shopping that I happen to excel at and have special skills at. It is a kind of scavenging and plundering after the ravages of war-type shopping. They left Marshalls after a few minutes and made their way back out to the mall to various stores. Kerrie left soon after and Bridget was in her own little Bridget world (hey what happens in Phoenix stays in Phoenix). Who knows where Bridget was and went?



Belle, Lindsay and I stayed the full allotted time in Marshall’s and did quite well I might add.





We met the rest of the girls and Darren and Dax and I took one look at the boys and knew that they were done, so we opted to leave the mall and drive north to Scottsdale and try and check in to the Westin Kierland Villas. Unfortunately, they were not ready for us so we went out and about and came back later to check in and then off to Walmart to get the groceries and supplies. The rest of the girls stayed at the mall and did not make it back to the Villas until well after 7 pm. They apparently tried to stay and unpack their vehicle at the Westin Kierland Hotel until they were redirected back to the Villas. We lucked out with a great view of the mountains and golf course. We were on the second floor and when you went out onto the balconies in our suite it was a veritable animal kingdom outside. There were duck families and partridge moms and dads with their 10 babies following closely behind. You could watch the antics of hummingbird couples doing their hummingbird dance. Baby bunnies and multitudes of desert bunnies were scampering around continuously. Bunnies really are as dumb as mud; I guess that is why Playboy picked the bunny as their representative animal. You will throw a bunny a carrot and it starts to eat it and then something will scare it like its own shadow and then it will scamper off about a foot away and forget that it has a carrot one foot away and then it will actually leave the carrot. That is really dumb or brainless. There are also these black strange sounding birds with long plumage of tail feathers that fluff up when they sing. They look like they should be in the tropics, not the desert. There are also lizards slithering around and all sorts of other creatures. We spent a lot of time in the mornings with our coffee on the balcony. We tried to spend some more time at night on our balcony with our music and drinks but the lovely lady down below on the first floor was not really down with our music or us, she was always complaining and phoning management who would then call us to tell us to keep it down. I mean really, seriously, she should have just joined us and added some fun into her life; live a little honey.





We made our way to the pool a few times throughout their stay and to the lazy river and waterslide over at the hotel.



We did this on Mother’s Day and then later went out to shop some more.




The nights were great and we had lots of fun. The one night that Darren barbecued we spent our time outside with our drinks and later made our way to the outdoor fireplace.




The Westin has a ton of outdoor relaxing spaces. Lindsay packed it in early this night, because she had to leave the next day, which was one day earlier than the other girls. The girls last day was spent at the pool and a little bit of shopping and planning on how to get back into the country with their multitude of purchases. The next day the girls had to leave fairly early for the airport. We said our goodbyes and I was really sad to see them go. The good news is that we are at the end of our 8 month World Tour and I will see them again shortly. The bad news is that I don’t have anyone to shop with for the remainder of the time in Phoenix, so I will have to brave the amazing sales on my own. Thanks for coming to join us in Phoenix my lovely friends, I love you, you are the best!


Phoenix with the Girls