Everything you wanted to know about Phoenix but were afraid to ask.

This will be a literal primer, written for the back-easter, the mid-westerner, the newly-arrived visitor and even maybe the curious local - A basis for understanding the metro. This will be insulting to your intelligence but it's best we start from common ground.

Welcome to the dry heat.

Definition: Phoenix (noun)

1: The area comprising the cities of Phoenix (Fee-nix), Scottsdale, Mesa (May-sah), Tempe (Tem-pee), Casa Grande (Cah-sah Grahnd), Glendale, Peoria, Apache Junction (AJ), San Tan, Queen Creek, Maricopa, Maryvale, Laveen, Surprise and more.

Basically anything touching or somewhat adjacent to the Valley of the Sun, and increasingly beyond. It does not (yet) include Prescott (Press-kit) or Tucson (Too-sahn).

One of the first things you'll hear about Phoenix in your life is that it's a dry heat.

That means that even though it's murderously hot out, say, 115F on a normal summer day, you're probably going to be okay walking around for fifteen minutes between your air-conditioned car and your air-conditioned office before returning to your air-conditioned home. Yes, it will feel like being on the business end of a full-body hair dryer, but you might not even break a sweat.

Hiking is deadly

This will lead you into a false sense of security and you'll be tempted to go hiking. If the high for the day is over 104, and you are not yet accustomed to our weather, don't go hiking between 9am-8pm between June and November. This means be done with hiking by 9am. Do not start at 9am. Bring two bottles of water (one for the car and one for the trail) and drink water liberally the night before and during the hike. Pack your trash out.

We have real mountains. We have real hills, buttes, peaks and trails. This is not the rails-to-trails in Des Moines. This is not the rolling hill country.

We also have an unforgiving desert full of spiny plants and venomous animals. Jumping Cholla (choy-ya) is a cactus that will actively try to attack you, launching a cucumber-sized sausage link covered in three inch barbed spikes into your leg or arm. (use two combs to get it off, one pressed down against your skin and one to pull up.) Rattlesnakes want nothing to do with you, but will bite when you step on their invisible coiled bodies between rocks.

Stay on the trails to avoid both.