This blog title is surprisingly relevant to Phoenix itself, the heat there is akin to that given out by a blacksmiths forge, or so it seems. The morning of my arrival it was 45 celsius, excessive in anyone's book and my black jeans absorbed every little degree and multiplied it tenfold. Before I get too involved in the detail of my couple of days in Phoenix I'd like to give you a quick snapshot of the greyhound bus I took to this sprawling metropolis. My bus left at 9.45 so I wandered over to the station, 5 minutes from the hostel. X factor was on tv so I managed to pass a bit of time before we boarded with the world's grumpiest driver. I tell you that woman hated her job. We had to go through border patrol between California and Arizona and because one man didn't have the right paperwork we were delayed. Thus as we were about an hour away from Phoenix she came over the intercom and in the world's angriest voice said 'because we were delayed at the border crossing some of you are going to miss your transfers in Phoenix'. And cut off. Just like that, no apology or anything. Luckily this didn't affect me but I still wanted to smack her in the mouth, I think she needs a career change! Also the man in front of me was a snorer, but an unexpected one so just as I'd nearly drop off he'd suddenly snort and scare me half to death, it was very disconcerting but I did manage to get a few hours so I arrived in the sweatbox that is Phoenix relatively refreshed.

Getting to the hostel was relatively easy although I did my usual trick of getting on the bus heading the wrong way so had to sit on it for way longer than anticipated. When will I ever learn?! The hostel itself was one of the cutest ones I've been to - I think it only had about 20 beds, as well as a piano that I tried my hand at a few times, some random little instruments and a huge round table than made me feel like King Arthur! I decided I was going to go have a wander around downtown so set off with vim and vigour…which soon turn to lethargic shuffling as I all the moisture was slowly leeched from my body by the great flaming ball of fire in the sky. I seriously think I lost about a stone in liquid! To cool off I went into the library which had a very disappointing selection of books. I also started to get too cold; here I would usually say that I am too hard to please but Americans seem to be obsessed with having the air conditioning on the coldest setting ie. Arctic blast, so the contrast between inside and outside is just ridiculous. Phoenix is a quiet city - perhaps because it is so sprawling and difficult to get around without a car, probably because everyone is inside hiding from the heat, but there are some cool murals spread around Roosevelt street so I had a bit of a challenge for myself to see how many I could find. My favourite was one with three birds on the side of a shop, but there were also some pretty weird ones.

Upon return to the hostel I found some new people had arrived, Daniella and Ashley from Birmingham. Ashley was a guitar teacher and boy could that man play, and made it look so effortless. I was very envious as my skills are sorely lacking in that department, I blame my stubby fingers. Anyway after a lovely meal cooked by one of the girls who worked at the hostel we joined up with one of the guys who worked there and his friend to go to a small local watering hole where, joy of joys, they had Strongbow! Awesome, I got to treat myself! There was a slightly odd jazz group playing so we stayed there for a bit then went to this guys house where Ashley and he had a bit of a jam session with a harmonica and guitar - it was very impressive and a bit of a different end to the evening, especially with all the random stray cats running around outside!

I got back to the hostel around midnight looking forward to a good nights' sleep, only to find some hideous man beast in the room with me. Now I'll clarify here, I was in the women's dorm room so I guess it was some kind of woman beast. She/it had shaggy black hair, calves the size of watermelons and some pretty terrible tattoos, oh and don't forget she snored like a warthog. As if this wasn't bad enough when it was time for her to get up (this was about 7am) she turned the light on, sung really loudly and out of tune and just generally had no respect for anyone else in the room (ie. Me). She was just generally a nightmare room mate and very very odd.

That aside since I'd already been rudely awakened by the Yeti I had to share a room with I decided to get up for the lovely sunny day that welcomed me as I opened the curtain. My plan for the day involved going to the Heard museum, a Native American culture and history spot that seemed pretty interesting, I do like to hear a bit about the culture of the indigenous people of the land. Much like everywhere else the Europeans settled the Native Americans were royally screwed over when they arrived so some parts were a bit depressing. For instance the children were taken away from their parents and sent to boarding schools specifically for the 'taming' of the Indians, which meant that an entire generation was separated from their language, their culture and their families. Small wonder the Native American culture is dying out. I had been taken to the museum by a volunteer from the University who helped out as part of his degree in tourism, so after we'd finished looking around we went for some pretty tasty Japanese/Italian food. It sounds like a strange combo…and it is, but it does work!

The remainder of the afternoon for me was spent trying to hide from the sun inside, and I'm glad I did as it ended up in a really fun night. The basic story is that, as I'm sat tinkling the old ivories (not a euphemism for the rude minded amongst you), an American guy sticks his head in the door and says 'Hello. What is this place?'. Now as I've been here a few weeks I'm used to random strangers coming up and talking to me so I respond 'it's a hostel'. This response is met with a blank stare and a question. 'I ride past every day on my bike and always see the sign and wonder what exactly it is. What is a hostel?'. Now describing the concept of a hostel is difficult, and even though I've been asked several times now (hostelling isn't very big in America, they tend to think they are shelters for the homeless…which suppose technically we are!) I don't have a textbook answer as yet. Thus my response was pretty vague, mumbling something about it being a bit like a B and B slash hotel but with shared dormitories and bathrooms and kitchens to cook your own food. He sort of understood what I was getting at and asked for a little tour, for which I happily obliged. He was very impressed with the kitchen (it was a pretty cool one) and then, when he saw the boys dorm concern creased his face; 'so do you share a room with guys as well?' 'yes' I said 'although here I'm in a female dorm I have slept in mixed ones as well, and there have been no problems it's all fine'. This was a point he was very troubled by, explaining that American's like their privacy and he couldn't see many American people staying there and they probably didn't know about hostels. Now I've met a few Americans at hostels but I know what he means, the majority of the population, despite being very forward and chatty in public, like to keep their private homes private and the concept of shared rooms with strangers seems either a bit scary or a bit dirty, I'm not sure which! Whilst he struggled to comprehend that not only was I sharing a room with strangers, I was travelling alone through the States, had visited a wide range of countries and this kind of thing was common in Europe, I was trying to get my head around the fact that someone didn't know what hostelling was.

As it turned out the guys name was Chris, he was a prison warden studying at UofA to become a social worker, and that night he was going out for some drinks with his wife and a friend from work. This being America I was, of course, invited to come along. As I am now fully into the swing of travelling , a professional scrounger, and since he was going out in a group, I accepted his kind offer of a locals night out. We arranged to meet in a couple of hours at the hostel and went our separate ways - well I shut the door and he cycled off.

The main interesting points of the night were getting a ride in my first big truck out here - Americans just do not do small cars! - wandering around 3rd Fridays, an outdoor mini arts and crafts festival thing in the area local to the hostel with some cool lego art and lots of little jewellery stalls, Chris's USS Enterprise tattoo, being forced by Ursula (Chris' workmate) to prod her in the thigh to see how muscly it was (very odd) and visiting Tempe, the local University town. Now UofA has been dubbed one of the douchiest colleges in America, and is generally just a party place, not much learning goes on by all accounts! We got to Tempe and it was packed to the rafters with students being wasted. Now I don't understand how so many people manage to drink and not get caught, since for the first three years of their university career they aren't old enough to drink. I suppose there is high demand in the black market for fake ID. There were a lot of police about, but mainly on horses and bicycles, apparently too many people were getting run over or something by the police cars. Brilliant. American students were just what I expected from my excessive consumption of American tv shows and films. The girls were 'oh my gosh' just, like, the perkiest most American girls ever, mainly with very high pitched voices and a lot of blonde hair, whilst the guys were one of two things, either geek chic or American football players. The sheer number of them all was intimidating! American bars shut at 2am, which seems really early but is actually a bit of a Godsend as it means that you don't drink as long as at home. A few drinks in Tempe was rounded off with my first slice of American pizza (delicious it was too) and a return to the hostel by half 3 -perfect timing for someone whose alarm was going off at 7. Oh dear.

Becca