Phoenix is to Calgary as Montreal is to Miami. Several flights per day, a huge Customs area ensure the snowbirds convenience when it comes to living in two homes.
It was something adapting to living in a place where it gets hot, very hot in the summer months. The grass is plastic, much of the yard covered in paving or rocks with nothing living except the palms, orange and lemon trees and floral bushes. There was a letter noting a weed sticking up on the property. Someone must have snagged it as it was gone. The pool takes on a central place in the lifestyle. Inside the home all routes lead from the pool to the ensuite washroom on waterproof tiles. You dry and dress to watch television.
Phoenix is a city of neighbourhoods connected by freeways. The downtown core has a Light Rail connection. For the tourist, the daily drill is a drive to one or more such area, tour, take lunch and return. Phoenix is like Cape Town with brick walls around all yards. In South Africa they are guarding against criminals but in Phoenix it is natural things that can kill you. Privacy is huge as well. With the palms and walls you could believe you were in Florida.
