Phoenix

---

I arrived at about 10am on the Friday morning in Phoenix expecting my friend Tom to be waiting there open armed, teary eyed, sayin how good it was to see me again after he’d been away from the UK for the best part of 4 months. When I arrived I was somewhat deflated to find out that there were no tears, no open arms, in fact, there was no Tom. The lazy bugger had been out on the lash the night before and not only had he got up late, he was also still too drunk to drive so he had had to get one of the other poor unfortunates on his course to drive him to the airport to pick me up.

We then travelled from Phoenix International airport to Goodyear airport which is where all the training is going on for Oxford Aviation school and Lufthansa. The accommodation there is a lot like student flats back in England except for the fact that the students here see nothing but blue skies and sunshine all day every day and the compound on which the flats is situated has a pool area and cafeteria. This is however the ONLY entertainment for literally miles around. This didn’t seem to bother many of the lads though as there were also ‘pool cars’ which could seat up to 8 people at a time and were constantly in use to ferry the lads to and from their various jaunts.

I was introduced to several of the guys upon my arrival and they were the ones who I was to spend a majority of my time with whilst I was out in Phoenix visiting Tom; Saad - The chap kind enough to drive me back for Phoenix International, JK - Tom’s best friend and nemesis during his time in Phoenix. He reminded me a lot of non other than Mr Simon Godwin, Chris - A womanising Essex lad who had the charm turned up all the way to 11, 24 hours a day, Enda - A bald Irish man with a quick and witty sense of humour, Beaker - A tall lanky fellow with discernable features likened to the Jim Henson puppet bearing his nickname, Paul - a stocky Welshman who was one of the ‘elite’ as in he already had a job lined up with NetJets, another Tom - a former investment banker who was previously making obscene amounts of money in the big smoke and decided to give it all up for his love of aviation, and last but not least, Vincent - a Frenchman and former Vet with a fantastically dry sense of humour.

The day passed swiftly on as even I found time to allow my albino white skin to have some sun exposure ( I said some, not lots) whilst lounging around the pool area. As night descended the gang had arranged a night out around neighbouring Scottsdale. It was intended to be a quiet affair but turned out to be exactly what had been missing since Toronto. It turned out to be a classic first night frenzy. Where the alcohol intake flows without a care in the world and drunken debauchery is at it’s optimum. Whilst on the night I got talking to a local lad who I was teasing about living in one of the most remote parts of the world I’ve been too.

‘What on earth is there to do around here?’
‘Well, round here we like to hunt and we like to f*ck’
‘So waddya hunt for?’
‘Things to f*ck’
‘Ok. So does anything memorable ever happen around here?’
‘Well, one day we heard this young Asian girl had strayed out into the desert and got lost, so ten of us went out, found her f*cked her and brung her back again.’
‘Erm, anything else’
‘Well, another day one of my mates prize breeding goats got out and lost in the desert. So ten of us went out, found it, f*cked it, and brung it back again.’
‘I say. Well if that’s some of the good things there is to do round here, what’s some of the not so good things to do?’
‘Well. One day I got lost out in the desert…….’

(Sorry, I‘d heard that joke previously and had to get it in the Blog somewhere!)

It was a terrific night but some had over-cooked it a little. There was one person who had been especially unkind to his Liver. This was non other than my friend and yours, Tom McCartney.

It was obvious from the cab ride home (where 7 of us piled into the back of a standard car and two tried it on with the female cabbie who was 50 and had a face like a blomonge) that Thomas was clearly feeling the effects of alcohol. As we pulled up to the compound, Tom dived out of the car hoping to slope off unnoticed and get to bed without anyone teasing him. Unfortunately for Tom, disaster struck. He was too hammered to either a) remember the code to access his building, or b) function well enough to punch the code in properly. 10 minutes must have passed before the lads and I walked back to the compound only to find Tom frantically trying to punch the code into the door before we arrived. Too late. Paul, JK and Chris descended on him like a pack of dogs, hauled him to the ground and grabbed a limb each. This was when I did my journalist photo bit and took the photo you see attached to this entry. ‘Grab his other leg’ they screamed at me. ‘Who am I too argue’ I thought. We set off on our way to the pool a good 100yds away. During this time Tom didn’t struggle, he didn’t even scream any of the things you would come to expect from someone facing their impending doom. There was no ‘Put me down’ or ‘Let me go’. The only words that left Toms lips were a whimpering ‘I don’t under-staaaaand. I don’t under-staaaaaaaand. Why me? I don’t under-staaaaaand’. Seconds later Tom had been unceremoniously dumped into the pool. Ensuring he didn’t drown was JK who was stood closest to the pool (this was to be his own downfall) and me, stood closest to the gate out of the pool area.

As Tom halued stacked, rubbery frame out of the pool he seemed very nonchalant about the whole affair. Far too calm for someone who had just been dumped in a pool by his closest friends. He was plotting something. JK had not suspected anything and as Tom motioned to leave the pool area he grabbed JK. There was a brief tussle between the two with JK making a hell of a racket.

‘NO! NO YOU B*$TARD! NO!’ he said

This didn’t stop Tom BUT it did have a great effect of waking up the rest of the compound. We knew this because lights were popping on one by one throughout the accommodation blocks. Whilst I was looking at this I heard the inevitable: SPLEUSH. To my surprise though, Tom wasn’t stood by the edge of the pool. He was in it, with JK. Both fully clothed and both complete with soggy wallets and mobile phones. They both hauled themselves out of the pool and turned their attention to me. Not a chance. I was out of that gate quicker than you can say big girls blouse.

The following day everyone, complete with hang-overs, made their way to Lake Pleasant in order to hire a speed boat that would accommodate the 8 of us that had decided to go.. The idea of being on a speed boat with a hangover didn’t appeal to me but I thought ‘What’s the worst that could happen?’ The answer was to follow about an hour into the trip. I had already had my go on the inflatable ring at the back of the boat and found myself feeling quite nauseous by the time I had got back on board the boat. I had managed to suppress the feeling for a further 20 minutes before I could take no more.

‘Can you fellas just drop me off somewhere and come back for me when you’re done?’
‘What you talking about?’
‘I feel really sea sick’
‘You’ll be fine. Just grab some water and lie down’

It was too late. I had started to get that numb feeling and for some reason my fingers had gone all tingly. A second later I was hanging over the side of the boat yacking up like a trooper. Oddly enough the lads all agreed it was a tremendous idea to dump me in a cove and carry on with the rest of their time on the boat without me. 5 minutes later I was waving the lads off and turned around to find that I had been left in the middle of no-where. Rattle snakes are a real problem in Arizona so before sitting down I checked the area very carefully before plonking myself down. Half an hour went past with several boats passing at me, wondering why on earth the shivering lunatic they saw before them had decided to sit on the edge of a lake with nothing to do. It was then that I saw the guys dragging JK along on a wakeboard. After he performed a spectacular face-plant I saw the rest of them scoop him up out of the water and take off at a rapid rate of knots. In the wrong direction. It would be a further 20 minutes before I was to see the boat again and as soon as it came into view I started flapping my arms like a loony in hope that this time they would see me and head in my direction. Which they did. Thankfully.

Once back at Goodyear airport it was time for a quick 3S before we were back out in the pool car and heading this time into Tempe. Our first port of call was a bar called ‘The Big bang’. It was a duelling piano bar that Tom WOULD NOT SHUT UP ABOUT. Following that, we went to several other watering holes before the night, once again, turned into disarray. At the close of the evening, instead of catching a cab and heading back to Goodyear there were rumours of a house party at some random girls house. I needed no more persuading. I heard the word ‘girls’ and ‘party’. I instantly had images of American Pie house party’s flash before my eyes and I was in. Hook, line and sinker.

It turned out that instead of there being a house party it was basically us, at a girls house, expected to create a party atmosphere. At 3am. This was an impossible task and after it dawned on us that there was no party we stupidly decided to stay the night. The problem with this was that there were no spare beds in the house. There was however an abundance of floor space, which we duly took advantage of. I remember the clock rolling past 5:30 before I managed to get to sleep. I woke at 8:00 wanting desperately to get back to Goodyear after one of the worst nights ‘sleep’ I had ever had in my life. To my surprise the others were stirring and it wasn’t long before we were all awake, wanting to get back to Goodyear themselfes. This doesn’t sound like a problem, but it was. The homeowner was still asleep, some of our party had gone missing and we hadn’t got a clue where we were. After 10 minutes a tired and grumpy McCartney in unfamiliar territory, had a wave of inspiration hit him.

‘Check the mail. It bound to have the address on it.’

Sure enough, after rummaging through the mail, we found out where we were. The next problem was soon overcome. We didn’t know the number of any of the local cab firms but luckily the house owner had left their laptop out so a quick search on Google and we found our man.

In the hour wait that ensued we decided to get up and go out for a wonder. I was amazed at where we were. The drive back to the house from the nightclub was a haze. The only thing I remember as the car pulled up was that there was an orange on the ‘sidewalk’. I remember thinking ‘How odd that someone would throw an orange away on the street’. It would turn out that we were at no ordinary house. We were at an apartment complex that had security fencing all round and required key pad access to enter. The orange I had seen on the footpath had belonged to one of the many orange trees that lined the complex. To the right of the house was a swimming pool and to the left was a lake that, in size, rivalled the one in Stanley Park in Blackpool. All that and the homeowner was only an airline hostess. I think I live in the wrong country…..

The remainder of the day was very quiet and subdued in comparison to the rest of the weekend. We all chilled out until it was time to retire for the evening.

The following day I was to drive to Las Vegas. However, I had set myself the rather impossible task of getting there AND taking in the Grand Canyon AND the Hoover Dam. It would take me 10 hours to complete 510 miles. This might seem like an eternity but when you find out I stopped at the Grand Canyon for 1 1/2 hours and the Hoover Dam for 1 hour it might not seem so bad.

The Grand Canyon’s South Rim is accessible by one road only, which of course is controlled by a toll booth ($25!). This added considerable time and effort to the journey but it was worth it. Looking into the Grand Canyon is unbelievable. The place is so vast it’s almost as though your brain goes into meltdown trying to comprehend the distance to objects you see in the distance. After 10 minutes your brain gives this up and just accepts that the big hole in the ground is HUGE. I found that after 1 1/2 hours I’d had enough of seeing the big hole from several different angles and decided there and then that it would be pointless to return there on a tour as I would no doubt just be looking at the same big hole from yet another angle, which after time would look like most of the other angles I had seen it from.

The Hoover Dam was my next port of call. Unfortunately there were no Transformers or Meagan Fox present (most disappointing) but it was still impressive non the less. Because I had arrived at the ‘obscure’ time of 5 o’clock in the evening there wasn’t a tour running so I had to make do with poking around the place and seeing what I could get into, which turned out to be not a lot. I was still really impressed with the Dam and would definitely recommend that people go and visit it. Preferably during visiting hours.

Over the other side of the dam takes us into Nevada and Vegas which is the next section of this Blog. Thanks for making it this far and hopefully see you for the final Blog of this trip

---

Photos

The things you do when drunk
Apparently we could have been arrested for this

Tom 'I dont understand' McCartney
Tom, about 10 seconds before he ended up in the compounds swimming pool

Pilot crew
Team NetJets and I on the speed boat just before it set off

Me
Hangin off the back of a speedboat in an inflatable ring. I need my head examining

Big bang
The title of Tempes premier duelling Piano bar