Know Before You Go
When to go: If you know anything about Arizona it is H-O-T.I’m talking dry heat no humidity where they put sunshades on ALL the windows in their car because it gets so hot in the summers. So, if you are anything like me and want to enjoy all the moments you can outdoors I would recommend keeping your trip between the months of February to May and October to November. We hit the weather just right and were lucky to have weather in the high 70s with cooler evenings in the high 40s. We went to the pool but just hit the hot tub because it was still a little chilly for a swimsuit!
Costs: Phoenix is where you’ll fly into to get to Scottsdale and as major airport, the flights were very affordable! Once you get to Scottsdale, the food and drinks are very comparable to Dallas so I was used to spending $20-$40 on a meal and $8-13 on a drink! I was blown away at how affordable the hotels were! We stayed in the cutest boutique hotel I’ll share below later.
Length of Trip: We decided on a three-day two-night trip and it was just enough time! We felt like we saw everything, got familiar with the town, and were comfortable going home when we did! We really lucked out on an early morning cheap flight on Friday and that made all the difference in our trip. We woke up early and once we landed went straight to a hike and afterwards napped and when we woke up it felt like a new day. Try to score an early morning flight to make the most of your time there!
Getting Around: My friend from college Danielle lives in Scottsdale and was our go-to tour guide and she walks everywhere and lives close to our hotel. She told us the city was very walkable (which it most definitely is) but to me walkable is less than 5 minutes. Some of the places we walked were a little over 15-20 minutes but the parking in Old Town is not the most convenient so I would definitely recommend not renting a car for the whole weekend. When we went on our hike we rode in Danielle’s car so if you plan on hiking you might need a car but the hikes are fairly close so you can uber as well! We ubered home from bars most nights but other than we walked everywhere!