Not that we would ever condone making use of the facilities of a hotel when not a guest, because we would never do that, but should you happen to have the opportunity to take in the backyards of the more chi-chi resorts in this little resort town of ours, you'll soon find out what we did: Gainey Ranch has the best pool facilities we've ever seen.

Sitting on just under three acres, with several divided pools, a "beach" surrounded by tiki torches, a whirlpool spa, and a three-story water slide, the "water playground" is like a water park with a full bar. Sections of the pool are adults only, so you can drop off the kids in the water-slide area and sneak off to one of the many swim-up or walk-up bars. The setting is beautiful, and guests can enjoy the full-service spa. Lie back on one of the upholstered poolside couches, swim around the waterfalls, or snooze on the Arizona fake beach -- it's the perfect mini vacation without leaving the city.

You try to concentrate on work, but the e-mail you just received keeps haunting you. You could play Johnson Ranch for $10? Gold Canyon for $15? Eagle Mountain for $23? Why the hell are you still sitting at this desk? At those prices, it seems immoral not to knock off and go golf.

The e-mails come daily from Cypress Golf Solutions, the creators of www.golf602.com, a Web site that serves as a clearinghouse for hundreds of daily tee-time discounts in the Valley.

You just go to the Web site and answer several questions about where you want to play, what times you like to play and how much you're willing to pay. Then, every day, you are sent an e-mail listing the tee times and discounted prices that fit your criteria.

Once you're signed up, you get an e-mail listing of an average of 20 to 30 open tee times at numerous Valley golf courses at savings typically ranging from 50 to 70 percent.

Sundance and Bear Creek for $10. The Arizona Biltmore for $25. Phantom Horse for $15. The discounts make Phoenix-area golf once again affordable for Phoenix-area residents.

El Dorado Hot Springs is owned by Camilla Van Sickle and Bill Pennington. It's a 1,200-gallon-per-minute subterranean hot spring of odorless, tasteless mineral water, with no nasty chemicals. Just a hot tub the way nature intended it. The water has a natural pH of 8.2 and contains sodium, calcium, potassium, magnesium, chloride, bicarbonate, sulfate, silicates, fluoride, boron, and trace amounts of lithium, which does wonders for the hair and skin.

Soak away your hectic workweek in one of the many pools, some of which have retractable shade or misting systems. You can choose either private soaking areas, or semiprivate, and if you decide you don't want to come back to the grind right away, there is an on-site sleeping cabin called Motel California that has a full bath and linens and comes with various soaking packages. It's a steal at $50 to $65. Therapeutic massage and Tibetan Bowl Resonant Relaxation are available by appointment.

The Peak trailhead isn't the easiest to get to, involving lots of curves through north Scottsdale's exclusive Troon area. But that's one of the reasons we love to hike here -- we escape the sweaty masses clambering up Camelback Mountain and Squaw Peak. At 3.5 miles, it's not too time-consuming, just long enough to get us breathing, and elevated enough to allow for spectacular views of the Valley below. And the beauty before us is breathtaking, with floods of dramatic cactuses and artistic-shaped boulders lining the path. Now and again, we'll bring our horse, though it's difficult for him to navigate the periodically steep and slippery rock-strewn paths. We always take our dog, who leaps and bounds and pauses only to drink large amounts of the water we always pack for him (and us). We also like to bring a little picnic of nuts, fruits, juices, vegetables and Scooby snacks, leaving it in a cooler in our car. When we're through hiking, we rest at picnic tables in the ramada between the parking lot and trailhead, refill our water bottles from the fountain, and take a break in the rest room. It's definitely a day well spent.

Readers' Choice for Best City Hiking Trail: Squaw Peak

Though we hardly could be called card-carrying members of the country-club set, we do occasionally enjoy pretending that we can smack a tennis ball with the best of 'em. And that's a backhanded way of informing our fellow lob-sters that our favorite place to run ourselves in circles is this wonderful city-run facility, tucked away in a west Phoenix residential park. For a few bucks (and a few more at night), you can hit the yellow orb to your heart's content on one of the 22 well-kept, lighted courts. It doesn't hurt that the pro shop is stocked with goodies, the locker rooms are more than adequate and the vending machines rarely are empty. Now if only we can figure out how to get that first serve in more than once in a blue moon.

Head west, young sports fan! West Valley leaders know what their constituents want: good sports in good facilities and lots of 'em. Take a typical spring afternoon out at Surprise Stadium, the gorgeous baseball mecca that opened in 2002 for the Texas Rangers and Kansas City Royals. The stadium is packed with everything from Sun City retirees keeping their own score books and West Valley families enjoying the up-close-and-personal with major league stars to college spring breakers sunning on the plush grass beyond the outfield fence. It's a great baseball vibe in a beautiful baseball facility, a facility that, in time, will serve as part of the walkable urban core of the exploding city of Surprise.

While many skateboarders are willing to dish out $10 to skate in indoor parks with smaller ramps and a load of regulations (or illegally skate in commercial strip malls), adrenaline junkies in the know ride their boards under the sun at the Paradise Valley Skate Park. The Phoenix Parks and Recreation Department has three skate parks (including the Desert West Skateboard Plaza on Encanto Boulevard and the Pecos Park Skate Park), but the PV Skate Park has way more than the other two -- the City of Phoenix Parks and Recreation Department's PR materials list the PV Skate Park's virtues with savvy heretofore unknown to bureaucrats: "kinked snakebowls, a kidney bowl, spine bowls, a banked alley, street plaza, flatbars, grinding ledges and blocks, pump bumps, sloped ramps, radial banks and an elongated funbox."

And best of all, it's free.

For those about to rock, we direct you . . . to AZ on the Rocks, where beginner, intermediate and women-only classes convene every couple of days. Learn the ropes -- and the lingo -- on 14,000 square feet of textured climbing terrain, with 50 top ropes, a lead-only cave, rappelling platform, chimney, separate bouldering area and -- we're not sure we like the sound of this -- "multiple cracks." "Arizona's largest indoor rock climbing gym" also has the hookup for kids, with designated family climb times, Saturday-morning "Kids Climbs," and certification classes for ages 12 to 14. While "Rock and Climb" sessions add a rock 'n' roll soundtrack, and three-hour party packages include a private room and party host, not-so-social climbers can get in the zone during members-only gym times.

Rock on!

Sure, there are other resort pools in town. But only at the Oasis can 25 adults party in a hot tub secluded from the lifeguard-patrolled toddler pool by faux red rock boulders and pretend they've found a private hot spring in Sedona.

The 17-year-old resort opened the $12.3 million water park just two years ago as one intentionally designed for an older demographic, and the rolling, six-acre enclave is full of the kinds of water features parents "ooh" over while the kids just yawn. Not to worry. There's something for everyone -- particularly you.

Yeah, the steep slides barreling down from the 83-foot tower at the back of the park rival Waterworld's Kilimanjaro for sheer free-fall thrills, and the 10,000-square-foot wave pool can keep the kids bobbing happily all afternoon. But it's the meandering lazy river feature, dubbed the Zuni, that really draws the crowds -- of chillin' grown folks content to float endlessly around the manmade red rock canyon, entertained by little more than misters, arcing water squirts and the occasional current-speeding jet stream.

The kids might eventually tire of the falls at Slide Canyon after a few climbs up the three-story staircase, but mom won't have to hear "I'm bored" until they find her -- which may take until dusk.

We don't care what Jack Hanna says. Bats are just plain creepy and, dare we say, evil little critters. Still, we can't help but be drawn to the southern border of Paradise Valley along the Arizona Canal where, from late spring through November, Satan's Little Helpers gather at sunset and hover along the warm flood-control waters in search of mosquitoes and moths. Joggers and spectators alike have been known to gather at the overpass at 40th Street just north of Camelback Road to catch a glimpse of the flying mammals, which migrate annually from Mexico. But we suggest a real adrenaline rush: Start your evening run along the canal at 37th Street just behind Phoenix Country Day School (where, rumor has it, the bats nap during the day) with a raw, bloody steak in tow. Best. Workout. Ever.