The State of Arizona

Geography Hard 23 words3 plays

The Grand Canyon with iconic saguaro cacti stretching across the desert.

AMTRAK
ARIZONAN
BANNER HEALTH
BISBEE
CARDINALS
CARMONA
CATHEDRAL ROCK
CESAR CHAVEZ
COPPER
DOUGLAS FIR
GOLDWATER
GRAND CANYON
HUMPHREYS PEAK
JAN BREWER
MARICOPA
PARKINSONIA
PHOENIX
RATTLERS
SAGUARO
SONORAN DESERT
SUNS
TURQUOISE
WREN

Print this puzzle

Arizona is made for sun, road trips, and desert scenery. This grid rounds up the state's biggest cities and landmarks, like the Grand Canyon and the Sonoran Desert, alongside its pro sports teams and well known Arizonans. See how fast you can find them all.

The State of Arizona word search printable sheet, 23 words to find — The State of Arizona word search, printable sheet

Tips for Solving Word Search Puzzles

Words in this puzzle run in all eight directions: across, down and diagonally, and some of them read backwards. Knowing the rules narrows the search before you start.

How hints work

Press and hold a word in the list beside the puzzle above, or hold Space or Enter on it from the keyboard, and a ring fills while you wait. After five seconds every cell where that word's first letter appears is outlined in the grid. Keep holding another six seconds and the outlines narrow to only the places where its second letter follows on. Let go and the outlines clear. A word found with help keeps its outline, in the grid and in the list, so you can see afterwards which ones needed a hint. Hints are available while the clock is running, not while the puzzle is paused.

Ways to find a stubborn word

Check the edges for long words. A long word needs a long straight run of cells, and the outer rows and columns are where those runs tend to begin or end. Trace the border first.
Hunt the rare letter, not the first one. A word that contains a J, Q, X, Z, K, W or V is easier to find by that letter than by its opening one: there are far fewer of them on the grid, and each one you find is a candidate to read outward from in every allowed direction.
Search the open ground. Once several words are marked, the remaining ones are hiding in the areas nothing crosses yet. Give the untouched patches your attention before re-reading rows you have already combed.
Look for doubled letters and fixed pairs. LL, OO, EE, TH and QU stand out at a glance. Find the pair, then check whether the rest of the word runs from it.
Scan one direction at a time. Run your eye along every row looking only for the word's first two letters, then down every column, then along the diagonals if the puzzle allows them. One direction per pass is faster than switching on every cell.
Read the endings. If words here can run backwards, an ending like ING, TION or ER is as good a handle as the start: spot it, then read back the other way.
Take the longest words first. They have the fewest possible positions, and marking them carves the grid into smaller regions for everything shorter.
Pause when you are stuck. Pause stops the clock. A fresh look after a minute away finds what a tired one keeps missing, and Shuffle gives you a new arrangement of the same words if you would rather start over.

What the words in this puzzle mean

AMTRAK: The national passenger rail service, which crosses Arizona on its Los Angeles routes.
ARIZONAN: The demonym for a resident of the state; Arizonian is also used but less commonly.
BANNER HEALTH: A large non-profit hospital system headquartered in Phoenix.
BISBEE: A former copper-mining town in the southeast, now known for its steep streets and artists.
CARDINALS: Arizona's NFL team, based at State Farm Stadium in Glendale.
CARMONA: Richard Carmona, the Tucson doctor who served as United States Surgeon General.
CATHEDRAL ROCK: A red sandstone formation near Sedona and one of the most photographed sites in the state.
CESAR CHAVEZ: Labour leader born in Yuma who organised farm workers across the Southwest.
COPPER: The metal that built Arizona's economy — it is still the leading copper-producing state.
DOUGLAS FIR: A tall conifer growing in Arizona's high country, far above the desert most people picture.
GOLDWATER: Barry Goldwater, five-term senator from Arizona and the 1964 Republican nominee for president.
GRAND CANYON: The mile-deep gorge cut by the Colorado River, and the state's defining landmark.
HUMPHREYS PEAK: The highest point in Arizona at 12,633 feet, north of Flagstaff.
JAN BREWER: Governor of Arizona from 2009 to 2015.
MARICOPA: The county containing Phoenix, home to most of the state's population.
PARKINSONIA: The genus of the palo verde, the green-barked desert tree that is Arizona's state tree.
PHOENIX: The state capital and largest city, and the most populous capital in the United States.
RATTLERS: Rattlesnakes; Arizona has more species of them than any other state.
SAGUARO: The giant branching cactus of the Sonoran Desert, which can live two hundred years.
SONORAN DESERT: The desert covering southern Arizona, greener and more varied than most deserts.
SUNS: The Phoenix Suns, the state's NBA team.
TURQUOISE: The blue-green stone mined here for centuries and central to Southwestern jewellery.
WREN: The cactus wren, Arizona's state bird, which nests inside spiny cholla.

The State of Arizona Word Search Answer Key

Checking a finished sheet, or stuck on the last word? The The State of Arizona Word Search Answer Key marks all 23 hidden words in the grid and lists the row, column and direction each one starts from. It prints on its own sheet, so you can hand out the puzzle and keep the answers.

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