Arizona Destinations
Phoenix
Phoenix – the name just makes you think of big ol’ flames and big ol’ birds getting burnt up in them and the dastardly summer heat of this capital city does nothing to diminish that image. The climate is pleasantly warm in the winter – prime time to check out the range of leisure activities on offer. The city’s location in a valley ringed by mountains enables recreation in a spectacular setting. There are hiking and mountain biking trails to be tackled and scenic drives and lookouts to be explored, plus this valley’s reputation as a golfer’s paradise is well known. To get in touch with the true South Westerner in you, there are plenty of yee-hah-ride-’em-cowboy horseriding opportunities.
For the hotter months, or for the less sporty visitor, the city itself is host to some world-class museums. The Heard Museum, which houses an impressive display of Native American history and culture, comes to life with a festival each March, while The Pueblo Grande Museumis a Hohokam Indian village which has been partially excavated and then re-buried for preservation, leaving sections open to the visitor. Nearby Mesa is home to a large Mormon temple – it is closed to the public but Mormon guides are on hand to take visitors around the grounds and explain the basic tenets of the faith. Botany buffs can visit the Desert Botanical Gardens, while fireman fanatics will enjoy the fire fighting memorabilia displayed at the Hall of Flame. The city centre itself has no obvious links with its past, except for a group of 8 or so early 20th century houses in the optimistically-named Heritage Square. The surrounding cityscape, however, is aggressively modern and host to a range of dining possibilities, from traditional American steakhouses and diners, through to the ubiquitous Southwestern or Tex Mex offerings, to more diverse Asian and European establishments.
Tombstone
The Wild West of countless classic movies can be experienced first hand in evocatively-named Tombstone. Founded in the late 19th century by a lucky prospector, the town provides a glimpse into a reckless past of cowboys and Indians, bandits and outlaws, desperadoes and flash gunslingers. The famous OK Corral shootout took place here and the Corral is now the scene of historic animations and exhibits. Dramatic re-enactments of shoot-outs take place against a backdrop of original Western buildings – gimmicky, but fun – and the Boothill Graveyard houses the graves of many of these early chancers; the gruff epitaphs on some of the headstones displaying the rough sensibilities of the real, pre-tourist Wild West. Nearby Bisbee is less sensationalist, providing tours of the mines that were the lifeblood of the days of gunfights, saloons and ladies of dubious virtue. Various events and festivals in both towns celebrate this colourful history.
Petrified Forest National Park
The name conjures up images of a perfectly preserved, Sleeping Beauty of a forest, woods in a time-warp, but the Petrified Forest National Park is no less enchanting for being an area littered with fossilised tree trunks, many fragmented. The area offers a glimpse into an inconceivably distant past – the trees date from 225 million years ago and were standing before the time of the dinosaurs. Buried, fossilised and then exposed by erosion, some of the logs boast impressive dimensions. The main viewpoints in the park – Blue Mesa, Jasper Forest, Crystal Forest and Rainbow Forest are, as their names suggest, beautiful and colourful, but have sadly all been plundered to lesser or greater degrees by early souvenir hunters. Removal of any materials from the park is now strictly forbidden. Other features of the area include a 16th century Indian hut built entirely of petrified wood, petroglyph sites and nearby are many-hued landscape of the Painted Desert. Here, the sun reacts with minerals in the earth to create changing colours in the surrounds. Unsurprisingly, the area is especially striking at sunset.
Wupatki National Monument
Wupatki National Monument covers 54 square miles of over 2700 well-preserved archaeological sites, offering evidence of the rich and complex past of the area’s prehistoric Anasazi and Sinagua inhabitants. The area features rock art, pottery, baskets and tools, and the pueblos and dwellings here are distinctive from many found in the Southwest due to the fact that they are free standing – some several stories high – rather than cut into cliffs. Only a few of these masonry pueblos are easily accessed; one other – Crack-in-the-Rock Pueblo can be visited only an organised 16 mile weekend-long hiking trip, available only two months per year and limited to 25 hikers. Places are given out on a lottery basis and interpretative exhibits at the visitor centre offer a fuller understanding of the historical and cultural significance of the area.
Arizona-Sonora Desert
Huge, imposing desert cacti, eerily resembling people with their arms raised skywards, are as much a part of people’s image of the Southwest as the Grand Canyon. The Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in the Arizona-Sonora Desert, is host to thousands of these columnar cacti – the common saguaro, plus the organ pipe cacti from which the monument takes its name and the rarer Old Man’s Beard (so named because of its distinctive white tufts) which grows nowhere else in the USA. Springtime often sees a profusion of both wild- and cactus-flowers and the abundance of resident fauna is best seen in the early mornings and evenings, when it is not taking shelter underground from the searing heat of the day. There are a variety of hiking trails available, ranging from stroll to strenuous, as well as a 52-mile scenic loop drive to the west and a 21-mile loop to the east. Plenty of camping places are available, but backcountry camping is permitted with a permit.
Guide by Sarah Rodrigues
Destination – Arizona