Topic: Planning a road trip from Phoenix to Sedona, to the Grand Canyon, Horsehoe Bend, Montezuma Castle, and Oak Creek Canyon.

Growing up on the Big Island of Hawaii there was no shortage of nature. Within a few hours you could go from white sand beaches to lava rock through the rain forrest and end in tide pools. So why choose Arizona for a road trip? Because Red dirt and the dessert is as close to the opposite of rain forrest and beaches as you can get so why not experience something new?

The Planning

Planning a road trip from Phoenix meant lots of choices. There is something to see in every direction. If you travel South you can see Tuscon, East to New Mexico, North towards Sedona and the Grand Canyon, further North to Page or Utah, Northwest towards Las Vegas, or even Northeast to the 4 corners monument. But we wouldn’t have enough time to do it all and like anything else it came down to tradeoffs.

Vegas was quickly scratched off the list. Although we like Vegas this specific trip was about adventuring somewhere new and we had been to Vegas many times. However, if you haven’t been to Vegas before it could be worth the drive. It’s only 4.5 hours away and along the way you could go to Page (see Horseshoe Bend) and/or the Grand Canyon.

For us though the Arizona area was uncharted and new so we decided to focus on the Arizona.

We narrowed down our travel paths to two realistic options that would make sense based upon our number of travel days (4 full days).

The first option was about covering ground. With this option we could go through Arizona to New Mexico and see Sedona and Horseshoe Bend.  This was a doable travel path but it would mean over 24 hours of driving time total. With this we’d get maximum exposure to see different terrain and cities but again it’s a lot of ground to cover (759 mi, 12 hours drive time each way).

Our path with option one would have been to start in Phoenix, drive up through Sedona, through Flagstaff, up to Horsehoe Bend, over to Albuquerque and back to Phoenix.

The second option, and the one we ended up selecting, was to make Sedona our home base with nights in Phoenix at the beginning and end of our trip. We selected this option because going up North gave us the chance to really experience Sedona plus the flexibility to do day trips to the Grand Canyon, Horseshoe Bend or even hike locally around Red Rock State Park, Robbers Cave, or Cathedral Rock. Since I’m traveling with family the flexibility to be able to adventure on our own was a pretty big motivator and reason why we decided to have a home base for a few days.

The driving path for option one was to start in Phoenix, go to Montezuma Castle, to Sedona via Oak Creek Canyon, then up Grand Canyon and Horseshoe Bay on different days.

A rough itinerary for our trip:

• Day 1: Fly in and stay overnight in Phoenix
• Day 2: Leave early morning driving up I-17 to Montezuma Castle. Leave Montezuma Castle driving up Oak Creek Canyon to Sedona.
• Day 3: Take a day trip up to Horseshoe Bay
• Day 4: Take a day trip up to the Grand Canyon
• Day 5: Adventure around Sedona then drive back to Phoenix in the afternoon
• Day 6: Travel day back to San Francisco

There really is so much to see in Arizona and with this trip we’ll just scratch the surface.

One example of something that we won’t be able to see on this trip is Havasupai Falls. If you haven’t seen pictures of the falls go check it out. It is breathtaking. To get to the falls is a full day hike – cars aren’t able to get to the falls and even food is brought into the village by donkey! The falls also requires an advanced reservation to control the number of people visiting. Anyway, something to look forward to on another trip.

For our Sedona trip I’ve included resources below on tours to the Grand Canyon and Horseshoe Bend, hikes in Sedona, and breakfast places you might want to check out.

Hope you too are planning a great adventure to somewhere new.

Get out and travel!

Johanna

Guided Tours

1. Horseshoe Bay via a tour (8 hours)
2. Red rock state park Tour (2 hrs)

Hikes in Sedona

1. Robbers Cave – A short hike with a view
2. Cathedral Rock

Breakfast in Sedona

1. Coffee Pot
2. Wildflower Bread Co