Mike & Sharon's RV Adventures: Circle Pines KOA, Williams, AZ

We arrived at the Circle Pines KOA RV Park on April 24, 2015 and stayed for five days. We heard about Williams from another RVer and it was a great place to stay. It’s springtime, but the day we arrived, it snowed! Just our luck! But it was beautiful, as long as we didn’t have to drive the RV in it! Mike even made a snowman for Sharon!

Our neighbor had to sweep all the snow off of his "slides" before he could bring them in and leave the campsite!

WILLIAMS, AZ

Williams is located just north of Phoenix and west of Flagstaff and is known as the “Gateway to the Grand Canyon.” It is located in the heart of the Kaibab National Forest at an elevation of 6,770 feet and serves as the forest’s headquarters. Williams was also the last town in America on Historic Route 66 to be bypassed by the freeway. Interstate 40 replaced the last surviving segment on October 13, 1984.

Founded in 1880, Williams was named for the famous trapper, scout and mountain man, “Old Bill Williams,” whose statue stands at the west end of the city. The large mountain directly south of town is named Bill Williams Mountain.

We strolled along the antique brick side-walks of Historic Old Town which was full of interesting shops, galleries and restaurants. You can also ride the rails on a historic steam train to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. We spent a lot of time in a corner gallery store that offered a lot of unique art.

Then we ate at Twisters Soda Fountain and Route 66 Café all decked out in pink and 50’s motif. When we arrived, a parade of vintage cars pulled up to Twisters. They were members of the Horseless Carriage association. After lunch we admired the beautifully restored cars!

JEROME, AZ

Jerome is a mine town propped on a thirty-degree mountainside two thousand feet above the Verde Valley floor a short drive from Williams. Few towns, if any, are more precariously anchored on an inclined plane. The town’s main streets are switchbacks in an arterial highway that snakes over Mingus Mountain. Fifteen hundred vertical feet separate the upper-level houses from the lowest dwellings in the Gulch. It was once known as the “Wickedest Town in the West.”

The first mine claims were staked on an ore body west of town back in the days of horses, mules, and burros, when this rugged mountain was without a road. It was natural for those early prospectors and miners to camp close to the diggings. The diggings grew into one of the greatest copper-producing mines in the world, and the camp grew into the fabulous “city” of Jerome which was once populated by nearly 15,000 residents during the height of the copper mining business.

Here is a photo of Main Street, Jerome, ca. 1917 - “Billion Dollar Copper Camp”

It was quirky little town that has one fire station, lots of galleries and restaurants. We ate at the Mile High Grill which was delicious!

Jerome is Arizona’s Art Destination and it’s true, the galleries and studios were filled with every kind of creative art you could think of. We stopped in at the glass studio and watched the artist in motion.

We also drove through the Gold King Mine Ghost Town filled with antique trucks, tractors and construction and mining equipment dating back to the turn of the century.

Here is Where the Pavement Ends, The Old West Begins…

SEDONA, AZ

We took a scenic drive to Sedona. It was a beautiful sunny day with blue skies filled with a wondrous display of clouds.

Early Native Americans built cliff dwellings in Sedona around 1100 A.D., but Sedona was named for the wife of the area’s first U.S. postmaster, T.C. Schnebly. Surrounded by soaring red-rock monoliths, the city is best known for its enchanting views. The shapely sandstone rock formations give off a red-orange glow, and verdant plant life – from red-limbed manzanita to alligator juniper – adds to the mystique.

We typically do not return to places we have already been, but it had been years, so we decided to return. When we arrived in Sedona, we didn’t recognize it since we last visited on a vacation out West with our friends Dan and Karin. Today, the town had grown to a tourist attraction with traffic congestion and lots of stores and restaurants. But the iconic red canyon rock landscapes were as beautiful as we remembered. And the artwork amazing!

The only familiar things we remembered were:

Schnebly Hill Road – A hair-raising “shortcut” Mike found that we traversed at night in a minivan, only to find out the next morning at breakfast that it was a dirt trail used for off-road Jeep tours! It was so dark that Mike came inches to the edge of the cliff and turned sharply to avoid driving off. And the road was so rugged and full of curves that Sharon and Dan cursed Mike while their stomachs churned from nausea.

Center for the New Age – A throwback to the Hippie days with all things spiritual, crystal and having to do with the vortex.

Tlaquepaque – Sedona’s Art and Shopping landmark since the 1970s. Today its boundaries enclose more than 40 shops featuring one-of-a-kind. Giant sycamores and stately cottonwoods dapple the light that falls on Tlaquepaque’s masonry walls as you walk through four different courtyards.

On another day we drove back to Sedona to meet our friends, Bob and Jackie from Payson, AZ. It was a cloudy, rainy day but it was fun to walk between the raindrops, have lunch and visit with them.