Today was set aside as our day to explore the Sedona area. We got up at a reasonable hour, ate breakfast and took off up I-17 north toward Sedona. We turned off I-17 on the Red Rocks Scenic Parkway and moseyed into town making a couple of stops to take pix. The rock formations are gorgeous in this area. We found that at least some of the spots where you can park are under the control of the U.S. Forest Service and do not require incessant contributions to the iron ranger conspicuously posted in all the parking areas if you were clever enough to own a federal lands access pass. We got to park for free in the lot where we stopped although during the day we found numerous other small lots where the feds or the state have farmed their lack of services out to a concessionaire whose sole function seems to be to make you pay.
Sedona itself is chock-full of businesses that cater to ardent believers in vortexes, soul enrichment through dubious strategies, crystal wizardry, spiritual guidance by affluent, strangely-dressed practitioners and personal improvement of a type where results cannot be measured, identified or reproduced. If you are one of those thinking there must be more to life than that which can be proven, then this is the place for you to come for continued disappointment with life. However, if you are the type that does not need mysterious regimens to enjoy life, then the nature scenery here is truly extraordinary and worth passing through the gauntlet of shit to see.
The gorgeous local geologic formations surround the vile, disgusting town. Some apparently very rich folks have built enormous estates that project their magnificent ugliness into the vistas but it is quite easy to ignore these folks’ monuments to excessive consumption by merely looking up. The assholes can only build so high.
We spent quite a bit of time being awed by nature before heading up the back road between Sedona and Flagstaff. This drive is spectacular and, before long, we came to Slide Rock State Park. At the entrance to the park they have done away with the possibly informative presence of a human ranger replacing it with a sluggish, dull-witted iron ranger that makes you part with $10 per car and $3 a head for any number of passengers exceeding four carried within the vehicle.
The $10 entry fee ends up being a very good deal. The park is beautiful. There is a very well-maintained homestead residence and apple processing barn, a great river area accessible for swimming, slimy rocks beneath the running water on which you can slide downriver and great places to just sit and enjoy the stunning surroundings while having a picnic. The road from Sedona is a bit squirrely but the trip is definitely worth the terror induced by the poorly engineered and maintained highway.
After Peggy and I had some lunch and got to play with dogs wisely brought for us to play with by their owners, we departed the park and drove back into the Sedona area armed with a map we had acquired from the almost completely concealed and difficult to access visitor information center in town. For those of you contemplating a visit here, go through the Hyatt parking lot, turn right down the road where the VIC is supposed to be located and immediately find a street parking space because the adjacent parking lot only seems to have an exit. If you miss your parking opportunity, turn right twice more and circle around through the Hyatt parking lot again. If you are looking for road maps of the area, go to the USGS because the Sedona Chamber of Commerce does not have road maps or only staffs their info centers with folks unfamiliar with the concept of road maps.
By random perusal, we were able to acquire a map showing 4-wheeler routes around the area and we used this resource to find all the roads leading away from town that did not have spiritual guidance scouts at the other end of them. As it turned out, most of the paved sections had small parking lots or turnarounds at the end of the paved sections and the passages up these roads were truly gorgeous with plenty of views of wildlife and colorful rock formations. We were passed by numerous pink Jeeps driven by vendors taking very well-dressed yahoos along the dirt sections of the roads from town. None of the Jeeps seemed to be even slightly dusty or muddy so I surmise the dirt roads must not be too challenging, even for normal cars. Some roads have signs indicating that high clearance vehicles should be the only vehicles to proceed past the sign and we followed their advice.
Our entire exploration loop today only covered about 60 miles but the scenery was so fantastic that it ended up taking us just less than six hours giving us an average speed of ten miles per hour. About 35 of the 60 miles was freeway so that should be some indication of the time it took us to truly appreciate the views on the 15 miles of sightseeing. Sedona itself is quite unremarkable but the country surrounding it is absolutely magnificent and worth the effort of spending a day here.