Arizona – Cottonwood, Sedona, Flagstaff
April 10: New City, AZ to Cottonwood, AZ
Leaving New City, we stopped at Arcosanti. This visionary urban center was built primarily by volunteers in the middle of the desert. The vision was to build an urban “city” that is environmentally efficient. The architect, Paolo Soleri, was disgusted with suburban sprawl and its associated wasted energy. This led him to design a community where buildings would have multiple uses, thus conserving energy. The beautiful ceramic and bronze bells they make are sold as fund raisers and Jack had to have one. Arcosanti sponsors poetry readings and concerts. We drove a couple of hours north to Cottonwood, which will be our home base for exploring the Sedona area.
April 11: Cottonwood and Sedona, AZ
We ran errands this morning and after lunch, we drove up to Sedona via the Red Rock Lower Loop. This drive took us among the fantastic red rock formations. We stopped at the visitor center in downtown Sedona to get information about the area. 
Then we drove over to the 
Chapel of the Holy Cross, built by a student of Frank Lloyd Wright’s son. The church is a massive 90’ cross seemingly growing right out of the rock cliff with panoramic views of Sedona and the surrounding area.
After climbing up to the church from the parking area to visit the church and its gift shop and to admire the view from atop the cliff, we went to the trailhead for Little Horse . 
Little Horse trail is about 5 miles roundtrip with fabulous views of the Courthouse Butte and Bell Rock. We stopped at Chicken Point, atop a massive rock outcropping with stunning views. During our 2 1/2 mile hike, we saw no one. We pushed to the ascent for our view at Chicken Point, and sat down and admired our hard-won view. A few minutes later, the place was crawling with people! We turned around and there were two pink jeeps that had brought tourists up from the other side of Chicken Point in comfort! Cheaters….and wimps….
April 12: Cottonwood, AZ
Drove up, up, up to the small town of Jerome. This was a former copper mining boomtown of 15,000 people that became a ghost town and is now quite the artsy enclave. The town clings to the side of the mountain about a mile higher than Cottonwood.
W
e only had time to climb up and down a couple of the steep streets in town as we had a tee time at the Pine Meadows golf course. The course was a difficult executive 4500 yard course. Fairways were very narrow with lots of waste areas. The weather was great – 80 degrees with the nice weather forecasted for the rest of the week.
Drove out to the airport – we were told it has great views, and it did. The airport is built atop a mesa and we did get some nice panoramic pictures of Sedona.
April 13: Cottonwood, AZ
Drove back up to Sedona today and stopped at Red Rock Crossing State Park for a hike to Cathedral Rock. This is also one of several “vortexes” in the area where folks meditate and perform vortex ceremonies at the edge of scenic Oak Creek that runs through here. Many of the folks in Sedona that weren’t tourists appeared to be reincarnated 60’s hippies and 70’s flower children. 
Further down the creek were lots of rock towers built by folks trying to achieve peace, good luck, or whatever the vortex is supposed to provide – a good energy type of thing. Supposedly there are three types of vortexes – positive, negative and neutral. Jack built his own rock tower – of course, it was larger and taller than any of the others. Guess Jack figured it would take a really tall tower to bring enough good energy to make him laidback, calm and peaceful. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the tools necessary to make the required skyscraper.
The scenic drive through Oak Creek Canyon (Hwy 89A) that I had read about in a lot of literature – was a bit of a disappointment. Some of the drive was pretty, but it wasn’t spectacular – and we have been used to extraordinarily spectacular scenery. We’re becoming jaded. On the return drive to Sedona, we stopped near Slick Rock State Park where kids play in a natural water slide. We hiked down to the river, surrounded by red rocks – the water was too cold for swimming, though.
April 14: Cottonwood, AZ
Today we decided to return to Jerome and spend the morning exploring the areas we missed the first time. We visited the shops, a number of art galleries and craft stores. We also stopped in at the elegant Jerome Grand Hotel that started out as a hospital in 1927, but has been renovated in Victorian style. The large elevator is original and contains a table, lamp and chair. 
After lunch, we boarded the Verde Canyon train for a ride through a picturesque canyon. The ride was very nice, but overpriced. The most impressive part of the trip was watching eaglets in their next with mama bald eagle on the side of the cliff.
April 15: Cottonwood, AZ to Flagstaff, AZ
Before leaving the Cottonwood area, we stopped at the Tuzigoot Indian ruins. These were a little different than previous ruins and the visitor center had more displays. 
We made the short drive up to Flagstaff and set up the campsite and then we took the car and drove about 45 minutes east to Meteor Crater – a huge hole in the ground made by a meteor 50,000 years ago. 
Not very scenic and the entrance fees were too high. Jack was happy to find a monument to the Space program that included the first woman Commander of the Space Shuttle, Eileen Collins -- yup, you guessed it, she's from Elmira.
April 16: Flagstaff, AZ
Today we drove the Sunset Crater and Wapatki Ruins loop. At Sunset Crater, we hiked a steep half mile trail to a small crater cone. It looked like someone had paved the area with gray macadam right up to the base of each tree – of course, it was the volcanic cinders that gave it that paved look and allowed no vegetation. We also hiked through the lava flow area strewn with black boulders of every shape and size with the snow-capped Flagstaff Mountains in the background. 
The Waputi ruins were multiple pueblo styles and very large. The people here had a large ball court, similar to what we had seen in Mexico.
We drove back to downtown Flagstaff for dinner.
