Dear Arizona Travel:
I am staying in Scottsdale in April. I want to go to Sedona, see Painted Desert, Grand Canyon, and some place that has black volcanic rock and petrified trees. I have 2 days, and want to spend 1 night and then return to Scottsdale. What’s a good plan?
Sheila O.

Hi, Sheila! First of all…. oooookaaaaaay. There’s no way you can do all of this in two days, but you can do most of it. Which is more important to you, the Grand Canyon or the Petrified Forest/Painted Desert? They’re opposite directions from Flagstaff, and equidistant at about ~170 miles each way. Either way, you’ll definitely be spending a lot of time in your car (about 12-15 hours of driving total). Be prepared to log ~600 miles and about 12 hours of driving and sightseeing one day, 8 hours the other. Be sure to fill up your car in Sedona or Flagstaff (both pricey areas for gas)… the National Park areas you’ll be visiting are REMOTE.

Here’s a sample itinerary for Option 1 – Sedona / Petrified Forest / Painted Desert / Sunset Volcano and links to a maps and helpful National Park Service websites.

Day 1 early morning: Drive to Sedona (90 – 120 minutes, 125 miles.)
Day 1 morning: Stop in Sedona for a bit, walk around Uptown Sedona.
Day 1 morning: Continue up AZ-89 up Oak Creek Canyon toward Flagstaff. (40 minutes from Sedona to Flagstaff)
Day 1 mid-day: Drive east of Flagstaff on I-40 toward Painted Desert / Petrified Forest National Park (3 hours, 168 miles)
Day 1 evening/night: return to Flagstaff for an overnight. The Park closes at 5pm in winter…. not sure if they’ll be on Spring/Summer hours yet or not. See Flagstaff.com for Flagstaff hotel options. (Return 3 hours, 168 miles)
Day 2 early morning: Head north of Flagstaff on AZ-89 toward Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument – this is where you’ll have volcanic rock. (2 hours, 115 miles)
Day 2 midday: Return to Flagstaff for lunch (2 hours, 115 miles.)
Day 2 evening: Return to Scottsdale (2 hours, 140 miles.)

Here are links to some terrific information:
Petrified Forest
Sunset Crater
Painted Desert
Google Map for this custom itinerary

Day 1 early morning: Drive to Sedona (90 – 120 minutes, 125 miles.)
Day 1 morning: Stop in Sedona for a bit, walk around Uptown Sedona.
Day 1 morning: Continue up AZ-89 up Oak Creek Canyon toward Flagstaff. (40 minutes from Sedona to Flagstaff)
Day 1 mid-day: Drive north of Flagstaff on AZ 89 toward Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument – this is where you’ll have volcanic rock. (2 hours, 115 miles)
Day 1 evening/night: return to Flagstaff for an overnight. (return 2 hours, 115 miles)
Day 2 early morning: Head northwest of Flagstaff on Us 180 toward Grand Canyon National Park (100 minutes, 80 miles)
Day 2 late afternoon: Return to Flagstaff (100 minutes, 80 miles)
Day 2 evening: Return to Scottsdale (2 hours, 140 miles)

Here are some resources and links:
Grand Canyon
Google Map for this custom itinerary

Good luck! Let us know which itinerary you choose and feel free to send us pictures of you climbing on volcanic rocks!

– ChristinaToo

Northern Arizona University’s Lumberjacks football team may have lost their homecoming game to Montana this past weekend, but my Saturday stay in Flagstaff was a winner.

My husband and I drove the scenic two-hour drive from our home in Scottsdale to Flagstaff on Saturday morning. As an NAU alum, he was jazzed to return to his college town and relive his glory days… twenty years later. After a quick lunch at Buster’s Restaurant & Bar – our traditional spot for watching football and good eats in Flag – we checked into the Little America Hotel, our lodging for the night.

The Little America is an elegant, upscale hotel located minutes from the downtown Flagstaff area. Although clearly an older hotel, this classic fixture of Flagstaff lodging has been nicely updated with flat-screen TVs, elegant decor, large bathrooms & guestrooms. I’ve stayed at the Little America about half a dozen times and I’m never disappointed. The staff is friendly, polite and thorough; the front desk and concierge consistently deliver four-star service. The hotel is immaculate and very reasonably priced – a tremendous value for the dollar.

After the homecoming game, our Little America concierge made reservations for us at Pasto, a fine-dining Italian restaurant in downtown Flagstaff. The perfect romantic dinner spot for my husband and me, Pasto’s exposed brick walls and simply candlelit decor fits in well with the Flagstaff downtown vibe. Pasto’s upscale and ecelectic menu of traditional Italian fare mixed with a selection of artisan cheeses & breads, game birds & other unusual proteins, and appealing flavor profiles made browsing the menu like watching an episode of “Top Chef.” While we fancy ourselved “foodies,” my husband and I were in the mood for a fairly light dinner, so we settled on a “create-your-own” antipasto to start and had house specialty entrees of portebello mushroom ravioli and jumbo prawns in a tomato-cream sauce. A nice wine list and desserts (we shared the chocolate & volipicello crema… essentially a rich chocolate pudding infused with red wine – divine and rich!) topped off our night.

Sunday morning, we headed for home early. After a quick stop at Starbucks on Milton Road, we hit the highway leaving behind another set of good memories to add to my husband’s college-days nostalgia and my Arizona travel mental scrapbook.

Updated October 2010:
Late September October through mid-October November is the best time to visit Sedona to see the fall leaves change color. Sedona.net gives tips on scenic drives and photography spots for a “leaf-peeping” trip to Sedona this fall…

Read the rest of the article on Sedona.net