Photographers tell us that Doll Baby Ranch Road, which winds into the mountains west of Payson, is best experienced at day’s end, when the light of sunset brings a beautiful glow to the hills. But this 11-mile drive is nice for other reasons, too: It’s mostly paved and little traveled, and you’ll get mountain views and even a little history along the way.
It sounds like something out of the Wild West: a remote desert outpost, without electricity or running water, at the end of a rocky dirt road. The Hovatter family lived that reality — not in the 1800s, but for more than two decades in the mid-20th century. Today, road conditions make the site of the family’s homestead inaccessible to most passenger cars, but a 21.7-mile drive on the rest of Hovatter Road is rich in scenery, history and Sonoran Desert flora.
When you start this drive amid a thick forest of ponderosa pines, you’ll find it hard to believe that you’ll soon be peering into one of Arizona’s largest canyons. But Sycamore Canyon, despite its size, has a way of surprising you. Although a wildfire raged in the canyon this summer, the view from Sycamore Point is as spectacular as ever — and there’s plenty to enjoy along the way.
Fire does what it does. On just about any scenic drive in the White Mountains of Eastern Arizona, you’ll be reminded of that. But the forest does what it does, too. On this easy loop drive just south of Big Lake, you’ll see ample evidence of the Wallow Fire, which was sparked by an improperly extinguished campfire and scorched more than a half-million acres of this landscape in the summer of 2011. But you’ll also see what it looks like when the forest undergoes a vibrant rebirth — and in summer, that rebirth is lovely to see.
Gary Ladd knows Northern Arizona as well as anyone. For more than half a century, he’s been photographing that part of the state — including Marble Canyon, the gorgeous gorge through which the Colorado River runs before it reaches the Grand Canyon. That made Gary the person to ask about a dirt road leading to what looked like a remote Marble Canyon overlook. “I’d call that Buck Farm Viewpoint,” he replied. “Good view!”
Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument covers 516 square miles of Southern Arizona, so you could spend a month there and not see all of this isolated, biodiverse jewel of the national park system. But most people spend significantly less than a month there — and Ajo Mountain Drive is for them. Careful drivers can navigate this 20-mile loop in most vehicles, and it traverses much of what makes Organ Pipe great, including unique desert flora, steep mountains and dramatic views.
If there’s one thing we’ve learned in recent years, it’s that we all could stand to be a little more polite to each other. On the route to the summit of the Globe area’s Pinal Peak, that’s a necessity. This narrow mountain road presents a few challenges and a need for driving etiquette, but a pleasant trek with remarkable views at the top is the reward.
There’s no shortage of history at Apache Pass, the route between the Chiricahua and Dos Cabezas mountains of Southeastern Arizona. A freshwater spring — one of the only reliable water sources in the area — made the pass a gathering place for Indigenous people, sparked a battle during the Civil War and led to the creation of a U.S. Army fort.
It’s too bad Tom Mix was in such a hurry. In the fall of 1940, the Western film star was south of Florence, driving down what now is State Route 79, when he came upon a washed-out bridge and couldn’t stop in time. The resulting crash took his life, and a roadside memorial now honors an actor who “served to better fix memories of the Old West in the minds of living men.”
