Arizona Off-Road Trails

The Black Hills Back Country Byway is a scenic gem, not to be confused with the nearby Black Hills Rockhound Area, which holds real gems. In winter and early spring, Mount Graham, to the west, is likely to be snowcapped, which is a rare view in southern Arizona. Informative kiosks beckon the inquisitive to stop and learn about the geology and history of this most interesting area. Forever vistas appear as the trail winds higher into the hills, but keep your eyes on the road around those blind switchbacks. The massive Morenci copper mine tailings appear halfway through the trip, a palette of pastel pinks, purples, creams, and blues. A kiosk near the eastern end tells you everything you ever wanted to know about copper.

The trail crosses the wild Gila River on a bridge constructed in 1918. Shaded day-use areas beckon travelers to stop for a while and enjoy the sounds of the birds along the often muddy Gila. Nearby Owl Creek will gladly lengthen your time along the trail with a dark sky starry overnight.

Old cabins in remote desert areas are fascinating glimpses into our history. But the story of the McGuffie cabin may surprise you. Venice McGuffie was born in Nebraska in 1890. She moved to Arizona sometime around 1930. In the late 1930s, she bought the mine near today's cabin. Venice worked her mine, which produced gold, silver, copper, and lead. Although Venice was married four times, she worked the mines herself. In 1945 she built the cabin at the cost of $1,000. She also built the dam near the cabin. For a while, she owned and operated the Congress Cafe, now Nichols West, in the tiny town of Congress near Wickenburg. Besides being a good miner, she was apparently a pretty good cook. In October 1983, Venice died in Wickenburg at the age of 93. Different offroad and historical groups have helped maintain the cabin since her death. Please respectfully enjoy the cabin when you visit.

The Rolls OHV Area is located just outside the Phoenix Valley, in Tonto National Forest, and covers 27,000 acres. It features 65 miles of varied-width trails, offering breathtaking views and hiking trails around the Four Peaks, along with camping, fishing, and water sports at the back coves of Saguaro Lake.

The trails in the area cover a wide range of terrain, including deep sandy washes, hard-packed dirt, loose rock, and steep bedrock climbs. Most can be enjoyed by high clearance, stock 4x4 vehicles. However, there are a few more challenging spots, primarily on the eastern edge of the Rolls, that would require a more modified vehicle.

This route is short and sweet. Elden Lookout Road winds steeply up the west flank of Mount Elden, the 9000-foot mountain around which wraps Flagstaff and Route 66. From the peak, the views are excellent. It’s a nice place for a picnic or stargazing. The summit can be windy, especially in Spring. The real highlight and reason most use this road is the collection of hiking trails and mountain biking singletracks that crisscross the mountain. The trails include Elden Trail, Sunset Trail, Brookbank Trail, Rocky Ridge Trail, Oldham Trail, and more. Mount Elden is a frequent host of professional mountain bike races. Unfortunately, the 2019 Museum Fire burned much of this route, so it is now a monument to the damage of a forest fire and the catastrophic debris floods that often result. In 2019 the Museum Fire was the worst early-season fire in the country and attracted a large number of airborne firefighting assets. The fire nearly burned into the City of Flagstaff.

A drive along Bar M Road takes you back in time. On the east end, the hundred-plus-year-old Brolliar Cabin sits on the edge of an alpine meadow. Born in Iowa, David Brolliar built his one-room cabin in 1911 and raised cows and crops on the prairie now known as Brolliar Park. He lived there alone until his death in 1938. Today, the cabin is a great spot to watch elk, deer, and pronghorn grazing on the park. A small pond beside the cabin often hosts migratory geese. The cabin is a short walk from the road. Farther west along the trail, ranchers use the forests and parks for summer grazing, just as they have for the last century. Branded cattle roam wild until the fall roundup when they are moved to lower elevations and winter pastures. The road nostalgically passes an old corral, battered and worn but still in use. Take a drive back in time on the Bar M. The road is a little bumpy, but so is the region's history.

Casner Park Road is named, like many of the original roads in the area, for the broad grassy meadow along which it meanders just a few miles out of town. Here beautiful alpine meadows are called parks. Casner Park and Bert Lee Park, which the trail briefly passes later, are named for the hardy pioneer families who settled nearby. Casner Park offers broad vistas, and numerous shady campsites are nestled in the pines along its edge to enjoy those views. There are many campsites along the trail, and it's a favorite summer weekend destination for desert dwellers escaping the heat, enjoying the forest beauty, and happily parading every kind of ATV imaginable. The trail climbs enough that fir, spruce, and a few aspens line the road before dropping back down a bit. The final curve in the trail delivers an almost shockingly unexpected view across the 3-mile diameter Mormon Lake, a sometimes lake, most times grassy meadow.

Early pioneers, mostly miners and ranchers, used broad sandy washes as ready-made roadways through the rugged landscapes of southwestern Arizona. A perfect example of that pioneer ingenuity is the use of a convenient section of Hoodoo Wash as a route into the edges of the rugged Kofa Mountains. The Wilbanks family settled on the western end of Hoodoo Wash, building a fine home and raising cattle. Their story is one of gritty determination to overcome the obstacles thrown their way. Their house burned, and they rebuilt the two-room cabin you see today. The Great Depression crashed cattle prices. Drought and flash floods took their toll. Severe injuries meant several days on rough roads to find medical care. Only the determined last in the Kofa Mountains. Later the Hoodoo Cabin was erected on the eastern end of Hoodoo Wash as a line shack for a cattle company. The cabin was modern for its time and came in prebuilt segments to be assembled onsite. You can still see the numbered medallions that identified each section so the assembly instructions could be followed. Working cattle this far out was a lonely affair, but at least it was comfortable. Narrow roadways have been built where required, but the trail between the cabins is mostly in the wide sandy Hoodoo Wash. Wells at both cabins, and one along the way, still pump water via windmills to fill water troughs for local wildlife, which includes among others desert bighorn sheep, deer, fox, and coyotes. Palo verde and mesquite grow in thick tangles on the edges of the wash, while stately saguaros stand as silent sentinels on the rocky slopes above. Saguaros live for hundreds of years. The ones you see today watched the Wilbanks come and go. They have seen prospective miners combing the slopes for mineral veins only to vanish into history. Cowboys have ridden under the silent sentinels only to disappear from the area as well. They will watch you drive the sandy wash as you search for whatever brought you into the remote and rugged Kofa Mountains.

Set in central Arizona's Prescott National Forest, FR 68D, locally called Reimer, traverses a wide-open grassland bespotted with rim rock-capped buttes and crossed by tree-lined washes. Named for a prominent ranching family in Arizona's history, Riemer predictably runs past Reimer Butte and Reimer Tank as it climbs Reimer Draw. Today the area still serves as winter pasture for Arizona's larger cattle ranches. Old-fashioned windmills pump precious water into tanks, the western term for a dammed wash that catches and holds rainwater for cattle and wildlife. Cattle lazily raise their heads from the grass to watch any passing vehicle. This is the Upper Sonoran Desert. The stately saguaros have given way to prickly pear and agaves. Junipers line the normally dry washes. Cat-clawed acacia are best avoided. The openness of the landscape offers vast vistas with jagged horizons created by various mountain ranges like the Bradshaws, New River Mountains, Squaw Peak, Black Hills, Mingus, and Woodchute. Views abound with every turn. Reimer is also a section of the Great Western Trail, a north/south collection of tracks that run from Arizona to Montana.

Located a short distance west of Flagstaff, Camp Two – Wild Bill – Kendrick is a popular forest road that winds its way from I-40 to the Kendrick Peak Wilderness, passing the famous Lava River Cave. With abundant RV-accessible dispersed camping and dozens of connecting forest roads, this trek through the Coconino National Forest is a bustling summer route through lush pine forests and open meadows offering excellent hiking opportunities. The Lava River Cave is a difficult but manageable one-mile hike down under the pine forests. It is cold in the cave, so bring a jacket! Kendrick Peak is another popular hike in the area, that is a moderately difficult 9-mile round trip rewarding users with the best views of the San Francisco Peaks.

Sheep Spring Road leads into the heart of the vast and beautiful Coconino National Forest. Lined with ponderosa pines and the occasional aspen grove, the often bursts onto expansive alpine meadows, called parks by the locals. Sheep Springs Road traverses three large parks; Tie, Brolliar, and Long. These are favorite haunts of elk, mule deer, and pronghorns. The occasional flock of wild turkeys may cross the road as well. Both Brolliar and Long Park host historic log cabins. The Brolliar Park cabin was built in 1911 and is currently being restored. The Long Park cabin is two rooms and is in ruins but it remains an interesting glimpse into the history of the area. Sheep Springs Road is a fun and scenic drive, but stop and get out of your rig. Listen to the wind singing in the top of the pines, a distant elk bugling, and jays squawking in the trees. Life is good in the Coconino.

Located in northern Arizona, within a vast area known as the Arizona Strip, the Mount Trumbull Scenic Loop is a picturesque drive through the Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument that takes drivers through nearly every aspect of terrain the monument offers. Cutting through the desert, shrubland, and montane habitats, drivers are rewarded with picturesque views of deep canyons, vast valleys, lonely buttes, and 8,000-foot mountains.

Main Street is the western section of the CR 5, Mount Trumbull Loop, traveling between Wolf Hole Valley and the Mount Trumbull School House, essentially connecting St. George to Mount Trumbull. This is the primary access road for those visiting the Mount Trumbull School House and the Whitmore Overlook. The Mount Trumbull School House is a historic replica of the 1918 schoolhouse that served as the school, town hall, church, and community meeting place for the local homesteaders until 1966, when it was shut down. The original building burned down due to arson but was rebuilt to its original specs in 2001 with the help of volunteers. At the schoolhouse, you will find many relics of the past, informational signs, and a public outhouse. The road through Main Street Valley has a well-maintained, hard-packed gravel and clay surface, is multiple vehicles wide, and is suitable for any vehicle in dry conditions. After mild rain, the clay sections of the road become impassable for a few hours, while a heavy rain event can make the road impassable for days.

Duquesne Road is easy on the kidneys but hard on the hairs on the back of your neck. You'll be able to run this trail in your 4x4 efficiently and your 2WD cautiously, but the vistas you'll experience and the dangerous vibe will give you great satisfaction once you reach the end. You'll never shake the feeling that someone is watching. (Because likely, they are). One of the closest roads to the US/Mexico Border, FR 61/Duquesne Road travels within 2 miles of the line. This is a well-traveled and patrolled road, and you should expect to see at least one US Border Patrol officer/vehicle on your trip. If you were to cross the border on foot, this is the first East-West line you would come to in this area, and the border patrol regularly drags tires over it to smooth the surface to look for footprints. The area is rich in mining history, and several offshoot roads lead to old mines from the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. You'll want to stop at the Kansas mine chute for a rig picture. The scenery is splendid on this road, starting along the Santa Cruz River (At one point so close you could toss a rock into it), through the lush Sycamore Canyon/Wash, up and over the Patagonia Mountains for a wonderful view of the San Raphael Valley below. At the end of this trip, you'll be out on the much longer Ghost Town Loop.

Heading east out of Apache Junction on the N. Apache Trail, Highway 88, the First Water Road trailhead is on the right-hand side just after entering the Tonto National Forest. The trail is maintained and can be easily handled in a 2wd pickup truck or SUV, but something low clearance like a sedan is not recommended. The trail runs 2.25 miles to the First Water hiking trailhead, where hikers have their choice of 15 hiking trails. Due to Forest Order 03-12-03-22-34, camping is prohibited along the entire route, until at least January 12, 2026.

Diamond Creek Road, the only vehicular route leading to the depths of the Grand Canyon, offers an exciting 36-mile round-trip adventure with stunning panoramic vistas. This well-maintained road boasts a gentle gradient, averaging just 1 degree with occasional sections reaching 2 degrees, easing travelers through a remarkable descent of approximately 3500 feet from the trailhead in Peach Springs.

Approaching the canyon floor, the trail crosses Diamond Creek multiple times, with the deepest crossing around 2-3 inches. At the trail's end, a breathtaking panorama of towering canyon walls climbs above the majestic Colorado River.

Near the trail's end, a designated campground offers ten pavilions equipped with sturdy concrete picnic tables and conveniently located porta potties. Camping outside this designated area is strictly prohibited.

Each person over the age of 10 is required to have a permit to visit Diamond Creek. To secure permits, visit the Hualapai Game and Fish Department opposite the Walapai Market entrance in Peach Springs. Their operating hours are 8 AM-5 PM Monday through Friday and 8 AM-4 PM on weekends, with daily permit sales concluding at 4 PM. Expect routine permit checks while traversing the trail.

The Hohokam flourished in southern Arizona from approximately 200 to 1500 AD. They were known for their complex system of irrigation ditches along the Gila and Salt Rivers, which allowed them to grow corn, beans, and squash as well as cotton. While largely living in the valleys near the Salt and Gila Rivers, their villages extended into the surrounding mesas, hills, and mountains. Between present-day Gila Bend, Phoenix, and Prescott, the Hohokam also constructed what appear to be fortifications on high points. Each walled fort had a direct line of sight with at least one other fort. When archeologists mapped the known forts, a network appeared. The purpose of the forts remains a mystery. Were they for defense? Communication? Ceremonial? All of the above? This short loop takes you to a hilltop Hohokam ruin in this complex network. A brief steep footpath leads you up the hill to the rock-rimmed fort. Indian Fort trail is located in the Table Mesa Recreation Area, a BLM-operated OHV complex that offers everything from easy scenic drives to hardcore rock crawling. Enjoy a short easy drive back into the history of this rugged landscape along the Indian Fort trail. If you hike to the top, see if you can spot any other hilltop fortifications nearby. Take time to ponder the purpose the Hohokam had for these unique structures. Please respect all archeological sites, so future generations have the same opportunity to ponder the past.