Arizona Off-Road Trails

Black Canyon Creek Trail is an exciting adventure along narrow roads with outstanding scenic views. However, this trail will challenge anyone's confidence with long, steep, rocky ascents, intimidating washouts, and seriously off-camber shelf roads. The thick brush lining the trail will leave pinstriping in your vehicle's paint.

This trail is best to be driven when dry. Slippery conditions make washouts extremely dangerous. This trail is not for the novice driver or anyone who fears steep, narrow shelf roads. The trail is best suited for narrow, high clearance vehicles with skid plates, traction aid devices, and winches. Full-width vehicles should avoid this trail.

Route finding can be difficult, but the official trail only crosses Black Canyon Creek once. It then begins a short trek west before heading north. Three miles in, you must conquer loose, beachball-sized boulders. One mile later, the trail traverses the narrowest of the washouts.

At 1.3 miles from the trail's southern end are several great dispersed campsites along Black Canyon Creek.

Expect 3-4 hours to complete this trail.

When combined with the Apache Trail and the Two Bar Ridge Trail, Deer Hill is a great way to connect two recreation areas located in the Tonto National Forest. The trail connects Apache and Roosevelt lakes while providing an off-road experience in one of the most scenic regions in the Arizona desert. One of the true highlights is the large and rare crested saguaro at Waypoint 5. Though crested saguaros are somewhat rare, this particular one is quite large and easily accessible. Biologists disagree as to why some saguaros grow in this unusual form. Some speculate that it is a genetic mutation, while others say it's the result of a lightning strike or freeze damage. At this point, we simply do not know what causes this rare, crested form. The trail also provides access to the iconic Arizona Trail and Cottonwood Trail 120. The trail leads down to the Roosevelt Lake region, where numerous recreation areas provide access to the water.

Rolls 13 bisects The Rolls OHV area with connections to most other trails. Access the trail through the Probrecito entrance off Bush Highway just north of Saguaro Lake. The trail has some camping and can be busy at times. The track is rocky, with large bumps and berms in some areas. Expect new pinstriping.

Please note that an OHV permit is now required on this trail.

Gardner Canyon Road packs a lot into its 8.7 miles. There's world-class camping in both designated and dispersed sites. The lack of nearby cities means dark skies and a carpet of twinkling stars above that campsite. The views of the Santa Rita Mountains looming above the trail's end are inspiring. Bucolocly beautiful Apache Springs Ranch reminds you of that early ambition to be a cowboy. The splashy crossing of Cave Creek is just bumpy enough to be fun. Trailheads for a myriad of hiking trails, including the world-class Arizona Trail, remind you that you should get out and stretch your legs in the crisp, clean air of this vast countryside.

In 1864, President Lincoln tasked Lieutenant Colonel J. Francis Chavez to escort the new territorial governor of Arizona from Santa Fe, New Mexico, to Prescott, Arizona. Unfortunately, there was no road between the two cities. One major obstacle was the descent off Arizona's Mogollon Rim into the Verde Valley. Chavez's navigation skills led to a stage route and thus was born the path of the Blue Grade Road. Today's hearty traveler can exit the interstate and climb the scenic Blue Grade in far more comfort than those who once negotiated the rocky passage in a rickety stagecoach. With excellent views along the way, the road leads you up from the lush Wet Beaver Creek area into a pine and juniper forest. Located in the Coconino National Forest, be on the lookout for elk, deer, bear, and wild turkeys. And yes, this is also cattle country, so watch out for cows on the road as well as where you step.

Clover Springs is a tale of two trails, and thus more interesting. One part of the trail is as rough as a corncob enema. The other portion is as silky smooth as your grandmother's buttermilk pie. Turning off Highway 260 onto the west end of the trail brings you almost immediately into some fun little obstacles. Most have several choices of lines. Decisions based on your rig's unique characteristics may leave you scratching your head. They aren't overly difficult, just enough to make it fun and interesting. In a few places, erosion has cut nice washouts, which will test the level of travel in your suspension. Bone-jarring sections of trail consist of nothing more than cannonballs and larger-sized rocks jarring your rig, you, and everything else. There are a few bypasses. Just when you have had enough, the trail becomes as easy as pie. Clover Springs becomes a stroll through a huge Ponderosa Pine studded park. Deer, elk, javelina, turkey, and the occasional cow may cross the road in front of you or be lurking in the brush nearby. Wonderful campsites beckon you to slow down and spend some time around a campfire. So what's it gonna be? Corncob? Pie? Why not both?

The sun woke me. In compensation for interrupting my dreams, it offered the quintessential western skyline for my consideration. Backlit in hues of burned orange, melted copper, and baby blue, jagged peaks of the Eagletail Mountains sawtoothed the eastern sky. Silhouetted on closer hills, saguaros stood as silent sentinels of the dawn. The lower Sonoran Desert is at its best at sunrise, all peace and stillness and beauty. The Palomas Harquahala Road crosses the expansive Palomas Plain to the Clanton Hills, traces the western edge of the Eagletail Mountains Wilderness, parallels sandy Deadman Wash up into Nottbusch Valley, and skirts the western edge of Cemetary Ridge before passing in the shadow of Deadman Mountain. The names alone bespeak adventure. The trail cuts through a flat desert sea of creosote bush, bursage, and brittlebush. The sameness is broken here and there by saguaro and ocotillo. Like green ribbons, the washes snake through the desert with their overgrown banks of palo verde, mesquite, and ironwood. Corrals and windmills, many still in use, evoke an earlier time when rugged men came here to eke out a living in this arid landscape. In that pursuit, they cut the trails we drive today. Download the track. Pack your gear. Gas up the rig. Take a ride on a long trail.

The Southwest can have the most interesting and unlikely names for places. That is probably a result of native history, Spanish influence, and European exploration all adding and mixing names onto the maps. Often, the origins of many names are lost to history. So how did Big Bug Mesa, set high in the Prescott National Forest, get that moniker? There is also a Big Bug Creek, and once was a small mining village in the late 1800s along the creek with the same name. Likely, it was an encounter between a giant beetle and Theodore Boggs, who founded his small settlement of Big Bug and mined in the area. Boggs had survived as a 10-year-old member of the ill-fated Donner Party and was the great-grandson of Daniel Boone. That he would be so inspired by a large insect either says much about the insect or a little about him. Only Boggs knows for sure, and he is no longer available to tell us the story. Big Bug Mesa is a relatively broad, flat feature along the northeastern slopes of the Bradshaw Mountains. The area is seldom visited except by hardy ranchers and a few hunters searching for the mesa's plentiful deer and turkey. Covered in Ponderosa pines, juniper, and even the ancient alligator juniper, the mesa is green and high enough into the mountains to see heavy winter snow and have relatively mild summer temperatures. The main trail into Big Bug Mesa starts easy enough but turns rocky towards the end, providing a workout for both your suspension and kidneys. The trail becomes smoother in the open pine forest but is often beset by rutted mudholes. All that means you will likely experience solitude on Big Bug Mesa, except for the deer, turkeys, and apparently, at least one very large bug.

Located in central Arizona, Antelope Creek Road was a key transportation route for ranchers and miners before paved roads were introduced into the area. Driving along the winding desert road today, you still see ranchers with large stock trailers moving cattle to market or greener pastures along with hikers and mountain bikers headed to one of several trailheads for the Black Canyon National Trail. Located almost exclusively on BLM land, the road follows Antelope Creek to the historic ghost town of Cordes Station. The trail crosses Antelope Hill before slaloming downhill to join the Crown King Road. Antelope Hill offers impressive views of the nearby Bradshaw Mountains and the modern-day mining operations in its foothills. The campsites atop Antelope Hill look down on the captivating tableau of the canvas-tan, dried grass flatlands​ of Perry Mesa, and the Agua Fria National Monument.

In 1882, White Mountain Apache warriors, led by Na-tio-tish, got into an altercation with and killed several policemen in San Carlos, Arizona. Eighty warriors, chased by U.S. cavalry, crossed the Tonto Basin and climbed onto the Mogollon Rim. They laid a trap for the pursuing cavalry on a rugged side canyon of East Clear Creek. The cavalry's scout ferreted out the trap. The fight raged for an afternoon until a severe afternoon thunderstorm halted hostilities. The warriors escaped in the night and returned to the reservation, leaving behind 20 dead Apaches, with two dead and six wounded among the cavalry troops. Nearly lost to history, today, a lonely marker stands on the site, and the entire area is called Battleground Ridge. Battleground Ridge, also known as FR 123, is a distinctive trail for two reasons. First is the obvious connection to the obscure bloody battle fought here. Secondly, an aqueduct that pumps water from the C.C. Cragin Reservoir down to Payson runs along a portion of the trail. You can see the roadside access points; round metal covers every hundred yards along the trail. A small power line brings electricity to the pump station near Waypoint 10. But take a step away from both the history and the modern, and you overwhelmingly sense the remoteness of this place deep in the uplifted country of the Mogollon Rim. The wind, as it always has, sings through the upper branches of the tall Ponderosa Pines. Elk bugle on the ridges and down in the deep canyons. Flocks of shy wild turkeys scratch the forest floor for a meal. Gazing across the deep canyon at the trail's end to the distant forest-blanketed ridgelines of this wild landscape, both the past and present seem very far away.

Every king needs a queen. Kofa got its name from the abbreviation for the large King of Arizona Mine. So it wasn't much of an imaginary stretch when prospectors named their small nearby mine the Kofa Queen. Today only the mineshafts and a few small stone walls remain where miners once toiled in the Kofa Queen. But the scenic sandy canyon that provided access to the mine back in the day now provides hikers and offroaders access deep into the Kofa Mountains. Beginning on the King Valley's vast plain, the trail marches relentlessly toward the low jagged ridgelines of the igneous Kofa Mountains. These are not gentle wind-sculpted sandstone bluffs. Rather these edifices were violently created from near-molten heavy minerals violently pushed up from deep below the earth's mantle, bringing with them the precious gold, silver, and manganese that the miners came here to find. Today those formations are valued for their rugged, angular beauty by the hardy folk who venture here. Dropping into the wide sandy canyon takes you into the depth of the mountains. Formations in many improbable shapes surround you. Scary Skull Rock is just one apparition formed by the immeasurable forces that created this landscape. Side canyons invite you to explore deeper on foot. The many campsites beckon you to spend time and take it all in. The trail ends near the site of the Kofa Queen Mine. The Kofa Mountains gave the miners gold. What will the mountains and Kofa Queen Canyon give you?

Flat places. Many of us live in flat places with their perfectly surveyed checkerboard of straight roads, all leading to properly homogenized and carefully structured sameness. But our souls live in the mountains. We feel ourselves coming alive when we point our rigs up a twisting, winding snake of a road that leads up into a wildly disorganized and jumbled mountain range. Add a few gurgling mountain streams and the whistling song of the wind in the tops of tall pines, and we are happy boys and girls again. Pine Flats, so named for the level Ponderosa studded valley about 8 miles up the trail, is not an overly exciting road. There are no challenging obstacles. You won't shift in and out of low range. There are a lot of things this trail isn't. But Pine Flats possesses unmistakably fine attributes. The views are long across the valleys below. Looking upward, there's always a ridgeline teasing you to climb higher yet. Splashing through the water crossings is somehow childishly satisfying. Catching a glimpse of a doe and fawn amongst the trailside brush makes you smile. Listening to the relaxing harmony of a mountain stream sluicing over multihued granite boulders as you picnic or camp soothes the frayed nerves of we flat land dwellers. Take an easy ride up Pine Flats into the Bradshaw Mountains. There's lots of adventure beyond the end of the trail if that's what you're after. But your soul will appreciate what Pine Flats isn't.

Rolls 401A is a rocky and somewhat challenging trail on the eastern edge of The Rolls area, beginning just past where 401 and 13 intersect. The trail provides access to various hiking and horse-riding trails and is enjoyable, with beautiful views of the Four Peaks and Salt River Valley areas. The trail is rarely used much and has significant wash-out areas, with the very end blocked off about 300 yards early due to what appears to have been a flash flood. Expect pinstripes with 20+ degree rocky climbing, off-camber spots, and tight turns. There's no camping available along the trail.

Please note that an OHV permit is now required on this trail.

Black Canyon Road is a very easy trail and a delightful way to spend an afternoon exploring the Mogollon Rim and learning about the area's long and diverse history. The trail begins at Black Canyon Lake, a picturesque mountain lake much less crowded than the nearby popular Woods Canyon Lake. A 1-mile hike takes you to the gravesite of three cowboys lynched and hung from a ponderosa tree nearby, unfortunate victims of the Pleasant Valley War between feuding ranchers. Further down the road are pullouts for old homesteads, native american ruins, and ancient petroglyphs. The trail offers numerous historical markers with informational signage. Black Canyon Road is a great day trip for a family with young children or anyone interested in the region's colorful history.