Highway 89A switchbacks
— — the road that gives up altitude in handfuls.
Not only on a wall.
“The stretch of Arizona 89A that drops from the Mogollon Rim down into Oak Creek Canyon. A run of tight hairpins folded against the canyon wall, falling roughly 2,000 feet between the Oak Creek Vista pullout and the canyon floor. Ponderosa above, red sandstone below, the creek somewhere under the trees. Drivers come down in low gear. Most stop at the Vista to look back at the road they just took. It is the kind of stretch a passenger remembers more than the driver does.
Highway 89A switchbacks, on ceramic.
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The place, in three passes.
Arizona 89A climbs the western wall of Oak Creek Canyon between Sedona and Flagstaff, gaining roughly 2,000 feet in about four miles of switchbacks before it crests the Mogollon Rim near the Oak Creek Vista overlook at about 6,400 feet. The road runs through Coconino National Forest and tracks Oak Creek, the year-round stream that carved the canyon. The Vista is operated by the Forest Service and sits at the top of the climb, with Hopi and Navajo artisans selling at the overlook. From Sedona to Flagstaff the route covers about 27 miles.
The rim sits in ponderosa pine country at about 6,400 feet, and the canyon floor at Slide Rock State Park drops to roughly 4,930 feet. Drivers feel the change in the air before they see it in the trees. The Forest Service closes or restricts the switchbacks for snow several times a winter, and the National Weather Service Flagstaff office posts chain-up advisories most years between November and March. By June the rim is still cool while the floor is in the high eighties Fahrenheit.
The Oak Creek Vista overlook is free to stop at and open during daylight hours, with restrooms and a small artisan market run under a long-standing Forest Service permit with the Hopi and Navajo nations. RVs and trailers are discouraged on the switchbacks themselves, and the Arizona Department of Transportation posts the grade and curves on AZ 89A. The drive is at its quietest between sunrise and about 9 a.m., before the Sedona day traffic builds. Fall colour on the canyon maples typically peaks in late October.