Memorial Day Weekend - Saturday Road Trip

We decided to take a road trip last Saturday, as a start to Memorial Day weekend. We drove 2 hours Friday after work to attend the Mesa Temple. We stayed at the Trone home Friday night. Saturday morning we drove another 2 1/2 hours to Red Rock State Park, located near Sedona, Arizona. We hiked the Eagle's Nest Trail and saw the beautiful Oak Creek and some amazing red rock scenery. We were lucky to see a huge Black Tail Diamondback rattlesnake that was making its way slowly on the trail. Unfortunately we didn't get a picture with the rattles, but the snake had at least 7 rattles.





After we hiked at this state park and ate our picnic lunch, we drove into the town of Sedona. We drove up a dirt road and took in some more amazing red rock scenery. We want to come back to this area to hike.

We then drove to Verde Valley and stopped at Tuzigoot National Monument. This is a remnant of a Southern Sunagua village built between 1125 and 1400. The original pueblo had 77 groundfloor rooms! It was fun for us to climb around the structure and get a great view of the surrounding valley.



We then drove through the living ghost town of Gerome - where the homes are built stacked on each other on the side of the mountain, then through a beautiful winding mountain pass to Prescott. After driving around Prescott, we found the freeway and headed back to the Trone home in Mesa. We enjoyed pizza and oreo pudding with Charles' cousins before going to sleep. It was a very fun road trip!