Yavapai County is near the center of the U.S. state of Arizona. As of the 2020 census, its population was 236,209, making it the fourth-most populous county in Arizona. The county seat is Prescott.
Sedona is a city that straddles the county line between Coconino and Yavapai counties in the northern Verde Valley region of the U.S. state of Arizona. As of the 2010 census, its population was 10,031. It is within the Coconino National Forest.
Village of Oak Creek is an unincorporated community located within Big Park a census-designated place (CDP) in Yavapai County, Arizona, United States. The population was 6,147 at the 2010 census, up from 5,245 in 2000. Big Park is the name of the CDP while the community is more commonly known as the Village of Oak Creek (VOC), and is a bedroom community for Sedona, located seven miles away. Tourism and service to retirees and second-home owners are the basis for the local economy. Big Park, the pioneers' name for the large open area that became the Village of Oak Creek in the early 1960s, is set among scenic red-rock buttes and canyons. The Bell Rock scenic area adjoins the north end of VOC, and the town is surrounded by the Coconino National Forest. A Forest Service Visitor Center is located at the south end of VOC.
Lake Montezuma is a census-designated place (CDP) in Yavapai County in the U.S. state of Arizona. The population was 5,111 at the 2020 census. The CDP includes the communities of Rimrock and McGuireville. Located along Interstate 17, it is 20 miles (32 km) south of Sedona and 8 miles (13 km) north of Camp Verde in central Arizona's Verde Valley.
Montezuma Castle National Monument protects a set of well-preserved dwellings located in Camp Verde, Arizona, which were built and used by the Sinagua people, a pre-Columbian culture closely related to the Hohokam and other indigenous peoples of the southwestern United States, between approximately AD 1100 and 1425. The main structure comprises five stories and about 20 rooms and was built over the course of three centuries.
A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions of the technique to refer to such images. Petroglyphs, estimated to be 20,000 years old are classified as protected monuments and have been added to the tentative list of UNESCO's World Heritage Sites. Petroglyphs are found worldwide, and are often associated with prehistoric peoples. The word comes from the Greek prefix petro-, from πέτρα petra meaning "stone", and γλύφω glýphō meaning "carve", and was originally coined in French as pétroglyphe.
Northern Arizona is an unofficial, colloquially-defined region of the U.S. state of Arizona. Generally consisting of Apache, Coconino, Mohave, Navajo, and Yavapai counties, the region is geographically dominated by the Colorado Plateau, the southern border of which in Arizona is called the Mogollon Rim.
The Coconino National Forest is a 1.856-million acre United States National Forest located in northern Arizona in the vicinity of Flagstaff, with elevations ranging from 2,600 feet to the highest point in Arizona at 12,633 feet. Originally established in 1898 as the "San Francisco Mountains National Forest Reserve", the area was designated a U.S. National Forest by Pres. Theodore Roosevelt on July 2, 1908, when the San Francisco Mountains National Forest Reserve was merged with lands from other surrounding forest reserves to create the Coconino National Forest. Today, the Coconino National Forest contains diverse landscapes, including deserts, ponderosa pine forests, flatlands, mesas, alpine tundra, and ancient volcanic peaks. The forest surrounds the towns of Sedona and Flagstaff and borders four other national forests; the Kaibab National Forest to the west and northwest, the Prescott National Forest to the southwest, the Tonto National Forest to the south, and the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest to the southeast. The forest contains all or parts of nine designated wilderness areas, including the Kachina Peaks Wilderness, which includes the summit of the San Francisco Peaks. The headquarters are in Flagstaff. The Coconino National Forest consists of three districts: Flagstaff Ranger District, Mogollon Rim Ranger District, and Red Rock Ranger District, which have local ranger district offices in Flagstaff, Happy Jack, and Sedona.
The Sinagua were a pre-Columbian culture that occupied a large area in central Arizona from the Little Colorado River, near Flagstaff, to the Verde River, near Sedona, including the Verde Valley, area around San Francisco Mountain, and significant portions of the Mogollon Rim country, between approximately 500 and 1425 CE.
The Palatki Heritage Site is an archaeological site and park located in the Coconino National Forest, near Sedona, in Arizona, United States at approximately 34 55' 4"N, 111 53' 59"W. In the Hopi language Palatki means 'red house'.
Oak Creek Canyon is a river gorge located in northern Arizona between the cities of Flagstaff and Sedona. The canyon is often described as a smaller cousin of the Grand Canyon because of its scenic beauty. State Route 89A enters the canyon on its north end via a series of hairpin turns before traversing the bottom of the canyon for about 13 miles (21 km) until the highway enters the town of Sedona.
State Route 179, also known as SR 179, the Red Rock Scenic Byway, a north–south state highway in Arizona, United States, running from Interstate 17 to SR 89A in Sedona, entering Coconino County from Yavapai County. In 2006, the US Dept. of Transportation awarded SR 179 its highest designation within the National Scenic Byways Program: the All-American Road designation, due to the red rock and sandstone formations through which it travels along its 7.5-mile (12.1 km) length within the hills of the Coconino National Forest. The All-American Road designation also signifies to the travelling public that this is a road that is "a destination unto itself".
Sycamore Canyon is the second largest canyon in the Arizona redrock country, after Oak Creek Canyon. The 21-mile (34 km) long scenic canyon reaches a maximum width of about 7 miles (11 km). It is in North Central Arizona bordering and below the Mogollon Rim, and is located west and northwest of Sedona in Yavapai and Coconino counties.
Montezuma Well, a detached unit of Montezuma Castle National Monument, is a natural limestone sinkhole near the town of Lake Montezuma, Arizona, through which some 1,500,000 US gallons of water emerge each day from an underground spring. It is located about 11 miles (18 km) northeast of Montezuma Castle.
Wet Beaver Wilderness is a 6,155-acre wilderness area located in the Coconino National Forest in the U.S. state of Arizona.
The Honanki Heritage Site is a cliff dwelling and rock art site located in the Coconino National Forest, about 15 miles (24 km) west of Sedona, Arizona. The Sinagua people of the Ancestral Puebloans, and ancestors of the Hopi people, lived here from about 1100 to 1300 CE. The Palatki Heritage Site is nearby, also in the Coconino National Forest.
House Mountain is a shield volcano located in the U.S. state of Arizona located between the Sedona Red Rock Country and the Verde Valley in the Coconino National Forest. House Mountain erupted approximately 13–15 million years ago on the edge of where the Mogollon Rim stood at that time. Thus, the basalt that was emitted preserved the sedimentary layers below it, including the Schnebly Hill Formation and the thin band of Fort Apache Limestone. The Mogollon Rim has receded at a rate of 1 foot per 600 years since and the current edge of the rim can be seen several miles away from the summit.
Flagstaff is a city in, and the county seat of, Coconino County in northern Arizona, in the southwestern United States. Established as a modern settlement in 1876 and incorporated as a city in 1928, the land had previously been lived on by native peoples of the southwest, primarily the Sinagua. Mountaineer Antoine Leroux then traveled the area, with Edward Fitzgerald Beale following in his footsteps and establishing a trail through the city in the mid-1800s. With a local spring, a small settlement grew by the wagon road, and the town was dominated by the McMillan, Riordan, and Babbitt families. Focused on agricultural pursuits, these families constructed some historic red stone buildings that still stand today.
