The Mogollon Rim, Payson AZ

Wednesday, November 23rd




Woke up at about 6 am, our usual time. It was quite a bit warmer last night than it has been at Sedona, no need for any heat. This area is having an unusually warm Thanksgiving, which works out for us beautifully to explore the area. Normal daily temps are between 57F and 67F, we enjoyed temps at 80F. It wasn't too noisy last night in the parking lot, so Ray and I slept pretty good. Today's adventure will be to drive along the Mogollon Rim (Spanish scholars go with “mo-go-yawn,” locals use “muggy-on” — everyone agrees that “the Rim” is impressive.) for Steve and Ray to take pictures. As their tour guide, I will be stopping at look-outs for them to jump in and out on command. lol :)

Freya stayed home with the windows open, as there's no room in the "bus". With being in a casino parking lot we cannot completely empty out the car with our "junk" as it is frowned upon. With the casino security and the Tonto Band Police Office across the street from us ... I was not worried about leaving the windows open.

Highway 260 towards Show Low is great, but the climb is immense. If we were towing it would be a slow grind for many miles uphill to Show Low! Anyways, about 20 miles up the road, we stopped at the Mogollon Rim Visitor's Centre ... it 's closed for the season. A great view from the deck though. We left town and it was quite warm ... got to here and with the wind it was really cold. The boys did not have any jackets, glad Dianne and I did. lol

Picture by Steve

Next we carried on down the road to Black Canyon Rim Road, a forest service road in the Sitgreaves National Forest about 5 miles further  and checked it out to see some views from the Mogollon Rim. We were out of luck for any views, but scored on a whole pile of chopped firewood left from a previous camper. Yeah. This area is great for boondocking and there are great spots for large rigs.

Back on Highway 260 we headed back towards the Visitor's Centre and went down across the road to FSR 300, The Rim Road, and followed it for about 15 miles until the "mountain was trying to overtake the road" with large rock protrusions the size of pickup trucks (well it seemed that way anyway). The road is actually 43.3 miles long. The first part of this road, about 4 miles, is paved and accessed a few viewpoints.

Mogollon Rim, Coconino/Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests

Measured in thousands of feet and hundreds of miles, it’s a massive wall of rock that begins near Arizona’s border with New Mexico and stretches diagonally across most of the state. Through the lens of a camera, a set of binoculars or your own baby blues, the views from the top of the Rim are stunning, and on a clear day, you can see all the way to Mount Lemmon.

First Viewpoint, Rim Lakes Overlook.

Panoramic shot

Picture by Steve

There are quite a few developed campsites along the first part of the paved road that are closed for the season. We decided to take a look at the Woods Canyon Lake Campsite and boat launch. Everything here is also closed for the season, including the store and boat rental shack, but it is a very pretty little lake. Huge campground with more improvements/campsites being put in.

Picture by Steve

Isn't this a fabulous spot. Look at all that blue water!

Shortly after Woods lake the road became gravel. We stopped a few more times for more pictures at other access points.

The Second Viewpoint .... and so on ... there were no signs depicting each stop so they are all together. We did not get a map of the area either with the Visitor's Centre closed.

I found this really awesome rock projection for a photo op!

 As you can see it was a good thing we did not bring Freya anyways ... I would've been worried about her falling off the edges of these lookouts.

See Steve and Dianne in the distance?

Notice, Dianne is on the inside hanging on to Steve! lol

You really feel you are on top of the world. Fabulous views.

You can see behind Steve, the highway winding through the valley that we took to get up here.

The last viewpoint we stopped at (bad road conditions = no Horseshoe Viewpoint, our original objective) according to our AZ Benchmark Atlas is the Promontory Viewpoint. After this we turned around.

The brown stripe is hydro lines running through the valley.

Fabulous rock formations.

Ray and Steve decided to walk "to the end of the world" on this short plateau while Dianne drove up the road a little further to see if the condition got any better ... Nope, the mountain slabs of rock were taking over the road!

It almost looks like Dianne is at the very edge! Those of us who know her well, definitely know that this is not the case!

See Ray at the end of the point.

Dianne taking a moment to contemplate the gorgeous view.

With the road so rough we decided to turn around and give "Freddie the Ford" a brake with all of the potholes and rock protusions! Besides we were hungry.

Coming back took no time at all with the lovely 4 lane divided highway, all downhill. Back at the casino we took Freya out for a walk, started the generator for A/C and then tried to find a place for lunch. We were told at the Casino there was an 1 1/2 hour wait to be seated ... not gonna work. Most other restaurants and pubs were closed for Thanksgiving. Wow they really do celebrate Thanksgiving. We drove back on Highway 260 to a pub called "The Pour House Bar and Grill" as we noticed their door open when we originally drove by. Unfortunately there was no food being served except for a private party.

It was a poor house instead of a pour house for us!

Back in the car we thought our only hope was going to be Denny's, but at the last moment we noticed a place called Tiny's Family Restaurant and Lounge. Turned out to be a great place with Turkey Dinner and Dressing for "free" and you paid $2.00 for all beverages (including glasses of draught beer) with the funds going to charity. They had other things on the menu that the guys ordered and for all four of us, including 3 beer, the tab was only $32.00. Ray picked up the tab and gave a great tip. I also dumped out our change bag to the little girls taking donations for their cause.

Back home Freya had a walk and we met up for a quick drink outside. Shortly after, everyone was really tired, so we said we'll see each other tomorrow ... felt like 8 pm and it was only 3:30!! Dianne and I were suffering from our "turkey hangovers" and the guys were just too full of food. Another great day. Tomorrow we are off to Roosevelt Lake.