R&R and Red Rocks in Sedona (Arizona)

For Thanksgiving week, we joined some friends at an Airbnb in the midst of the red rocks of Sedona, Arizona. Our life was slow-paced, as one might expect most lives in Sedona are, especially over the Thanksgiving holiday.

If new age enlightenment, drawing energy from vortexes, and getting in touch with nature are your thing, Sedona is your mecca. Lots of tours offer access to the vortexes to help grow and heal your spirit, shops along Uptown Sedona sell crystals so you can take a piece of Sedona’s vortex power home, or you can have your aura photographed to map your energy for self-discovery.

We chose, primarily, to spend time in nature, admiring the beauty of Sedona’s surrounding iron oxidized rocks and layers of red sandstone. Hiking is perhaps the largest draw in Sedona for both the enlightenment seekers and others. There is an absolute ton of it around making it a hiking mecca as well as a more spiritual one. Many of the lots require paying a fee (or buying a weekly pass in advance online) and some do not allow parking at all during peak times requiring free shuttles from town to trail heads. As such, advance planning is recommended.

Hiking the Broken Arrow Trail. We did two long loops on two different days (and took a photo tour on a third, as you’ll read about below). The first was literally right outside our door from Chapel Road to the Little Horse Trail Head on the Broken Arrow Trail system. Most of the loop was relatively flat, with only a few short not-too-steep ascents but some of them followed along ledges which may not be for everyone. Despite some mountain bikes and other hikers and, on the back end of the trail along the wilderness boundary on some 4×4 roads, the Pink Adventure Tour company’s pink-colored jeeps accompanying our walk, we were mostly alone for the majority.

Courthouse Butte and Red Rock Trail. The second loop was much shorter and also mostly flat. Its dusty red path wound around Courthouse Butte through dry river beds, over rocky crags and steps through scrub and and past clusters of cactus stands. It is listed as Moderate on All Trails but is on the easier side of the Moderate scale.

In addition to hiking and getting in touch with your soul and energy, or just chilling out and relaxing, here are some other to do in the Sedona area:

• Tours. There are a lot of tour options for exploring the area. Redstone Tours offers history and geology, Pink Adventure Tours offers the aforementioned 4×4 jeep tour, there are helicopter tours, vortex tours and wine tasting. We chose a Photographic Experience tour we had found on Airbnb experiences with Arizona Photo Adventures. While we misunderstood that the tour was less of a scenic one of some of Sedona’s best sites (with some photography tips) and it is more designed for Instagrammers, engagement or family photos it was worth it, nonetheless, especially because it enabled us to discover some pretty unique places around Sedona we might not have otherwise found, it was pretty fun and we got some great professionally done photographs (bottom of the photo set below are examples) from a really talented photographer.
  
  We began at Fay Canyon, following the trail to the end and then climbing up a challenging but short vertical climb and scramble for a view of the canyon beyond. We then returned back down the canyon and climbed to a cave with petroglyphs about halfway back to the parking lot.
  
  From there, we walked through Boynton Canyon to the “Birthing Cave” where pregnant Hopi women allegedly climbed to give birth. The cave was very popular on the weekend after Thanksgiving complete with a couple of stoned women massaging each other’s womb areas (etc.) with healing hands in a mystic place (presumably), a large group of obnoxious tourists who hogged the cave denying others’ serenity and Instagram moments, and a couple of self-proclaimed peyote trippers finding their auras. It was, obviously, a highlight.
  
  We finished at several overlooks of Cathedral Rock and surrounds for sunset.

• Religious experiences. We visited both the Chapel of the Holy Cross around sunset (which was a short walk from our Airbnb) and the Buddhist Amitabha Stupa at sunrise. Holy Cross has a remarkable (if not a little disturbing) depiction of the crucifixion and is incredibly popular both with formal tours and individual tourists alike.
  
  The Stupa is located at the foot of Chimney Rock and provides access to the peace park trail network into which we climbed to watch the sun rising to our east and was much more peaceful and sedate.

• Slide Rock State Park. At the foot of the stunning canyon drive along Arizona 89A into Sedona is Slide Rock State Park. About thirty years ago, I was spending considerable time working in northern Arizona and came here several times to cool off from the hot summer heat on weekends. Named one of America’s top 10 swimming holes by the Travel Channel, this first-come-first-served swimming area allows you to slide down a natural rock slide and wade and swim in the Oak Creek. While my information is a few decades old, the website indicates that it is as I remember.

• Shopping in Uptown. While we didn’t personally partake, there are loads of galleries, jewelry shops and new age shops for those wanting to spend some extra cash. The Tlaquepaque Arts and Crafts Village offers lots of galleries in a Spanish-style villa under an umbrella of sycamore trees.
  
• Golf. We chose Sedona Golf Club for our day out on the course. We also ate lunch at neighboring Oak Creek Golf Course which seemed a great, casual spot for a round. Sedona Golf Club is home to the (self-proclaimed, anyway) “most photographed par 3 in the west” (bottom, below). On a weekday following the Thanksgiving holiday, it was not sleepy but not crowded, the weather was stunningly beautiful and the course treated us well.