Prescott, AZ

We picked Camp Verde as a base to check out some of the towns nearby including Prescott, Jerome, Sedona & Flagstaff.   Today was Prescott's turn for us to check out and we packed some cold water in the car and hit the road.  We headed down I-17 to Rt 169 and skooted over to Prescott.

The drive there was very interesting even in spite of how brown the fields were.  There is a certain beauty to the harshness and barrenness of the landscape.  

We combined sightseeing with some geocaching and the first geocache led us to a small park as you enter Prescott.  There is a major intersection near the park and it's easy to overlook the park, but the GPS directed us there.  There is a statue located there showing some of the early settlers.   The other structure is dedicated to members of the US Armed forces who served our country.  The park stands out in another way since it has beautiful grass, which isn't something you see out here all the time.

Early Settler Statue

  
We drove around the downtown area including Whiskey Row and found it very interesting.  There are a number of beautiful homes on Nob hill including "The Goldwater House" which was built in 1894 by Henry Goldwater who was an uncle of Barry Goldwater.  The Goldwater brothers founded a mercantile company and were prominent businessmen of Arizona for almost a century.  The home now is a vacation rental unit.

The Goldwater House - 1894

One cache was located next to the old Sante Fe Railroad depot in downtown Prescott.  The old structure has been restored and is now an office building attached to a shopping center.  They were working on the building when we were there and couldn't see inside of it, but it was a really interesting from the outside.

Old Sante Fe railroad depot

Prescott is an interesting town and built on the numerous hills and mountains in the area.  I don't think there is a single spot other than local football fields that are level for more than 120 yards.  It is also a mile high and combine that with hills, it must be difficult to walk around a lot.  At least it is for old people like us.

We decided to return to our campsite by driving through Jerome, AZ.   As we were leaving Prescott, we drove by Watson Lake just north of town.  It is a crystal clear lake and has a bright blue sheen to it.  Beautiful lakes like this really stand out in the desert.

Watson Lake

Just up the road from the lake was an area called Granite Dells with huge boulders piled on top of each other.  There was a narrow road through the area and we took a side trip to view the boulders up close and personal.   Areas like this interest both of us very much and we can't pass them up.

Granite Dells

There was an area called The Canyons with a locked gate just down the road from the Dells that had a cache near the front gate.  Since we couldn't get in to purchase a vacation home there, we just took a picture from the entrance.  They closed the gate about 15 minutes before we arrived there - darn it.

 

The Canyon

This area was a favorite of old time Cowboy actor Tom Mix and he filmed many westerns in this area with the granite boulders as back drops.  Now I have to look up his old films and see if I recognize any of the area in his films.

 Since it was getting late and we had a long ways to go, we reluctantly had to leave Prescott and head back to the campground via Jerome, AZ.   We have a day trip planned for Jerome & Sedona for Thursday, but since we had to drive through there to get back, we took a few photos.  It was almost dark as we arrived and captured this photo as we entered the town.

Jerome at sunset

 We stopped at a Strombolli's restaurant in Cottonwood on the way home.  Gerry wanted some Italian food for a change and we used the GPS to find an Italian restaurant.  The food was plentiful and very good.  I ordered a half pitcher of Rolling Rock beer that was priced at $3.50 which was a great price for 2 1/2 glasses of beer.  It had a great taste, so that made it even better.

Oh, btw, we found 9 geocaches and had a lot of fun with the search.  The nice thing about geocaching is finding out of the way places that you wouldn't normally see in an area.  Try it, you will like it.

That was our day, how was yours?