After our stop at Granite Dells near Prescott Arizona, Man and I headed back to our campsite, by driving the long slow gorgeous way, via Jerome Arizona. If you plot the route on Microsoft Streets and Trips, it says it is 34.8 miles. Lets see, at 55 MPH, that is less than an hour away. NOT!
We had met a fellow on one of our trips to Jerome who had been born and had actually graduated from high school there, I believe he said he was the last class to graduate before they closed the school. During our chat he told us that they had driven from Prescott that morning. Asking about road conditions he said it was a bit rough. That concerned us, just a little, it is never fun riding a rough road, necessary sometimes, but not terribly comfy. However, we decided to drive it anyway and much to our surprise and delight we found the road to be more than acceptable, very few small bumps, not what we consider to be rough, NOT AT ALL! LOL Course, our stick built home is on a gravel country road, a mile and half off of any paved road, so, we rate roads from a different point of view, err, bump.
A blow up of the map shows a few curves and switch backs:
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| Click on image for a larger view. |
Looking down on part of 89, from somewhere on the way towards Jerome, still going UP!
Below: After you reach the top and start back down, you can see for miles and miles, way in the background, the red and white rock formations, that is Sedona!
Below, another view of Sedona far off, mid-photo is Cottonwood Arizona. And, just over that guard rail, an extremely long and sharp drop off into some canyon. Not one inch of room for a driving error here.
Look closely at this next photo, lots of curvy road down there, on the way down to Jerome and Cottonwood:
Switch backs galore, another reason this ride took a lot longer than what the mileage amounts would indicate:
Just down the road from here there is a huge beautiful pull off with the best views (just before you get to Jerome). At this point Man had me drive the rest of the way to Cottonwood. Man wanted to really have a good lookie see at the views, not just the glances he usually gets while driving. I managed to get us down without incident, except for a few irate drivers that wanted to do 55 around the 25 MPH hairpin curves and 75 in the 45 MPH steep grades down. Yep, I got flipped off by one nice dude. Why he would want to flip off an old lady with white knuckle grip on the steering wheel who is doing the speed limit (plus a couple) is beyond me, but, he did.
And thus ended our trip to Prescott Arizona, the Granite Dells, route 89A to Jerome, Cottonwood and back to Camp Verde. We had a full day, fun, thrilling a time or two. Perfect!!
* We visited Prescott and drove 89A to Jerome on April 16, 2011.
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1 comment:
OK...so now I'm thinking I am a real weenie greenhorn for my fuss over Monteagle. I see what you mean when you told me I should stay east, LOL! The western grades are not for the faint of heart!
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