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Roy Kerckhoffs' Arizona Road Trip 2018 | Day 3, part 1

In early 2018 I went on a road trip in Arizona, driving from the Grand Canyon to Tucson, with stops at Monument Valley, Sedona, and Jerome

Wednesday Morning 

I opened the curtains of my hotel room. Everything was white! It looked very pretty. This - and also the town of Flagstaff - reminded me a little of Mammoth Lakes in California. 

After breakfast I walked outside. I love the crispy sound of walking through the snow. Hmmm, but wait, I thought, this is actually a lot of snow, several inches. I looked towards the road and it was not cleared. Now I started to get a little worried. I walked around the building to where I had parked my van last night. It was fully covered in snow, including the windshield, and the parking lot had also not been cleared yet.

I walked up to my van and started wiping the snow off the windshield. This was not easy, as the layer right on the glass was frozen. Then, a hotel employee saw me and handed me a snow broom with ice scraper. That was super helpful and I’d cleared the snow and ice in no-time. I hopped in the van, switched the ignition key and the van turned on without any problems. I cranked up the heat. 

My plan was to go Sedona from here, in particular to see Cathedral Rock. Google Maps was telling me to take the AZ-89A. Having a closer look at that I noticed some hairpin turns which was telling me it was some scary mountain road. Scary under current weather conditions that is. I was wondering if I should skip Sedona as I was pretty sure that was not the safest way to get there. So I decided to take the I-17 South towards Phoenix. I thought that the freeway would be all nice and clear. At some point it would be possible to exit the freeway and still head north towards Sedona (the 179 didn’t look that scary). If that area looked fine to me, I’d still try to get to Sedona, otherwise keep on going to Phoenix.

I slowly pushed down the gas pedal. So far so good. I exited the hotel parking lot and followed Google Maps’ directions. Fortunately it was quite early (before 7am) and not very busy on the road yet. Or perhaps people stayed home till the roads were cleared? I inched my way around, going under 5 mph. When a traffic light turned green, my wheels spun for a bit, but then picked up speed. I entered the I-17 and guess what? It looked like the rest of the town and cars were going 10 miles per hour. I joined them.

Having driven for several miles, the snow was getting thinner and at some point it was even all gone. I was driving at a normal freeway speed again. The exit for AZ-179 was still ahead of of me, so I felt more confident I would be able to make it to Sedona.

It was only slightly foggy now, but with all the snow gone, I exited the freeway and was now heading north again towards Sedona. If things would get too bad (the road was gaining elevation) I could always turn around. When I entered the town of Sedona, there was snow on the sides, but the roads were cleared. I found my way to the Cathedral Rock Trailhead. 

It started snowing again. I took out my photo gear and started walking. Overall, Cathedral Rock looked like the buttes I saw yesterday in Monument Valley (Cathedral Rock is a sandstone butte), but covered in snow it had a completely different feel.

I took several shots of it, using different lenses from a variety of locations along the trail. I also tried to get some shots with falling snow flakes showing in the photos.

It always tough to photograph something that has been photographed many times before (Cathedral Rock apparently is one of the most photographed sites in Arizona), but hey, at least I captured it with snow and snow flakes. Also, by hand coloring I can give it my own twist.

It was late morning now and I looked at Google Maps again where I could go next. Because it was still early, I didn’t feel like going to Phoenix yet (where I’d only spend the night on my way to Tucson). And then I spotted it: Jerome! At art shows, several people had asked me if I had any photographs from Jerome, Arizona, a ghost-town-but-not-really-a-ghost-town. And it was less than an hour away. So I hopped in my van again and started driving. I pulled over one more time, to get a shot of Cathedral Rock from a distance.

Jerome, here I come!