Flagstaff

History The Northern Sinagua moved into the area around present-day Flagstaff about 700 CE, and ash from the eruptions of Sunset Crater later enriched the soil for farming. The Sinagua had left by the early 1400s, probably moving north. The San Francisco Peaks are sacred in Hopi culture, and until the 1860s the Northeastern Yavapai and the Northern Tonto Apache also used this land. The town's name comes from a flagpole made from a stripped pine tree, raised at Antelope Spring at the foot of Mars Hill on July 4, 1876, the year Thomas F. McMillan built the first permanent cabin. The Atlantic and Pacific Railroad came through in 1882, and by 1886 Flagstaff was the largest town on the line between Albuquerque and the West Coast. Timber, run by the Riordan brothers, and cattle, run by the Babbitts, shaped the next decades. Percival Lowell built his observatory in 1894, the year the town incorporated, and the school that became Northern Arizona University opened in 1899. Route 66 arrived in 1926, and by the end of the 1920s tourism had taken over from the older industries. In the 1960s US Air Force cartographers used Lowell's Clark Telescope to map the Moon, and some of their charts were used to choose Apollo landing sites. Downtown declined in the 1970s and 1980s and was revived in the 1990s around the new Heritage Square.

What to See Lowell Observatory sits on Mars Hill about a mile west of downtown. A day ticket covers tours of the 1896 Clark refractor, the Rotunda Museum, where the blink comparator Tombaugh used to find Pluto is displayed, the Astronomy Discovery Center that opened in November 2024, and telescope viewing after sunset. The Museum of Northern Arizona, on Fort Valley Road (US 180) north of downtown, occupies a 1936 building of local lava rock, with galleries on the Native peoples, archaeology, geology and life zones of the Colorado Plateau. Downtown itself is compact, and many of its historic buildings are made of red Moenkopi sandstone once quarried in the city. The Flagstaff Urban Trails System, more than 50 miles of paths, links neighbourhoods with the national forest.

East of the city, Walnut Canyon National Monument has 25 cliff dwelling rooms along a steep, paved trail. North on US 89, a 35-mile loop road links Sunset Crater Volcano, where a lava-flow trail runs below the cinder cone, with the pueblos of Wupatki. One $25 private-vehicle pass covers Sunset Crater and Wupatki for seven days, Walnut Canyon charges its own $25, and a $45 annual pass covers all three. Entrance fees at the three monuments are paid by card only.

Getting There From Phoenix, Interstate 17 runs north to Flagstaff, where it meets Interstate 40. By road, downtown is about 149 miles from Phoenix Sky Harbor, about 29 miles from Sedona through Oak Creek Canyon on State Route 89A (closed by flooding since November 1, 2026; until it reopens, use SR 179 and Interstate 17, about 58 miles, and check az511.gov), about 34 miles from Williams and about 87 miles from Grand Canyon Village. Flagstaff Pulliam Airport, just south of the city, is mainly a general aviation airport with a limited number of scheduled flights, so check current routes. Amtrak's Southwest Chief stops at the downtown station on its run between Los Angeles and Albuquerque and beyond.

When to Go Flagstaff's record high is 97°F, so summer is when people from the low desert come up to cool off. July and August are the wettest months, with monsoon storms in the afternoons. Winters are cold and snowy: the Island Trail at Walnut Canyon may close for snow or ice, and roads and trails at Sunset Crater can close in winter weather. Lowell Observatory is closed on Tuesdays, and its telescopes open around sunset, as early as 4:30 p.m. in winter.