SEDONA · ARIZONA
Red rocks, canyon roads, desert nights.
Pink-jeep trails over the slickrock and vortex hikes at Bell Rock. Grand Canyon day trips and Verde Valley wine. Helicopter flights over the spires, Jerome ghost tours, and some of the darkest night skies in America.
Only here
Energy, red dirt, and a sky full of stars.
Plenty of places run jeep tours and stargazing nights. The vortexes, the red rock backcountry and Sedona’s dark-sky desert belong to this one stretch of Arizona and nowhere else.
The energy
The Sedona Vortexes
Sedona is the vortex capital. Four sites the locals all name first, Bell Rock, Cathedral Rock, Airport Mesa and Boynton Canyon, are said to concentrate the land’s energy, and the juniper trees near them grow in tight spirals believers point to as proof. Guides take you out to walk them, sit with them, and feel for it yourself.
- 1 Explore Sedona’s Vortexes: 2.5 Hour Jeep Tour of Mysticism
- 2 PRIVATE Sedona Jeep Tour 7 Sacred Pools – Soldier’s Pass Trail
- 3 Sedona Vortex Odyssey – A Spiritual & Scientific Adventure
Red dirt
The Red Rock Jeep Trails
The backcountry only opens up from the seat of an open-top 4x4. Broken Arrow climbs the slickrock to the lip of the Devil’s Staircase, the Outlaw Trail rolls through old Western movie country, and every run ends on a view you could not have hiked to before lunch.
- 1 Explore Sedona’s Vortexes: 2.5 Hour Jeep Tour of Mysticism
- 2 Sedona Outlaw Trail: 3-Hr 4×4 Tour of Western Canyons & Wildlife
- 3 Sedona Red Rocks Outback Tour: Scenic with mild off-roading
Dark skies
UFO and Stargazing Nights
Sedona is a certified Dark Sky Community, so once the sun drops the Milky Way comes out hard over the rocks. Outfitters hand you military-grade night-vision goggles to sweep the sky, aim telescopes at Saturn’s rings, and tell the long Sedona story of the lights people swear they have seen out here.
- 1 Sedona Stargazing Tours LLC
- 2 The Original Sedona UFO and Stargazing Night Tour
- 3 The Night Sky Star Story, Galaxy, and Sedona Story Tour
Start here
The one most people book first.
More Sedona visitors build a day around this single experience than anything else on the list.
The classics
Sedona's Most Popular Tours
Red rock jeep trails, the Verde Canyon railroad, vortex hikes and the Grand Canyon run. The days most people come to Sedona for.
Where to begin
The days a Sedona trip is built around.
The Grand Canyon run, the red rock jeep trails, the vortex sites, the Verde Valley wineries, the scenic flights and the old town of Jerome. The handful of days most trips are planned around, and the best way to do each.
The red rocks
How to get amongst the red rocks.
The formations are the whole reason you came, and there are really three ways into them: by jeep, from the air, or on foot. The right one comes down to your time, your budget and how close you want to get.
Verde Valley
Arizona wine country, down the valley.
Drop down Oak Creek from the red rocks and the high desert turns to vineyards. Page Springs and Cornville grow the grapes; the tasting rooms line old Highway 89A through Cottonwood and up the hill to Jerome. Arizona wine country, four thousand feet up and twenty minutes from town.
Read the guide: the best Verde Valley wine tours →A mile high
The old town up Cleopatra Hill.
Jerome hangs off the side of Cleopatra Hill above the Verde Valley, a copper-boom town of fifteen thousand that all but emptied when the mines shut. What is left is a National Historic Landmark of switchback streets, a haunted hotel or two, and ghost-and-history tours that trade on a genuinely wild past.
See the Jerome ghost tours →The red rocks
Sandstone that catches fire at sundown.
Sedona’s buttes and spires are iron-stained Schnebly Hill sandstone, stacked over millions of years into bells, cathedrals and coffee pots. Late in the day the low sun sets the whole basin glowing red, the half hour photographers drive clear across Arizona to catch.
Red rock sightseeing tours →Grand Canyon
The big one is two hours north.
Sedona is the easiest base for the Grand Canyon’s South Rim, a couple of hours up through the high pines past Flagstaff. Day tours drive the whole way for you, with stops at Mather Point, the overlooks along Desert View Drive, and time at the edge of that mile-deep drop.
- 1 Grand Canyon Complete Day Tour from Sedona or Flagstaff
- 2 Grand Canyon Deluxe Day Trip from Sedona
- 3 Private Grand Canyon Day Tour
Up at Page
Slot canyons and a bend in the river.
North toward Page, the desert cracks open. Light beams drop through the shoulder-wide sandstone slots of Antelope Canyon, and a few miles on the Colorado River swings a full horseshoe around a sheer red cliff. They make long days out of Sedona, and every mile pays off.
See all 8 Antelope Canyon trips →By place
The red rocks, and the country beyond.
The Grand Canyon for the big one. Antelope Canyon for the slot-light. Jerome for the ghosts. The Verde Valley for the wine. Oak Creek Canyon for the drive. Cathedral Rock for the photo everyone takes home.
By activity
Pick how to spend the day.
Jeep if you want the backcountry. Helicopter if you want it from above. A vortex hike if you came for the energy. Wine, stargazing, or the long road to the Grand Canyon.
Plan it
Three perfect days.
First time in Sedona? Here is a long weekend that hits the essentials without a wasted hour.
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