On Friday, March 6, 2026, I started northbound on the Arizona National Scenic Trail from Montezuma Pass two miles north of the international border with Mexico in Coronado National Memorial (I added some new photos to that blog post). I hiked down to the border before turning around to pick up my backpack. My mother has been my trail angel and support crew for the first five days and 100 miles of this journey. I would not be doing this without her!
I climbed above 9,000 feet of elevation into the Huachuca Mountains within Coronado National Forest and down through the Canelo Hills across Highway 83 north of Patagonia into the foothills of the Santa Rita Mountains to reach the 100 mile point. Wednesday I am taking a “zero day” off the trail in Tucson.
Arizona Trail Day 1, Mile 2 to 0 to 10 starting in Coronado National Memorial to the Mexico border and turning around to enter Miller Peak Wilderness going above 9,000 feet elevation.
Arizona Trail Day 2, Mile 10 to 38 Huachuca Mountains down to Canelo Hills. Saw 2 Coues deer and 3 little javelinas. Met a triple crown finisher who was the character Greg in Cheryl Strayed’s book Wild. He’s still backpacking at age 72. My role model! Camped overnight by Down Under Tank.
Arizona Trail Day 3, Mile 38 to 61 across Highway 83 to meet my trail angel Mom for a hot meal and resupply. Surprisingly saw 22 wild turkeys in the desert. Lots of wildflowers and butterflies!
Arizona Trail Day 4, Mile 61 to 82 in the foothills of the Santa Rita Mountains. Rode out a hailstorm at historic Kentucky Camp goldmine, then got more thunderstorms overnight. Trying to dry out today.
Arizona Trail Day 5, Mile 82 to 101 to a resupply pickup on Highway 83 south of Vail. Snow overnight on the Santa Rita Mountains! Big thank you to the trail angels that fill up the water caches. Drove Saguaro National Park’s Desert Drive loop to look east where I’ll be backpacking in the Rincon Mountains this weekend. Thanks to my Mom for picking me up and boondocking her camper van in the desert for my “zero day” on Wednesday.
Since the Arizona National Scenic Trail cannot be done as a thru-hike this year, I took a non-traditional approach and started at Mile 700 in Grand Canyon National Park. Due to last summer’s Dragon Bravo Fire, more than 20 miles of the trail is closed on the North Rim. The six-mile stretch of North Kaibab Trail to Ribbon Falls opened up this week, so I made a reservation to spend the night in Bright Angel Campground. The weather was perfect, the scenery sublime, there were lots of ravens flying around, and (as I read) this time of year there were no bugs so I “cowboy camped” without a tent. What a privilege to get a campsite in such an incredible place listening to the creek. I carried my full backpack the seven miles down to the campground, then stashed most of my gear, refilled my water bottle, and headed six miles to the thigh-deep stream crossing for stunning Ribbon Falls, with an elevation gain of about 1,900 feet from the Colorado River. All told, I descended about 7,000 feet across 23 miles on Wednesday, but my left knee held up really well, either due to all the training or trekking poles. Thursday morning I made the hike out in three hours, impressing myself. I feel ready for the physical challenge of the 800-mile Arizona Trail! I am very grateful to be able to choose to do this hard and rewarding type of activity in my beautiful home state.
This week I am starting out northbound on the Arizona National Scenic Trail. According to the official website, it is 800 miles (with 105,000 feet of cumulative elevation gain) from the international border with Mexico in Coronado National Memorial to the Stateline Campground on the Utah border in Vermilion Cliffs National Monument. Due to last summer’s Dragon Bravo Fire in Grand Canyon National Park, more than 20 miles of the trail is closed on the North Rim making a thru-hike impossible this year. Since I am already in northern Arizona, I am going to begin by backpacking to the bottom of the Grand Canyon to spend one night before turning around and driving south to the official start. That will be on Wednesday! Once I return to Grand Canyon National Park (Mile 700), I will get a ride north to finish up the trail.
I recently moved back to Arizona for the 5th time in my life and I thought backpacking across the state would be a great way to reconnect. If you haven’t already read it, check out my 7-day Arizona Road Trip Itinerary with plenty of options to make it a month-long visit.
Once I finish the Arizona Trail, then I will get back to writing my latest guidebook American History 101: Reliving a Country’s Past at 101 National Park Service Sites, which I hope to publish by July 4, 2026, for the 250th anniversary of the vote to approve the Declaration of Independence.
Here are links to my blog posts on the public lands I will be traversing on the Arizona Trail:
In our previous post, we promised to share the Introduction to the book, which is included in the post below.
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Introduction
While numerous guidebooks exist for the United States of America’s National Parks, this is the first ever volume dedicated to recreation in all 138 National Monuments. Altogether, they cover 18.4-million acres of public land across 33 states and territories, plus 759-million acres of ocean in the five expansive Marine National Monuments created since 2006. Only 40 National Monuments have an entry fee, while the others provide free opportunities to learn about history or enjoy the outdoors. The mission of this guidebook is to introduce readers to the diversity of National Monuments by providing information on what makes each of them worthy of protection and how to go about experiencing what they have to offer.
National Monuments feature internationally recognized icons like the Statue of Liberty, as well as overlooked places that even locals rarely visit. They protect fossil quarries, historic homes of important Americans, caves open for exploration, sites significant to the Civil Rights Movement, volcanic wonders, relics of indigenous cultures, old military forts, and whitewater rafting spots. Select National Monuments have visitor centers and guided tours, while others are undeveloped wildlands encompassing everything from deserts to glaciers, including wetlands, sand dunes, and coastlines that provide habitat for countless species of wildlife. Whatever you are interested in, there is a new adventure out there waiting.
Monumental America is a culmination of our extensive travels seeking out the most spectacular trees, wildlife, waterfalls, caves, rivers, arches, houses, ruins, forts, and civil rights sites in National Monuments. Less than 80 of the 138 National Monuments are managed exclusively by the National Park Service, while others fall under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Department of Defense, as well as some state agencies and tribal governments. The federal agencies provide a plethora of information on their websites, including maps, updated hours and entry fees, and current road conditions.
We focused on hiking in this book as a way to explore each National Monument without needing any special equipment or skills. America’s National Monuments offer a variety of other recreational opportunities to enjoy the outdoors: camping, backpacking, picnicking, wildlife watching, birding, photography, hunting, fishing, swimming, whitewater rafting, boating, kayaking, canoeing, stand-up paddleboarding, horseback riding, mountain biking, road biking, rock climbing, caving, rockhounding, four-wheeling, scenic driving, snowshoeing, and cross-country skiing, not to mention the more extreme sports like hang gliding and ice climbing. National Monuments have something for everyone.
History
Most National Monuments have been created unilaterally by the U.S. President under the authority of the Antiquities Act of 1906 without Congressional approval. The Antiquities Act states that the president may set aside “historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest.” President Theodore Roosevelt was the first to utilize this power to protect small cultural sites like Gila Cliff Dwellings and vast wildernesses like the Grand Canyon. The legality of this executive action has been questioned and debated for over a century.
While Roosevelt was a Republican, the last member of that party to create a new National Monument in the western U.S. was President Herbert Hoover when in 1933 he set aside 10,288 acres of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison in Colorado. Smaller historic sites, like Kentucky’s Fort Nelson in 2018, have continued to be preserved by executives of both political parties. Many of our treasured 63 National Parks started as National Monuments, including all three in Arizona, five of nine in California, four of five in Utah, and, most recently, White Sands in New Mexico after nearly 90 years as a National Monument. On the other end of the spectrum, South Carolina’s Reconstruction Era National Historical Park (established in 2019) was a National Monument for only two years.
Less often, National Monuments are established through congressional bills that go through both the Senate and House of Representatives, such as George Washington Birthplace in Virginia, Hagerman Fossil Beds in Idaho, Grand Portage in Minnesota, Newberry Volcanic in Oregon, and Mill Springs Battlefield in Kentucky.
While Wyoming boasts the first National Monument ever established at Devils Tower, in 1950 it became the first state to block any future U.S. President from unilaterally designating new National Monuments larger than 5,000 acres after residents protested the creation of Jackson Hole National Monument (now part of Grand Teton National Park). Congress did use their authority to make 8,198-acre Fossil Butte National Monument in the state in 1972.
On December 1, 1978, President Jimmy Carter utilized the Antiquities Act to set aside 56-million acres within 17 National Monuments across Alaska. His actions led many Alaskans to protest and Fairbanks residents to burn the president in effigy. Two years later, with the congressional passage of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA), most of the land was redesignated under different categories, mainly as National Parks and National Preserves. Later, Congress effectively created a 5,000-acre limit on presidential National Monument designations in Alaska, which has been respected in the decades since.
The court system has continually approved the U.S. President’s ability to use the Antiquities Act in this way, although it has not always been popular, especially with industries based on natural resource extraction. Recently, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase–Escalante National Monuments in Utah have been the subject of political ping-pong as their boundaries have been adjusted. There is a long history of abolishing and redesignating National Monuments, which we highlighted in the introduction for each state.
Monumental America is organized alphabetically by state and each of the 138 National Monuments features the same categories for ease of navigation, starting with the total acreage and the year each was officially designated.
When To Visit
These are the preferred seasons to visit for the best weather. Some places are snowed-in most of the year while others get unbearably hot in the summer, and a few are pleasant year-round. It is worthwhile to check online before making a trip since many of the historic sites are closed seasonally and only open certain days of the week.
How It Got Its Name
When we started writing this book, we were unsure of the pronunciation of some of the names of the National Monuments, so we enjoyed learning the history and etymology of why each of them got their specific moniker.
Why It Was Created
Some National Monuments were established to protect a small historic site, while others preserve thousands of acres of undeveloped public land. We provided some basic background information as to why each place was deemed worthy of its special designation, plus a basic history of the site.
What To See
Presented in list form, these are the places that we frequently came across in our research of a particular National Monument. They may not be the busiest spots, or include everyone’s personal favorite, but they do tend to be more developed for visitation.
How To Visit
National Monuments vary greatly in size and development for recreation, so we provided a basic introduction on how most visitors approach their first trip, although there is no wrong way to do it.
How Much Does It Cost
98 National Monuments have no entry fee! We noted this at the beginning of each chapter, although we still covered relevant costs for guided tours and ferries, if applicable. Most admission fees apply at sites managed by the National Park Service where it may save money to purchase an annual America the Beautiful Pass (and if you qualify for discounted senior, access, and military cards you also receive half-off on all tours and campsites).
Where To Hike
A few National Monuments have extensive trail networks, so we chose one hike that is reasonably easy and provides a good introduction to the area. Not every site has designated trails, though, and a hike may instead involve city sidewalks or cross-country exploration.
What To Photograph
In this book we used black-and-white photography in homage to Ansel Adams, who did so much with his stunning imagery to popularize Canyon de Chelly and other National Monuments that later became National Parks. We selected one original photograph for the 127 National Monuments we have personally visited (not including four Marine National Monuments, three fly-in sites in Alaska, two that are closed to public access in Arizona and Texas, and two new ones in Maine and Pennsylvania).
How Are The Roads
Not all roads in National Monuments are paved, so we explained which ones actually require a high-clearance vehicle and should be avoided by RVs, as well as covering seasonal road closures.
Where To Camp
Most National Monuments managed by the National Park Service do not allow camping and some of the undeveloped areas do not have any campgrounds. In these cases, we researched where to stay at nearby State Parks or private campgrounds with RV hookups. There are often dispersed primitive options for car camping on back roads managed by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. Backpacking is a popular activity in some National Monuments, so we clarified if permits are required and where to get them.
We have posts on many National Monuments and other public lands with color photographs on our travel website (RavenAboutTheParks.com).
We hope that Monumental America provides inspiration for your own monumental explorations.
The mission of our guidebook is to introduce readers to the diversity of National Monuments by providing information on what makes each of them worthy of protection and how to go about experiencing what they have to offer. National Monuments cover a broad range of sites of historic and geologic interest from as small as 0.07 of an acre up to 2.2-million acres in size.
While numerous guidebooks exist for the United States of America’s National Parks, this is the first ever volume dedicated to recreation in all 138 National Monuments. Altogether, they cover 18.4-million acres of public land across 33 states and territories, plus 759-million acres of ocean in the five expansive Marine National Monuments created since 2006. Only 40 National Monuments have an entry fee, while the others provide free opportunities to learn about history or enjoy the outdoors.
National Monuments feature internationally recognized icons like the Statue of Liberty, as well as overlooked places that even locals rarely visit. They protect fossil quarries, historic homes of important Americans, caves open for exploration, sites significant to the Civil Rights Movement, volcanic wonders, relics of indigenous cultures, old military forts, and whitewater rafting spots. A select few National Monuments have visitor centers and guided tours, while others are undeveloped wildlands encompassing everything from deserts to glaciers, including wetlands, sand dunes, and coastlines that provide habitat for countless species of wildlife.
Whatever you are interested in, there is a new adventure out there waiting!
Please keep your eye out for our next post with the Introduction to our new guidebook. Check out our entire selection of U.S. travel guidebooks on our Amazon.com Author Page.
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