Places to go, things to do and local eateries to visit while staying at Ramsey Canyon Cabins. We are very fortunate to be so removed and yet so close to everything!
A short list of local eateries, we have way too many to list!
The Ramsey Canyon Preserve is just .25 miles and a few minutes walk or golf cart ride away. Southeastern Arizona is an ecological crossroads, where the Sierra Madre of Mexico, the Rocky Mountains, and the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts all come together. The abrupt rise of mountains like the Huachucas from the surrounding arid grasslands creates “sky islands” that harbor tremendous habitat diversity and form stepping stones to the tropics. This combination of factors gives Ramsey Canyon its notable variety of plant and animal life, including such southwestern specialties as Apache and Chihuahua pines, ridge-nosed rattlesnake, lesser long-nosed bat, elegant trogon, and Rivoli's and Anna's hummingbirds. There are numerous trails to hike at the preserve as well as its connection to the Hamburg trail. Click here for more information.
Brown Canyon Ranch is only 1 mile down the road and offers several hiking and mountain biking trails. The canyon is full of wildlife and its trails also connect to larger trail systems that exist in the Huachuca mountain range and Coronado National Forest. Step back to the turn of the 20th Century with a visit to Brown Canyon Ranch. First permanently occupied around 1800, the ranch was acquired by the U.S. Forest Service as part of a 1998 land swap to become part of the Coronado National Forest. Tour the adobe ranch house, storeroom, and corrals, where the old windmill still pumps water, and the tree-surrounded pond provides a cool view and home to wildlife. Allow 2 hours. 800-288-3861 or (520) 378-0311 (US Forest Service, Sierra Vista Ranger District). $8 per vehicle day use fee or Coronado National Forest recreation pass/annual pass.
Another one of our neighbors right next door is the Arizona Folklore Preserve. They offer live music shows shows every Saturday and Sunday afternoon. Go to their website for more information about the property as well as a schedule for upcoming show and artist information. Click here for information about the Arizona Folklore Preserve
Tombstone, AZ is 26 miles and 39 minutes from Ramsey Canyon Cabins - After getting its start as a silver mining claim in the late-1870s, the settlement grew along with its Tough Nut Mine, becoming a bustling boomtown of the Wild West. From opera and theater to dance halls and brothels, Tombstone offered much-needed entertainment to the miners after a long shift underground. In 1886, the mines flooded and hit rock bottom, and the miners moved on to the next claim. Click here to find out more!
Bisbee, AZ is 31 miles and 41 minutes away. As with all worthwhile treasures, Bisbee is a hidden gem tucked just beyond the point where you think you’ve gone too far as you approach Arizona’s southernmost border. In Bisbee, however, there’s no such thing as going too far; unless of course, you live more than 70 steps up on one of Bisbee’s 350 historic staircases. Recently voted “Best Historic Small Town in America” by USA Today Readers and “Frommer’s Best Places to Go in 2018, Bisbee is a unique place where the past collides with the present in a kaleidoscope of passion, art, color and kindness. Click here to find out more!
Fort Huachuca Museum is 14 miles and 20 minutes away. The Fort Huachuca Museum serves the Fort by collecting, preserving and exhibiting artifacts representing its own history and the larger history of the military in the Southwest. Opened in 1960, the Museum houses several thousand objects and documents, many on display in attractive exhibits telling the Fort’s one hundred and thirty-five year story. The Museum is located in two buildings on the Fort’s historic Old Post, and is open to the public without charge. Click here for more information
Kartchner Caverns is 30 miles and 39 minutes away. The park has several hiking trails and beautiful views but the main attraction is the caves. In November 1974, Gary Tenen and Randy Tufts were exploring the limestone hills at the eastern base of the Whetstone Mountains. They were looking “for a cave no one had ever found” and found it. The two kept the cave a secret until February 1978 when they told the property owners, James and Lois Kartchner, about their awesome discovery. Find more information here!
San Pedro House and San Pedro River Riparian Habitat is 16 miles and 20 minutes away. San Pedro House, a historic ranch house restored by the Friends of the San Pedro River, is a bookstore and gift shop run by volunteers. Around the San Pedro House, there are interpretive signs of various native plants of the area, riparian habitat and wildlife. The American Bird Conservancy has identified the San Pedro River and its environs as being significant for world bird conservation and it is designated as a globally important bird area. Click here for more information!
Coronado National Memorial is 16 miles and 20 minutes away. Francisco Vásquez de Coronado entered in 1540 what is now Arizona along the San Pedro River valley, a few miles east of the memorial, then continued north along a route marked today as the Coronado Trail, though there is no trace of his passage remaining today. The site offers several hiking trails through the wooded foothills of the Huachuca Mountains, excellent views over the river valley and south into Mexico, a cave, and an interesting variety of plant and animal life. Find more information here!
Patagonia Lake State Campground is 63 miles and 1:20 minutes away. Tucked away in the rolling hills of southeastern Arizona is a hidden treasure. Patagonia Lake State Park was established in 1975 as a state park and is an ideal place to find whitetail deer roaming the hills and great blue herons walking the shoreline. The park offers a campground, beach, picnic area with ramadas, tables and grills, a creek trail, boat ramps, and a marina. Click here for more information.
Sonoita, AZ is 40 miles and 45 minutes away. For anyone who thinks the idea of sipping local wines while taking in the breathtaking, wide open scenery sounds like a perfect day, Sonoita, is an ideal destination. Sonoita is a part of the state’s original wine country, and tasting rooms and vineyards continue to thrive around the small village. Here is more information about Sonoita and things to do there.
Parker Canyon Lake is 1 hour and 20 minutes away. This medium-sized 132 acre lake is located in the Canelo Hills west of the Huachuca Mountains. It offers a number of recreational possibilities. For those who like to fish, Parker Canyon Lake offers both cold and warm water species, including stocked rainbow trout and resident bass, sunfish, and catfish. There is a fishing pier and a paved boat ramp at the lake, as well as a lakeside paved area and a graveled path along some of the best catfishing shoreline. There is also a concessionaire-operated country store at the lakeshore where you can pick up some last minute supplies, buy a fishing license, or rent a boat. Bird watchers and just plain nature lovers will also find much to enjoy at Parker Canyon Lake. A five mile trail leads around the shoreline never getting more than a few steps from the water. Click here for more information.
Arizona Facts
1. Arizona has 3,928 mountain peaks and summits, more mountains than any one of the other Mountain States (Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming).
2. All New England, plus the state of Pennsylvania would fit inside Arizona.
3. Arizona became the 48th state and last of the contiguous states on February 14, 1912.
4. Arizona's disparate climate can yield both the highest temperature across the nation and the lowest temperature across the nation in the same day.
5. There are more wilderness areas in Arizona than in the entire Midwest. Arizona alone has 90 wilderness areas, while the Midwest has 50.
6. Arizona has 26 peaks that are more than 10,000 feet in elevation.
7. Arizona has the largest contiguous stand of Ponderosa pines in the world stretching from near Flagstaff along the Mogollon Rim to the White Mountains region.
8. Yuma, Arizona is the country's highest producer of winter vegetables, especially lettuce.
9. Arizona is the 6th largest state in the nation, covering 113,909 square miles.
10. Out of all the states in the U.S., Arizona has the largest percentage of its land designated as Indian lands.
11. The Five C's of Arizona's economy are: Cattle, Copper, Citrus, Cotton, and Climate.
12. More copper is mined in Arizona than all the other states combined, and the Morenci Mine is the largest copper producer in all of North America.
13. Clark Gable and Carole Lombard, two of the most prominent movie stars of Hollywood's Golden Age, were married on March 18, 1939, in Kingman, Arizona.
14. Covering 18,608 sq. miles, Coconino County is the second largest county by land area in the 48 contiguous United States. (San Bernardino County in California is the largest)
15. The world's largest solar telescope is located at Kitt Peak National Observatory in Sells, Arizona..
16. Bisbee, Arizona is known as the Queen of the Copper Mines because during its mining heyday it produced nearly 25 percent of the world's copper and was the largest city in the Southwest between Saint Louis and San Francisco.
17. Billy the Kid killed his first man, Windy Cahill, in Bonita, Arizona.
18. Arizona grows enough cotton each year to make more than one pair of jeans for every person in the United States.
19. Famous labor leader and activist Cesar Chavez was born in Yuma.
20. In 1912, President William Howard Taft was ready to make Arizona a state on February 12, but it was Lincoln's birthday. The next day, the 13th, was considered bad luck so they waited until the following day. That' how Arizona became known as the Valentine State.
21. When England's famous London Bridge was replaced in the 1960s, the original was purchased, dismantled, shipped stone by stone and reconstructed in Lake Havasu City, Arizona, where it still stands today.
22. Mount Lemmon, Tucson, in the Santa Catalina Mountains, is the southernmost ski resort in the United States.
23. Rooster Cogburn Ostrich Ranch in Picacho, Arizona is the largest privately-owned ostrich ranch in the world outside South Africa.
24. If you cut down a protected species of cactus in Arizona, you could spend more than a year in prison.
25. The world's largest to-scale collection of miniature airplane models is housed at the library at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona.
26. The only place in the country where mail is delivered by mule is the village of Supai, located at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.
27. Located on Arizona's western border, Parker Dam is the deepest dam in the world at 320 feet.
28. South Mountain Park/Preserve in Phoenix is the largest municipal park in the country.
29. Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station, located about 55 miles west of Phoenix, generates more electricity than any other U.S. power plant.
30. Oraibi, a Hopi village located in Navajo County, Arizona, dates back to before A.D. 1200 and is reputed to be the oldest continuously inhabited community in America.
31. Built by Del Webb in 1960, Sun City, Arizona was the first 55-plus active adult retirement community in the country.
32. Petrified wood is the official state fossil. The Petrified Forest in northeastern Arizona contains America's largest deposits of petrified wood.
33. Many of the founders of San Francisco in 1776 were Spanish colonists from Tubac, Arizona.
34. Phoenix originated in 1866 as a hay camp to supply military post Camp McDowell.
35. Rainfall averages for Arizona range from less than three inches in the deserts to more than 30 inches per year in the mountains.
36. Rising to a height of 12,643 feet, Mount Humphreys north of Flagstaff is the state's highest mountain.
37. Roadrunners are not just in cartoons! In Arizona, you'll see them running up to 17-mph away from their enemies.
38. The Saguaro cactus is the largest cactus found in the U.S. It can grow as high as a five-story building and is native to the Sonoran Desert, which stretches across southern Arizona.
39. Sandra Day O'Connor, the first woman appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, grew up on a large family ranch near Duncan, Arizona.
40. The best-preserved meteor crater in the world is located near Winslow, Arizona.
41. The average state elevation is 4,000 feet.
42. The Navajo Nation spans 27,000 square miles across the states of Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, but its capital is seated in Window Rock, Arizona.
43. The amount of copper utilized to make the copper dome atop Arizona's Capitol building is equivalent to the amount used in 4.8 million pennies.
44. Near Yuma, the Colorado River's elevation dips to 70 feet above sea level, making it the lowest point in the state.
45. The geographic center of Arizona is 55 miles southeast of Prescott near the community of Mayer.
46. You could pile four 1,300-foot skyscrapers on top of each other and they still would not reach the rim of the Grand Canyon.
47. The hottest temperature recorded in Arizona was 128 degrees at Lake Havasu City on June 29, 1994
48. The coldest temperature recorded in Arizona was 40 degrees below zero at Hawley Lake on January 7, 1971.
49. A saguaro cactus can store up to nine tons of water.
50. The state of Massachusetts could fit inside Maricopa County (9,922 sq. miles).
51. The westernmost battle of the Civil War was fought at Picacho Pass on April 15, 1862 near Picacho Peak in Pinal County
52. There are 11.2 million acres of National Forest in Arizona, and one-fourth of the state forested.
53. Wyatt Earp was neither the town marshal nor the sheriff in Tombstone at the time of the shoot-out at the O..K. Corral. His brother Virgil was the town marshal.
54. On June 6, 1936, the first barrel of tequila produced in the United States rolled off the production line in Nogales, Arizona.
55. The Sonoran Desert is the most biologically diverse desert in North America.
56. Bisbee is the Nation's Southernmost mile-high city.
57. The two largest man-made lakes in the U.S. are Lake Mead and Lake Powell, both located in Arizona.
58. The longest remaining intact section of Route 66 can be found in Arizona and runs from Seligman to Topock, a total of 157 unbroken miles.
59. The 13 stripes on the Arizona flag represent the 13 original colonies of the United States.
60. The negotiations for Geronimo's final surrender took place in Skeleton Canyon, near present day Douglas, Arizona, in 1886.
61. Prescott, Arizona is home to the world's oldest rodeo, and Payson, Arizona is home to the world's oldest continuous rodeo, both of which date back to the 1880's.
62. Kartchner Caverns, near Benson, Arizona, is a massive limestone cave with 13,000 feet of passages, two rooms as long as football fields, and one of the world's longest soda straw stalactites: measuring 21 feet 3 inches.
63. You can carry a loaded firearm on your person, no permit required.
64. Arizona has one of the lowest crime rates in the U.S.A.