SITGREAVES PASS

We drove from Seligman through the delightfully named Peach Springs which I think is my newest of many nicknames for Natalie and found the infamous set of switchbacks from the cover of our book that we thought were in Santa Fe.



Kingman itself is pretty uneventful, though we did see and overtake a few of the electric blue and neon pink cars from the parade the night before. Not long out of the town, before us the The Black Mountains loomed… dark, monstrous and foreboding.

We raced against the sunset to cover the distance between the West Old Highway 66 and our stopover for the night. The going would be tough, we had been informed it was not one for the feint of heart, but we had a destination in mind, and we wanted a beer.

The Sitgreaves Pass sits between Kingman and Oatman, it is a series of 27 hairpin bends, rising to an elevation of 3550 feet that wind their way up and over The Black Mountains.

Not the best place to take the world’s largest and only visible from space vehicle. But we thought we would give it a crack.

As yellow squiggly warning signs peppered the side of the road, we climbed and climbed.
A matter of feet separated first me then Natalie from the cliff edge as the road twisted and meandered its way toward the heavens. To the right the most desolate of landscapes; to the left Desperate Dan type mineshafts lay abandoned, watched over by rusty keep-out signs. In her own unfathomable words “The Best Example of a Cow” she had ever seen no doubt provided one of Dan’s Cow Pies.


We rested at the top to sit of the pass near some out of the way graves, including the final resting place of Jimmy Hoffa (one of many, it seems) I could see why these few fortunate people wanted to be laid to rest among the majesty of the Black Mountains of Arizona and stated that I wanted my ashes to be scattered there, if I’m not cryogenically frozen for the edification of future generations.

The landscape at this altitude was having a dizzying and Mercurial effect. Red Hill Mining Town from U2’s Joshua Tree provided me with the silent, internal soundtrack to match the breathtaking vista unfolding before us. The dark hues of the faraway peaks faded into the distance as the sky turned from blue through yellow, orange and red eventually settling on a dark blue grey.

After what must have been two hours of climbing, falling, stopping and starting, and eight miles of 1 in 8 grades, twisting and turning round ninety and one hundred and eighty degree switchbacks dusk began to set in and the driving became more precarious. We continued down the mountain and snuck passed one not so fortunate relic that had lost control and careened down the mountainside twenty or more years ago.

Natalie did an unbelievable job of getting us up, over and down the alpine pass, and not the short-cut over the cliff edge.

The kid done good.