Two Trips To Flagstaff, AZ: Here’s What We Did

Back in April we spent a week in Flagstaff having spent a week in the Sedona area. After that we headed back down to Tucson to get our second COVID shots, headed back up to Phoenix and then returned to Flagstaff for another five days.

Here’s a quick roundup of where we stayed, what we did and where we ate and drank during those two visits to Flagstaff.

Where We Stayed

For both visits we stayed at the Courtyard Flagstaff as they had a fairly decent paid rate when staying 5+ nights. The hotel was OK and the staff were great, but there were quite a few quirks which meant we didn’t enjoy our stays as much as we would’ve liked. Check out this review where I explain why.

What We Did

Grand Canyon

The main reason we wanted to visit Flagstaff was so that we could visit the Grand Canyon again, so we headed there on my birthday.

During that visit we just wandered along the main walkway with Truffles, but planned to return to rent bikes and cycle along a different stretch. Unfortunately a combination of Shae being ill and the bike rental company being fully booked meant we missed out on that when we returned there in May. We’d therefore like to head back there to rent bikes in the future, as well as visit the North Rim as we’ve only ever visited the South Rim of the Grand Canyon.

Boynton Canyon Trail / Subway Cave

The day before that we’d gone hiking on the Boynton Canyon Trail in Sedona. We’d picked that trail as there’s a semi-secret side trail taking you to a feature called Subway Cave. Unfortunately we initially took a side trail that was so secret, it went the wrong way and didn’t lead us to Subway Cave! Although it added time and miles to our hike, we were rewarded by some beautiful views.

We eventually found the correct side trail to Subway Cave and it was well worth it. You can read more about that hike here.

Petrified Forest National Park

Shae was sick for pretty much all our second visit, so we didn’t end up doing too much else in Flagstaff that didn’t fall under the next category – food and drink! However, on our way from Flagstaff to Colorado, we stopped off at Petrified Forest National Park.

While it’s a somewhat interesting place to visit, we’re glad it was along our route rather than making a special effort to drive all the way there and back as it’s not very close to anything else. Having said that, if you’ve never visited a petrified forest before then it could be worth the trip. We’d visited Mississippi Petrified Forest last year though, so we’d already gotten to experience something like this.

Where We Ate And Drank

The Toasted Owl Café

We met up with our friends Carrie and Drew at The Toasted Owl Café for brunch on my birthday in April and enjoyed it so much that we went returned for brunch when back in Flagstaff the following month. It’s a fantastic restaurant, so check out this post for more about why we loved it so much.

Long Horn Saloon

One evening we drove to the nearby town of Williams to have dinner with one of Shae’s past students on Outschool and her family. We met up at Long Horn Saloon as they had outdoor seating which was pet-friendly.

Shae and I shared The Tombstone which was a giant platter with 1/2 rack baby back ribs, 1/2 rack beef ribs, 2 BBQ leg quarters, 2 baked potatoes, 2 corn cobs, 2 cowboy sweet rolls and 2 side salads. As you might imagine, there was so much food that we had to take some to go. Thankfully we somehow managed to fit the leftovers in our ridiculously small mini fridge at our hotel.

Beaver Street Brewery

Flagstaff seems to be home to a number of breweries, so we went to Beaver Street Brewery one afternoon to meet up with a couple we’d connected with through the Go With Less Facebook group that we’re all in.

We’d eaten lunch just before that, but we got their pretzel sticks to snack on which were good, while I tried one of their stouts which was very good.

Ahipoki

We had a Grubhub credit to use up on my Amex Gold card, so one night I ordered a poke bowl from Ahipoki. They give you a lot of choice as to what you can include in your poke bowl, so it was nice being able to customize it so much with everything that I like. I enjoyed it so much during that first visit that I meant to order food from there again the second time we visited, but forgot in the end.

Final Thoughts

It didn’t feel like we made amazing use of our two visits to Flagstaff, but we were fairly busy working, plus Shae was sick during that second visit. I’m sure we’ll return in the future though, so hopefully we’ll get to do much more.