Downtown Flagstaff on historic Route 66 in northern Arizona

ROUTE 66

Route 66 turns 100 on November 11, 2026, and no state kept more of it than Arizona. This is the hub guide to driving it here: the towns in order, what is actually worth stopping for, and a three day plan that does not rush the best part. For the mountain town in the middle of it, start with our Flagstaff guide.

Most of Route 66 is a memory you drive past on an interstate. Arizona is the exception. The road originally ran 385.2 miles across the state, from Lupton at the New Mexico line to Topock at the Colorado River, and about 250 miles are still drivable today. The prize is the run west of Seligman: about 158 miles of continuous original road to Topock, the longest stretch like it left in the country. That is why this state, and not the faster states, is where a centennial drive actually feels like 1926 for long, quiet stretches at a time. The towns help too. Winslow kept its corner and its great railroad hotel. Williams held out the longest against the interstate. Seligman refused to die, and then talked the whole country into caring again. Kingman built the museum. Oatman kept the burros. Drive it east to west, the way the old road ran toward California, and give it three days. One day can sample it. Three days lets it slow you down, which is the point.

Arizona Route 66 at a glance

The birthday: Route 66 was established November 11, 1926, running 2,448 miles from Chicago to Santa Monica. The centennial is November 11, 2026. The Arizona miles: 385.2 miles originally, about 250 drivable now. The longest stretch: about 158 continuous original miles from Crookton Road, east of Seligman, to Topock. The towns, east to west: Holbrook, Winslow, Flagstaff, Williams, Ash Fork, Seligman, Peach Springs, Kingman, Oatman, Topock. Time needed: 3 days to drive it well, 5 with a Grand Canyon night. Best months: October and November, then March to May. Summer heat hits the western desert hard, and winter snow is real in Flagstaff and Williams. Fuel and signal: fill up in the bigger towns. Long parts of the Seligman to Kingman run have no fuel and patchy cell service.

Why Arizona kept the best piece

The short version is that Arizona had distance on its side, and then it had one stubborn barber.

History · The Bypass Years

The road the interstate tried to replace

When Interstate 40 replaced Route 66 across northern Arizona, town after town lost its traffic in a day. Seligman was bypassed on September 22, 1978, and its barber, Angel Delgadillo, born in Seligman in 1927, watched the cars simply stop coming. Williams was the last town on all of Route 66 to be bypassed, in 1984. That late date is why its main street still feels intact instead of reconstructed. Verdict: read the dates as you drive. The towns that kept the most are mostly the ones bypassed last, or saved first.

History · 1987

Seligman and the comeback

Delgadillo and other locals formed the Historic Route 66 Association of Arizona in 1987, and that same year Arizona designated the Seligman to Kingman stretch as Historic Route 66. Other states followed with associations of their own. Today his old barber shop on the main street in Seligman runs as Angel and Vilma Delgadillo’s Original Route 66 Gift Shop and visitor center, and Seligman calls itself, with a real claim, the Birthplace of Historic Route 66. The story also fed into Pixar’s Cars, whose fictional Radiator Springs owes a lot to towns exactly like this one. Verdict: Seligman is not a photo stop. It is the reason the rest of this page exists. Give it an hour, minimum.

The Centennial · Nov 11, 2026

Why go this year

A centennial only happens once, and Arizona towns have spent 2026 marking it with car shows, exhibits and small town celebrations up and down the road. Expect the birthday week around November 11 to be the busiest and most festive stretch of the year, especially in Seligman, Kingman and Flagstaff. That cuts both ways. You get the road at its most alive, and you share its two lane miles with a lot of other people who had the same idea. Book the characterful rooms, the Wigwam Motel in Holbrook and La Posada in Winslow, well ahead for that week. Verdict: go in the birthday week for the party, or in late October for the same weather with thinner crowds. Both are good calls.

The east half: Holbrook to Williams

East of Flagstaff the road runs as a mix of drivable old alignment and I-40 hops between towns. Do not let that put you off. The stops on this half are some of the strongest on the whole route.

Town · East Gateway

Holbrook and the Wigwam Motel

Holbrook is your eastern base and the gateway to Petrified Forest National Park, the park the old road ran right past. In town, the headline is the Wigwam Motel, where you sleep in a concrete teepee shaped room with a vintage car parked outside. It is kitsch, yes, and it is also a genuine piece of road history that still works as a motel. Book it as your first night if you can. Even if you sleep elsewhere, stop for the photo in late light. Verdict: one night in Holbrook sets up the whole drive. Park in the morning, corner in Winslow by lunch.

Town · The Corner

Winslow and La Posada

Yes, the corner is a photo of a corner. Do it anyway. Standin’ on the Corner Park, at Route 66 and North Kinsley Avenue, marks the Eagles line from “Take It Easy,” written by Jackson Browne and Glenn Frey, with statues, a mural and a red flatbed Ford. It takes ten minutes and everyone in the car will be glad you stopped. Then walk to the real prize: La Posada, the 1930 Fred Harvey railroad hotel designed by Mary Colter and restored room by room. It is the best historic stay on Arizona Route 66, full stop, and its gardens alone are worth the stop if you are not staying. Verdict: corner for the fun of it, La Posada for the substance. Stay the night here if Holbrook is full.

Detour · Off I-40 Exit 233

Meteor Crater

About six miles south of I-40 at Exit 233, between Winslow and Flagstaff, sits a hole in the ground roughly 50,000 years in the making: Meteor Crater, also called Barringer Crater, about three quarters of a mile across and 550 feet deep. It is privately owned, well run, and genuinely startling at the rim, and Apollo astronauts trained here because the terrain reads like the moon. It is not a Route 66 business, it is older than the road by a few millennia, and it still belongs on every drive through here. Verdict: 90 minutes, well spent. Go in the morning before the wind picks up on the rim.

Town · 7,000 Feet

Flagstaff, the mountain pause

Flagstaff is the biggest town on Arizona Route 66 and the coolest, in both senses, sitting at 7,000 feet in the ponderosa pines. Its downtown straddles the old road and the rail line, with the 1927 Hotel Monte Vista as the landmark, the visitor center in the historic depot, and enough coffee shops and bookstores to fill a slow afternoon. It is also a dark sky city and home to Lowell Observatory, where Pluto was discovered. Use Flagstaff as a night stop, a laundry and supplies reset, and your weather check for the road west. Our Flagstaff guide covers where to stay and what to do in full. Verdict: the most livable overnight on the route. If a winter storm is coming, this is where you find out.

Town · Gateway to the Canyon

Williams, the last town bypassed

Williams leans into its title, Gateway to the Grand Canyon, and earns it. The main street is a tight, neon lit run of diners and shops that survived because the interstate arrived here last, in 1984. The Grand Canyon Railway leaves from the Williams depot for the South Rim, about 60 miles north by road, and riding it turns a canyon day into a car free one. Sleep in Williams if the canyon is your next day, or if you want an early start on the long Seligman run. Verdict: Williams plus a canyon day is the best single detour on the whole Arizona drive.

[AFFILIATE: hotels on Arizona Route 66] · [AFFILIATE: Grand Canyon Railway]

The west half: the longest stretch

Open Arizona highway on a northern Arizona road trip
The open road is the attraction west of Seligman.

West of Ash Fork, at Crookton Road, the old road leaves the interstate behind and does not really come back. This is the drive people cross oceans for.

Town · Start of the Long Run

Seligman, where the road was saved

Start the west half here, slowly. Walk the main street end to end: the Delgadillo gift shop and visitor center, the Snow Cap Drive In built by Angel’s brother Juan, and a full block of signs, murals and vintage cars that never feel staged because the town never fully stopped being a road town. Fill the tank here. The next reliable fuel is Kingman, and the road in between rewards a driver who is not watching a gauge. Verdict: arrive by mid morning, leave after lunch, and let Seligman set the pace for the day.

Road · Seligman to Kingman

Peach Springs, Truxton and Hackberry

The run from Seligman to Kingman is about 75 miles of two lane road through high desert that changes slowly and then all at once. You pass Grand Canyon Caverns and Peach Springs, on the Hualapai Reservation and the check in point country for Havasupai trips (our Havasupai guide explains that system), then Truxton and Valentine. The stop everyone remembers is the Hackberry General Store, a former grocery and gas station turned roadside museum of signs, pumps and rusting classics. Nothing about it is polished and that is exactly why it works. Verdict: drive this section in daylight, stop often, and do not plan anything tight at the other end.

Town · The Museum Stop

Kingman and the Powerhouse

Kingman is the working hub of western Route 66 and the right place to sleep before Oatman. Start at the Powerhouse Visitor Center, home to the Arizona Route 66 Museum, which tells the road’s story from wagon trails to Dust Bowl migration to the neon years, with the Electric Vehicle Museum in the same complex. Across the street, Locomotive Park puts a full steam engine at photo distance. Kingman also has the widest choice of motels and food on the western half, which matters more than glamour out here. Verdict: museum in the afternoon, early night, early start over the pass. That order works.

Road · Sitgreaves Pass

The climb to Oatman

From Kingman the old road, signed as the Oatman Highway, climbs into the Black Mountains and over Sitgreaves Pass on a narrow, winding alignment with tight switchbacks, steep drop offs and very little margin. It is the best driving on Arizona Route 66 and the least forgiving. Take it slowly, use the pullouts, and do not attempt it in a large RV or with a long trailer. Drivers who dislike mountain roads can reach Oatman from the south via Topock instead. Verdict: go early, go slow, and let faster locals past. The pass is the memory, not an obstacle before it.

Town · Burros Included

Oatman, and the end at Topock

Oatman is a former gold mining town where the main street belongs, part of the day, to wild burros, descendants of pack animals left behind when the mines closed. They wander the boardwalks, block traffic, and accept only the approved feed sold in town. Walk the street, look in at the Oatman Hotel, and time your visit for late morning when the town is awake and the burros are in. From Oatman the road drops south to Topock and the Colorado River, where Arizona Route 66 ends and California begins. Verdict: end the drive here, with the river in sight. It feels like an ending, because it is one.

Drive it in three days

Day 1, Holbrook to Flagstaff. Petrified Forest in the morning light, lunch in Winslow, the corner and La Posada, then Meteor Crater in the afternoon and the climb into the pines. Sleep in Flagstaff. About 115 miles of driving, and a full day once the stops get their due.

Day 2, Flagstaff to Seligman. A slow Flagstaff morning, Lowell Observatory or a downtown wander, then west to Williams for lunch and the railway depot. If the canyon is in your plan, today is when you swap this drive for a Grand Canyon day from Williams and push everything west by a day. Otherwise, continue to Ash Fork and Seligman and sleep where the comeback started. About 75 miles.

Day 3, Seligman to Oatman. The big one. Morning on Seligman’s main street, then the long original run through Peach Springs and Hackberry to Kingman, the museum, and an early afternoon climb over Sitgreaves Pass to Oatman. End at Topock or double back to Kingman to sleep. About 140 miles, almost none of it interstate. Do not schedule a flight home this night.

Only have one day? Drive Seligman to Kingman to Oatman and back on I-40. It is the longest original stretch, the best town, the museum and the pass in a single long day from either Flagstaff or Kingman. Have five days? Add a Grand Canyon night from Williams and a Sedona night on the way back to Phoenix, which is exactly the shape of our 7 day Arizona road trip with Route 66 swapped in for the interstate legs. Our Grand Canyon in one day plan covers the rim day itself.

The honest warnings

Fuel is a plan, not a hope. Fill up in Holbrook, Flagstaff, Williams, Seligman and Kingman. The Seligman to Kingman run has no reliable fuel in between, and the Oatman road has none at all. Cell service fades west of Seligman. Download offline maps before Crookton Road and tell someone your plan for the day. Heat and snow are both real. Oatman and Topock bake in summer, while Flagstaff and Williams, both near 7,000 feet, get genuine winter storms that can close I-40 and make the old road slow going. Check the forecast at both elevations, not just one. Sitgreaves Pass is not for big rigs. The switchbacks west of Kingman are narrow with steep drops. Large RVs and long trailers should approach Oatman from Topock. Burro rules are simple. Feed only the approved feed sold in Oatman, keep hands and food away from your car windows in traffic, and give the animals the right of way. They live here. Centennial crowds cluster. The week of November 11, 2026 will be the busiest of the year in Seligman and Kingman. Small town dining rooms fill fast, so eat early or carry a picnic for the long run. None of this is a reason to skip the drive. It is the difference between a good story and a long tow.

Keep planning

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