Montezuma’s Castle is a 5-story, 20 room cliff dwelling tucked high into a cliff alcove along lower Beaver Creek near Camp Verde. Its National Monument status belies its importance in Southwestern archaeology. It’s a quick 5 minute drive once you exit I-17 at the Middle Verde Road exit unless your car mysteriously steers you into the Yavapai Tribe’s Cliff Castle Casino that you will conveniently drive right by. It’s not a site where you get up close and personal with the ruins, though; you stand several hundred feet below and look up. It has a very thorough visitor center including artifacts and educational displays. The exhibit that I love best, as do most kids, is the Poisonous Insects of Arizona display. That’ll get you ready for your walk in the desert!
The Well is less visited than the Castle largely because of its location. To visit you must drive several miles of pavement after leaving the Lake Montezuma exit off I-17. Next you transition to a few miles of dirt road to reach the site. It’s worth it, though, because in addition to a few standing rooms of masonry cliff dwellings there is a natural “well”, a limestone sinkhole, fed by a spring to the tune of one and one-half million gallons daily. You can choose a number of walking paths that enable great views and photo opportunities of the site. The Well is technically a detached unit of Montezuma’s Castle National Monument and unlike the Castle charges no entrance fee.
What a great view from a fantastic place. Tuzi is not a cliff dwelling in the typical style of ancient ruins you might explore near Sedona. It was a grand pueblo that at one time housed hundreds of occupants, making it the largest ancient village in the Verde Valley. There were originally 110 rooms, some with second and third story components. The visitor center has a museum-quality collection of artifacts, some from other important though lesser known nearby sites such a Hidden House in Sycamore Canyon. Tuzigoot is located between Cottonwood and Clarkdale on Hwy 89A so it fits in perfectly with a trip to Jerome and the Verde Canyon Railroad train excursion located in Clarkdale.
