Before you reach the Grand Canyon, Williams, Arizona will already make the trip feel worth it

Williams’ six blocks pack in more than you’d expect

Sixty miles south of the Grand Canyon, at 6,770 feet in the middle of a ponderosa pine forest, Williams, Arizona, sits at the edge of two eras. The neon signs still glow.

The old train still runs. And a town that fought for years to stay on the map ended up drawing about 2 million people a year.

You can blow through in 20 minutes on the interstate, or you can stay a few days and find out why so many people do exactly that.

The town that refused to go quietly

Williams was the last town on all of Route 66 to get bypassed by Interstate 40, and that didn’t happen until Oct. 13, 1984.

The town fought it in court for years, eventually settling when the state agreed to build three dedicated exits. A lot of Route 66 towns faded once the highway traffic stopped.

Williams didn’t.

It leaned into its history so hard that the Historic Business District landed on the National Register of Historic Places the same year the bypass opened.

From a mountain man’s name to a mother road legend

The town goes back to 1881, named after Old Bill Williams, a trapper and scout who roamed the Southwest long before the railroads came.

The Atlantic and Pacific Railroad arrived the following year, and Williams became a hub for ranching and lumber. When Route 66 was aligned through town in 1926 and paved by 1935, Williams had a new identity.

It kept that identity, through the bypass, through the decades, and straight into today.

Neon signs and a gas station frozen in 1949

Six blocks of Route 66 run through downtown Williams, and they still look like the 1950s. Vintage motels, retro diners, and locally owned shops line both sides of the street.

At 101 E. Route 66, Pete’s Route 66 Gas Station Museum sits in a restored 1949 station with classic gas pumps out front and a 1950 Ford parked under the canopy.

The building is packed with vintage memorabilia, and admission is free. It’s the kind of place where you walk in for five minutes and stay for 30.

A 64-mile train ride through the high desert

The Grand Canyon Railway has been running from Williams to the South Rim since Sept. 17, 1901, and it still runs daily except Christmas.

The trip covers 64 miles through high-desert grasslands and pine forest in vintage passenger cars from the 1920s through the 1950s. On the way up, cowboy musicians work the aisles.

On the return trip, actors stage a mock train robbery. The railway shut down in 1968 but private investors brought it back in 1989.

About 225,000 people ride it every year.

Drive through 160 acres of bears, wolves and bison

Bearizona sits on the east end of Route 66, and you drive your own car through more than three miles of ponderosa pine forest to get to the animals.

Bears, wolves, bison, and bighorn sheep move through the landscape with your car rolling slowly past.

On the other side of the drive-through, Fort Bearizona is a 20-acre walk-through area with river otters, bobcats, and jaguars. The park opened in 2010, and more than half its animals are rescues.

A raptor free-flight show with hawks, owls, and falcons runs daily.

Arizona’s only mountain coaster drops 31 mph

Canyon Coaster Adventure Park opened in 2022, and the mile-long track runs straight into the mountainside with steep drops, hairpin turns, and 360-degree spirals. It’s the first and only mountain coaster in Arizona.

You control your own speed with a hand brake and can hit up to 31 mph on the descent. In summer, the park also runs tubing on a 425-foot hill.

In winter, the hill fills with snow tubers.

It’s on the east end of Route 66, close enough to Bearizona that you can do both in the same afternoon.

Ancient carvings at the end of an easy trail

The Keyhole Sink Trail is a 1.4-mile round-trip through ponderosa pine, and it ends at something you won’t find anywhere else nearby.

A box canyon carved from volcanic basalt holds petroglyphs left by the Cohonina people somewhere between 700 and 1100 CE.

Deer, snakes, and lizards cover the rock face, and archaeologists believe the site was a hunting ground. During monsoon season and snowmelt, a waterfall fills the canyon floor.

The trail is easy enough for kids and short enough that nobody runs out of steam before the payoff.

Summit views and a waterfall in the national forest

The Kaibab National Forest wraps around Williams on every side and holds one of the largest stands of ponderosa pine in the world.

The Bill Williams Mountain Trail climbs 7.3 miles out and back to a summit with views across the forest in every direction. Closer to town, Sycamore Falls empties into an emerald pool at the end of a quarter-mile walk.

Seven fishing lakes sit within range of downtown. You don’t have to drive far to get deep into the trees.

Gunfights every night on Route 66

From Memorial Day through Labor Day, the Cataract Creek Gang performs free Old West gunfight reenactments at 7 p.m. nightly along Route 66.

The location changes each evening, and a billboard in town tells you where to show up.

The shows pull audience members into the action, and the same group stages the mock train robbery on the Grand Canyon Railway.

The tradition traces back to Williams’ roots as a rough frontier town full of saloons and cattlemen in the 1880s.

Car shows, the Polar Express and Steam Saturdays

Williams keeps its calendar full. The Historic Route 66 Car Show in June brings vintage vehicles cruising down the old highway.

August brings the Cool Country Cruise-In. From November through December, the Polar Express train ride turns the Grand Canyon Railway into a holiday tradition for families.

On the first Saturday of each month from April through September, Steam Saturdays put a steam locomotive back on the rails. The Williams Reunion Rodeo rounds out the year at the town’s rodeo grounds.

A mountain town worth more than a gas stop

Williams sits at 6,770 feet, so summers run cool and winters bring actual snow. Four distinct seasons in the pines, all within walking distance of downtown.

Shops, dining, and entertainment pack into the historic district without the sprawl you’d find somewhere bigger. Interstate 40 puts you here in 30 minutes from Flagstaff.

The 1901 train depot that now houses the Williams-Kaibab National Forest Visitor Center is worth a stop before you plan your day. Most people come for the Grand Canyon.

A lot of them end up staying for Williams.

Explore Williams, Arizona on Route 66

Williams sits off Interstate 40 in northern Arizona, about 60 miles south of the Grand Canyon’s South Rim and 30 minutes west of Flagstaff.

Route 66 runs straight through the heart of downtown and doubles as the main street.

Start at the Williams-Kaibab National Forest Visitor Center inside the historic 1901 train depot for maps and local information before you head out.

From there, the Grand Canyon Railway depot, Bearizona, and Canyon Coaster Adventure Park are all within a few minutes of each other.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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