The San Pedro Valley — Amerind, Ghost Towns & the Last Free-Flowing River

Southeast of Tucson, the San Pedro is the last major free-flowing river in the Southwest, and the broad valley it carves has been a corridor of human life for thousands of years — from Ice Age mammoth hunters to the Apache, from Spanish presidios to silver-boom ghost towns. This two-day journey moves through that deep layering of history. Day one climbs into the boulder wonderland of Texas Canyon to the Amerind Museum, an exceptional private collection of Native American art and archaeology set among the granite outcrops of the Dragoon Mountains — the homeland and final stronghold of Cochise and the Chiricahua Apache — with an optional pilgrimage toward Council Rocks, where Cochise and General Howard forged their 1872 peace. Day two follows the river itself: the well-preserved ghost town of Fairbank, a Spanish colonial and railroad crossroads on the San Pedro; the San Pedro House and its riparian nature preserve, a rare ribbon of green in the desert; and the railroad town of Benson, gateway to the valley. Both nights are spent in Benson.