Exiting the Tunnel

On Santa’s annual sojourn away from the North Pole, his favorite pas­times are lis­ten­ing to children’s gift wishes and sat­is­fy­ing his pas­sion for vin­tage trains. Lucky for us his December sched­ule prior to Christmas includes Saturday, Sunday and Wednesday after­noons rid­ing the rails of the Verde Canyon Railroad’s Santa Claus Express. Eagle-decorated FP7 engines pull coaches filled with glee­ful pas­sen­gers away from the sta­tion at 1:00 p.m. for a round trip through the won­der­land of Verde Canyon to the old Perkinsville Ranch, return­ing at about 5:00 p.m.

Santa excit­edly fills two seats with his ample girth and invites the chil­dren to gather round his magic story book for ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas…’ Mrs. Claus doles out scrump­tious cook­ies to all, and Elfie tags behind with milk and hot choco­late. Beer, wine and cock­tails are avail­able for the big kids.

Outside the panoramic win­dows of the com­fort­able, climate-controlled coaches, the breath­tak­ing splen­dor of crim­son cliffs and bril­liant blue sky passes by. From lofty tres­tle bridges the shim­mer­ing Verde River is seen snaking along the val­ley floor. Deer, elk and Javelina emerge from the for­est of Cottonwoods and Sycamores to quench their thirst and Great Blue Heron cruise along its emer­ald waters.

Nesting Bald Eagle

As nature’s extrav­a­ganza unfolds in the canyon, the train’s nar­ra­tor enriches the expe­ri­ence with his­tor­i­cal, archae­o­log­i­cal, geo­log­i­cal and wildlife facts. Young and old alike take to the open-air view­ing cars as atten­dants point out the siz­able nest perched pre­car­i­ously on a canyon wall. Everyone wants to know if Black and Decker, one of the res­i­dent bald eagle cou­ples, are at home. Eagle Watch will soon be under­way as many annu­ally return­ing bald and golden eagles join the locals and a vari­ety of other migra­tory birds and water­fowl already com­fort­ably ensconced within the rugged canyon walls.

Join Santa, the king of mer­ri­ment; his bet­ter half, Mrs. Claus, and Elfie as they sweep you away from the bustling city into a mag­i­cal fam­ily get-a-away steeped in nature’s spec­tac­u­lar wilder­ness vistas.

The Verde Canyon Railroad depot is located at 300 N. Broadway in Clarkdale, AZ, 25 min­utes from Sedona, 2 hours north of Phoenix, and 90 min­utes south of Flagstaff. Passengers are encour­aged to arrive approx­i­mately one and one-half hours prior to depar­ture.

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