So the original plan for this day was actually supposed to be a road trip to the Four Corners! The night before our road trip, I was hanging out in Rita and Lexi’s room making a bucket list of all of the places I wanna go to while in college. Making the bucket list got me really excited to start checking places off! We started brainstorming ideas of where we could go the next day. Our first thought was driving to the Four Corners, so we called my friend Ethan up to see if he’d be down, but he didn’t answer. We kept thinking about the Four Corners and realized it probably wasn’t worth the drive because we weren’t sure what would we’d actually do once we got there. Maybe jump on the Four Corners and then run from state to state. But what else? Since it was a 6 hour drive and we didn’t have any other activities planned, we decided to change our destination. Don’t get me wrong, we totally would’ve drove 6 hours to only get out and hop on the corners and head back, but we felt like we could do something better with our time and save the trip to the corners for when we have other activities planned! Eventually we decided on going to Tonto Natural Bridge in Payson, AZ!

The next morning Ethan texted me back and said he’d be down to go! So we got an early start to our day and Ubered to Rita’s house to pick up the ~Jetta~, our trusty ol road trip buddy. The drive to Tonto Natural Bridge was pretty short, just under two hours from Tempe.

When we got there we naturally got out and took pictures with the sign :)

There are two trails in the State Park. I don’t remember the names, but there is one that’s close to the parking lot and leads to a tiny waterfall. It was cute but super small haha. Here is a picture of us in front of it.

After we saw the tiny waterfall, we headed to the main attraction, Tonto Natural Bridge!

The hike down was super short and quick. The trail leads you right under the bridge, where you have to scale a wall in a way and then you can walk right up to the waterfall! To be honest, I was surprised that Arizona had waterfalls since it gets so hot. But I also didn’t know that it snows in Flagstaff so I guess you learn something new every day! This was a super fun place to explore with my friends!

On the way back to campus, we stopped to grub since we were getting hungry. Ethan, the king of Yelp, found us this place called Buffalo Bar & Grill, and they had the best burgers! It also had a great atmosphere. It was an old country styled bar and grill and they had a country group singing near the back while we ate. Couples got up to dance and it was so cute. I definitely want to go back here.

After dinner, we continued back to campus around the time the sun started to set behind the mountains. We decided to pull off the highway on a dirt road and we parked the car. It was breathtaking, I’ve never seen a prettier sunset!

Click here to read more about the sunset!

Here is the location for Tonto Natural Bridge State Park : 34.335, -111.421.

This is the location for the sunset pictures : 34.085, -111.357.

Have you visited Tonto Natural Bridge before? What were your thoughts? Comment below!