This year, Veteran’s Day landed on a Thursday so at university we had no classes. I also had no classes on Friday so I had a four day weekend! My friend and I had wanted to go to San Diego to watch my roommate compete in a rowing competition, but the logistics didn’t seem to work out. Instead, we headed up to Flagstaff, Arizona for a little day trip with two of our friends. I’d never been to Downtown Flagstaff before, the closest I’d been was camping just outside of Downtown Sedona, and the location was technically within Flagstaff.

In this blog, I’ll share all the details of exploring Downtown Flagstaff in a day trip! Including exploring its cute shops, and even going on a small hike.

Our Itinerary at a Glance:

Driving to Flagstaff
First Impressions
Exploring Downtown
Sunset at Buffalo Park
Authentic Thai Cuisine for Dinner

Driving to Flagstaff

We headed out from Tempe around 10am and stopped at Dutch Bros first to fuel up. We ended up waiting in line for 30-40 minutes because they were down a few staff members. Once we finally got our drinks, we were on the road. Flagstaff is just under two and a half hours from Tempe and we happened to encounter a little bit of traffic. We arrived just before 1:30pm, so even with traffic we arrived in good timing. I love driving north in Arizona because you can easily see the landscape change from the city of Phoenix with lots of city life represented by buildings, to the middle of the desert with many cacti, which soon transitions into the trees native to northern Arizona.

We had no actual plans for our trip. Emma wanted us to stop at a coffee shop she had visited before so other than that, we were exploring on our own time with no rush of getting from one place to another. This was a nice change of pace to previous road trips I’d done, where we had certain activities planned. Today, however, we were going with the flow and doing whatever came our way!

First Impressions

Downtown Flagstaff is basically apart of Northern Arizona University’s campus. For a second, we felt as if we hadn’t left Tempe since we saw other college kids walking around like us. Honestly, I fell in love with Flagstaff instantly. I loved that there were train tracks that ran right next to the center of town, I feel like I don’t see trains super often in Arizona. It made it feel more home-y since I see train tracks more often back home in Upstate New York. I also loved that there were so many cute shops to walk into and that everyone seemed super friendly. Downtown Flagstaff is such a quaint place to visit!

Exploring Downtown Flagstaff

We first stopped into a crystal shop called Crystal Magic. I’ve never really been into crystals before since I don’t know much about them, but this store was overflowing with different types and little cards that explained their purpose. It made me want to start learning more about them on my own time! They also had little wooden “buckets” that held each different type of crystal, it reminded me how I used to collect rocks when I was little. But now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure I collected crystals since they were all different colors and I usually bought them in a shop, I didn’t collect rocks from the side of the road. I specifically remember collecting rocks, or I guess crystals, when I’d go camping and there were little convenience stores that had them, and also when I visited the Grand Canyon when I was 7 there were a lot of stores that sold them. Talk about a memory being unlocked.

After we shopped at Crystal Magic, we made our way to the coffee shop Emma wanted to visit. This coffee shop was called Late for the Train and was actually quite big! When you walk in, there are two sections of the shop, one is for sitting and enjoying your coffee, and the other is side is dedicated to making the specialty drinks.

They had many options for coffee, and also many homemade pastries and bread. I ordered their pumpkin chai tea latte and a large cookie that had oats, chocolate chips, and coconut flakes. This was, without a doubt, the best pumpkin chai I’ve had. I could actually taste the pumpkin in every sip. Normally the pumpkin flavor is so faint I question if I received a regular chai! The cookie was also quite delicious, I highly recommend.

We sat outside in the back of the coffee shop to enjoy our drinks and snacks. We probably spent an hour out there just talking and laughing. Since we had no specific plans, we weren’t in any rush to go to the next place. This was one of my favorite moments of our little day trip, just enjoying the moment and not worried about anything. It was also quite cozy outside, despite it being cold, because they had two fire pits next to some tables. However, there were already people sitting at those tables so we weren’t as warm.

When we finished lounging, we toured through other shops and ended up at the Old Town Shops. I really liked walking through the shops here, they’re all locally owned which makes me feel good about supporting them! I ended up getting a pair of corduroy shorts (7 year old me is rolling my eyes), a pair of purple butterfly earrings, and a pair of sunglasses. I don’t normally buy clothes or things for myself since I mostly save my money or spend it on food. I’m not really a materialistic person, but it was nice to get myself something for a change.

Sunset & Buffalo Park

As we were exploring, we realized it was close to the time of the sunset, and naturally we wanted to watch it. Emma had visited Buffalo Park before and wanted to show us it so we headed there for the sunset. Buffalo park was less than a 10 minute drive from Downtown Flagstaff. When we arrived, we quickly realized there was no specific spot to watch the sun cross the horizon since we were surrounded by trees in the west, but we decided to go on one of the walking trails. This wasn’t just any old walking trail, it had stops every few hundred feet where there were signs that directed you to do some sort of exercise. Some of the exercises were jumping jacks, push-ups, doing the monkey bars, etc. This was actually super fun! I really liked how interactive the trail was. On top of that, we still were able to see the sky change colors from the sunset. Normally, my favorite sunsets have some clouds in the sky because the light reflects off of it making the sky look painted, yet this sunset had no clouds. It was a mellow sunset but we still saw very vibrant colors. It was so gorgeous! I definitely recommend coming here for the sunset because you can walk around the beautiful park as the sky changes colors.

Dinner in Downtown

After the beautiful sunset, we went back into town for dinner. Kynzie’s friend from home happens to go to NAU, so she met us for dinner! We all ate at Pato Thai Cuisine, which is her friend’s go to spot. They had a large menu and it was hard to choose what I wanted (like usual) since everything looked amazing. I really enjoyed their Pad Thai! I definitely want to go back there sometime.

Finally, after a fun day of exploring, we headed back to campus around 7:30. Little day trips like this are an easy way to destress during the semester and enjoy quality time with your friends. I can’t wait for another day like this <3

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What’s your ideal day trip in Arizona with your friends like? Let me know in the comments!