The boss and I are rapidly approaching our retirement years and are discussing places to live if we relocate. While I have spent small chunks of time (3-4 days at a time) in northern Arizona hiking and training, I am interested in hearing from folks that live (or spend significantly more time) there. In no particular order:
Training Stuff:
Quality and availability of the training facilities?
Bike and running trails?
Triathlon or Bike Clubs?
Never lived near or in flag, but did the race there many, many times, and camped around the area for a few weeks over the years. So for summer, it is absolutely beautiful, the air is clean and very thin, and I loved the old quaint downtown area. I went to the Grand Canyon one time in winter and through that area, and the winters are real, and no joke. I believe there is a thriving endurance community there, heard about runners going there too.
But you will have to be ready to either become a skier, or a basement dweller on zwift cycling and running. 7000ft is no joke when it comes to cold and snow around there, and the spring and falls are probably shorter than places that are a lot lower…
But just giving your thread a bump here, someone must live there, have lived there, or spends a lot of time there…Good luck, maybe post some more details on exactly what you are looking for in retirement, that helps others help you…
Never lived near or in flag, but did the race there many, many times, and camped around the area for a few weeks over the years. So for summer, it is absolutely beautiful, the air is clean and very thin, and I loved the old quaint downtown area. I went to the Grand Canyon one time in winter and through that area, and the winters are real, and no joke. I believe there is a thriving endurance community there, heard about runners going there too.
But you will have to be ready to either become a skier, or a basement dweller on zwift cycling and running. 7000ft is no joke when it comes to cold and snow around there, and the spring and falls are probably shorter than places that are a lot lower…
But just giving your thread a bump here, someone must live there, have lived there, or spends a lot of time there…Good luck, maybe post some more details on exactly what you are looking for in retirement, that helps others help you…
Noted about the weather. All of my visits have been in spring or early fall, but this spring I actually got snowed on in May. I like being outside, though, so it’s all good. It looks like the cost of living is manageable for us, so of course, that is going to have a primary impact.
There will be people with more experience that will reply (hopefully) but I would be slightly concerned at the variety of road riding available to a cycling enthusiast. There seems to be plenty of mountain biking, but really only a couple of (safe) road options.
I would consider Prescott as a good Northern AZ option as well.
Lived in Flagstaff when I went to NAU in the mid-late 1990s. My daughter went to NAU and graduated a few years ago. I love the area and community. Training facilities are top notch if you use the campus rec center and Wall aquatic. Wall is brand new and the Rec center is pretty new too. Really great facilities. They have a high altitude training center that continues to exist with Hypo2, and NAZ Elite running team is in the area too.
Trails are basically everywhere 10 miles out of town. Sedona (about 30 min away) has incredible mtb trails and trail running. I don’t know about clubs in the area since everything I did when I lived there centered around campus and student clubs. If Run Flagstaff is still around they will know. I haven’t been to the store in a few years since my kid graduated.
Cost of living is affordable, but it depends where you live now. Crime is nothing serious, but there are a lot of transients that go through town for many reasons, but I would consider it a safe community and was never worried with my kid living off campus.
I think Flagstaff is a great community and now is much more than just a college town. NAU does tend to dominate, but for outdoors life it is a great place to be. Although the east side of town has a lot of new stores and shipping, if you want to do any real shopping, Phoenix/Scottsdale is only a couple of hours away.
Lived in Flagstaff when I went to NAU in the mid-late 1990s. My daughter went to NAU and graduated a few years ago. I love the area and community. Training facilities are top notch if you use the campus rec center and Wall aquatic. Wall is brand new and the Rec center is pretty new too. Really great facilities. They have a high altitude training center that continues to exist with Hypo2, and NAZ Elite running team is in the area too.
Trails are basically everywhere 10 miles out of town. Sedona (about 30 min away) has incredible mtb trails and trail running. I don’t know about clubs in the area since everything I did when I lived there centered around campus and student clubs. If Run Flagstaff is still around they will know. I haven’t been to the store in a few years since my kid graduated.
Cost of living is affordable, but it depends where you live now. Crime is nothing serious, but there are a lot of transients that go through town for many reasons, but I would consider it a safe community and was never worried with my kid living off campus.
I think Flagstaff is a great community and now is much more than just a college town. NAU does tend to dominate, but for outdoors life it is a great place to be. Although the east side of town has a lot of new stores and shipping, if you want to do any real shopping, Phoenix/Scottsdale is only a couple of hours away.
Thanks! Spent a lot of time at the new NAU Wall Center and love the trails (picked a different couple each visit). Not sure about the road biking, yet, but Flagstaff really has our interest. Thanks for the knowledge!
There is no shortage of road biking because any direction 5 miles you’re out of town And while roads generally don’t have supervised bike lanes, the heaviest travelled roads have plenty of shoulders because of the snow you get in the region. From campus it’s about 15 miles one-way to the Snow Bowl. Pretty much just on Highway 180, also called Fort Valley Road, Turn right at Snow Bowl Rd and it’s a great climb from there. Very popular cycling route. Sign to sign, where are you turn off the highway up to the snow bowl, is 6 1/2 miles, just over 1900 feet of climbing at 5.6% grade. And the ride out to Mormon Lake it’s nice too. During the cold months you’ll probably become very familiar with Zwift though.
I lived in Flag for five years, moved in 2013, so I’ve been gone a while. Nice town, I enjoyed living there. The trail running is fantastic. I didn’t bike much back when I lived there but there is a biking community, road and mountain. Nice bike shop, Absolute Bikes right on Route 66 downtown. A few doors down is the Run Flagstaff store. Vince the owner is a great guy and still actively involved in Team Run Flagstaff. Fun running group, they do track workouts on Tuesday nights and fun runs occasionally throughout the week. A fun challenge to take on is to run or bike up to the SnowBowl resort. It’s about 9 miles but with 2,000 feet of climbing- starts at 7,000 and ends at 9,000 feet. I ran it twice, there used to be a race (not sure if there still is), it’s nasty. Sedona is only a 40 minute drive away and great to head out to for a change of scenery or trails on the weekends. The new on campus pool looks amazing. I swam at the old pool frequently. The Flagstaff Athletic Center, a gym, has locations on both sides of town. Nice facilities and well kept.
Cost of living can be a bit on the higher side but I didn’t make a ton of money working there at NAU. There are some homeless and places to avoid but there are many nice neighborhoods where that isn’t a problem at all. You’ll probably see a snow dusting in September and April, but it will be gone by 10:00am that time of year. Winters are cold, I’m from the Midwest and it is comparable. It gets chilly at night year round but very pleasant during the days. I never ran my AC once in five years there. It’s not uncommon to see 40 degree differences between overnight lows and daytime highs.
There is no shortage of road biking because any direction 5 miles you’re out of town And while roads generally don’t have supervised bike lanes, the heaviest travelled roads have plenty of shoulders because of the snow you get in the region.
When I was there in the early 90s the road biking pretty much sucked. Only the road out to Mormon Lake had a decent shoulder, and traffic was heavy everywhere. But looking on google maps it seems to be much better now.
Where are you coming from and where else have you been?
Winters are cold and snowy IMO, but you might not think so depending on where you are from. There’s a good deal of sun in winter, which is nice. Crime isn’t bad. Horrendous traffic. Expensive. Cool town, though!
Where are you coming from and where else have you been?
Winters are cold and snowy IMO, but you might not think so depending on where you are from. There’s a good deal of sun in winter, which is nice. Crime isn’t bad. Horrendous traffic. Expensive. Cool town, though!
Thanks for the link! We are from the mid-Atlantic and spend most of the winter outside, so I don’t think the winter weather will be an issue for us. Traffic-wise, when I have been out there, the traffic at North Huntington and 40 always seemed to be heavy, but easy enough to get around. We live pretty close to DC, so that kinda comes with the territory. I appreciate all the insights - thanks all!
If Run Flagstaff is still around they will know. I haven’t been to the store in a few years since my kid graduated.
I visited Flag this summer. Run Flagstaff is still there and they were great, both in the store and at their Tuesday track workout at NAU. Very close by is Absolute Bikes, also a good vibe. Lots of group runs around town, but those mountain goat types are FAST.
I was very impressed with the endurance community – mostly trail runners and regular runners but lots of places to bike, especially MTB. Warm days (upper 80’s) and cool nights in the low 50’s. I could live there in the summer, for sure.