Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum: See the region’s wonders up close — mountain lions, wolves, bighorn sheep, and other rare Sonoran natives.

Saguaro National Park: Drive, walk, or ride a bike through the Sonoran Desert’s unique saguaro forests.

Santa Catalina Mountains: Drive to the top of a sky-island peak and cool off in the high green forests.

San Xavier del Bac: See Arizona’s answer to the Sistine Chapel, a white jewel of a mission on the desert plain.

Kartchner Caverns: Enter an otherworldly cave still being formed by slowly dripping water.

Bisbee: Explore an old mining boomtown, now an enclave for artists and antique shops.

Chiricahua National Monument: Marvel at the “Land of Standing Up Rocks,” a forest of hoodoos and twisted rock high in the evergreen mountains.