Southeastern Arizona overview
In southern Arizona, the mountains sit upon the surrounding desert like bubbles on a boiling cauldron. The Santa Catalinas, the Chiricahuas, the Santa Ritas. Arizona's human history is written in the valleys below.

Southeastern Arizona attractions
Southeastern Arizona is a place where visitors can get a look back at the Old West — an area once dominated by cowboys and Indians, and the cavalry. It's also the legendary home of the Apache leader Geronimo.
• Itinerary ideas for Southeastern Arizona

Exploring the rugged Chiricahuas
There are two things you should bring on a weekend trip to Chiricahua National Monument: a camera and a disposable camera, in case your regular camera goes kaput.
• Story: Trail traces Apache wars of late 1800s

Driving Cochise County
Down in Cochise County, that storied land of cattle, copper and cavalry, there's a wonderful loop drive that touches on everything that makes this corner of southeastern Arizona such a great place to visit.

Side trip: Bisbee, Arizona
Bisbee, about 95 miles southeast of Tucson, boasts a historic district, museum and mine tour that recall its heydey as "Queen of the Copper Camps" and its new life as an artist colony, retirement community and tourist center.

Side trip: Tombstone, Arizona
Tombstone's place in the Old West is well-known from novels and movies — the discovery of silver and resulting boom, the gunfight at the O.K. Corral, larger-than-life characters like Wyatt Earp, and its rebirth as "The Town Too Tough to Die."