Route Description
The Catalina Highway begins at its intersection with Tanque Verde Road in northeast Tucson, traversing the unincorporated community of Tanque Verde before crossing into the Coronado National Forest. At this point, the roadway officially becomes the General Hitchcock Highway (Arizona Forest Highway 39), although many maps reflect the common usage of "Catalina Highway" to refer to the entire roadway.
From the boundary with the National Forest, the highway takes a winding route through the Santa Catalina Mountains. Due to the rapid gain in elevation there are numerous switchbacks, but the road follows a generally northward direction until reaching Forest Road 9 and Rose Canyon Lake, after which it begins traveling in a generally northwestern direction to the village of Summerhaven.
The final segment of the road, sometimes signed as Ski Run Road, heads east to the Mount Lemmon Ski Valley and ultimately approaches its final terminus near the summit of Mount Lemmon.
Read more about this topic: Catalina Highway
Famous quotes containing the words route and/or description:
“In the mountains the shortest route is from peak to peak, but for that you must have long legs. Aphorisms should be peaks: and those to whom they are spoken should be big and tall of stature.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Do not require a description of the countries towards which you sail. The description does not describe them to you, and to- morrow you arrive there, and know them by inhabiting them.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)