National Geographic Traveler Arizona

The American southwest, from the Grand Canyon to the desert landscapes, has always held allure for visitors from around the world. Acclaimed travel author Bill Weir, author of more than 16 books on Arizona, takes readers on several unforgettable car trips into the wilds of the West.

BILL WEIR discovered travel while still in school and has never tried very hard to settle down. A bicycle ride across the United States with Bikecentennial in 1976 inspired the idea of the ultimate ride—a cycle tour around the world. He got started writing guidebooks on that trip in 1979 by sending suggestions to the author of Moon Handbooks South Pacific while island-hopping there. That led to paid assignments with the publisher to update parts of the Indonesia handbook for five cents a word. When Weir returned to Arizona after four and a half years of travel, he started thinking of places about which to write a guidebook. Realizing that the best place lay under his feet, he wrote Moon Handbooks Arizona. Utah beckoned next, and Weir completed Moon Handbooks Utah a couple of years later. His bicycle, Bessie, collected dust for a while, but they returned to Asia in 1995 to finish the round-the-world ride via the Middle East and Europe. He continues to explore the world, a good bit of it by bicycle, as well as enjoying Arizona travels and writing.