Exploring Arizona’s West Coast

The Arizona side of the Colorado River from Lake Havasu City south to Parker is filled with opportunities for hiking, boating, fishing, golf, camping and sight-seeing. Here, you will find London Bridge, Parker Dam, wildlife refuges and a host of RV parks, campgrounds, marinas and golf courses.

Lake Havasu, which is popular for fishing and boating, is a 45-mile long lake that was created by construction of Parker Dam on the Colorado River in 1938.

The key tourist attraction, London Bridge, extends from the shore of Lake Havasu to an island that contains Rotary Youth Park, marinas, other recreation facilities and the Island Mall.
Robert P. McCulloch, an industrialist who developed automotive products and the McCulloch chainsaw, created Lake Havasu City after acquiring thousands of acres along the lakefront. To promote the area, he bought London Bridge, which had spanned the Thames since 1824. The British government put the bridge up for sale in the 1960s because it had begun sinking under heavy traffic. McCulloch submitted the winning bid of $2,460,000 and spent millions more to move it to Arizona. The bridge was dismantled in London and reassembled piece by piece at Lake Havasu.

The reconstructed bridge was dedicated in 1971, and the opening is celebrated annually with London Bridge Days in early October. From November through New Year’s, the bridge and the adjacent English Village are lit with more than a million lights. It is a grand sight when the Boat Parade of Lights passes under the brilliantly lighted London Bridge.

Lake Havasu City, with a population of 46,000, has become a popular tourist destination, offering shopping, a wide variety of special events and some very good restaurants. The area has four golf courses, three 18-hole and a 9-hole.

The Ramada Inn in Lake Havasu City exhibits a full-size replica of England’s Royal Golden Carriage. The original was built in 1762 and has carried every English monarch since King George III.

The Havasu National Wildlife Refuge occupies 37,515 acres just north of Windsor Beach State Park. Almost 300 species of birds have been identified in the refuge and 81 species nest there, according to park naturalists. The refuge is a haven for migratory birds.

Rockhounds will find an area rich in volcanic rocks, including geodes, obsidian, jasper, turquoise and agates.

A 34-mile corridor from Lake Havasu City south to Parker contains marinas, campgrounds, and hiking trails.

The Emerald Canyon golf course is an unusual and challenging 18-hole course that runs around the canyons north of Parker.

Bill Williams River National Wildlife Refuge is just north of Parker Dam on Highway 95. This 6,000-acre refuge offers a marshy delta where the Bill Williams River joins the Colorado River. Wildlife in the refuge includes 275 species of birds, beavers, bobcats, coyote, gray fox, muskrat, rabbits (both desert cottontails and black tailed jackrabbits), raccoon and skunks. Desert Bighorn sheep, javelina, mountain lion and mule deer also have been sighted in the refuge, but only occasionally.

In the upland part of the refuge, western diamondback and sidewinder rattlesnakes, king snakes, desert iguanas, Gila monsters and desert tortoise can be found. Nearer the river, checkered garter snakes, collard lizards and mud turtles frequently are encountered.

Seventeen miles north of Parker on Highway 95 is Parker Dam, which is touted as the world’s deepest dam, with 235 feet of it below the bed of the Colorado River, 85 feet of the dam above the river to road level, and 62 feet of superstructure above the road.

Since the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center, access to the dam has been restricted to cars, with a concrete barrier in the road just below the dam constricting vehicle width.

Construction of the dam as part of the Bureau of Reclamation’s project to provide water and power to the lower Colorado River Basin took from 1934 to 1938. The Bureau now operates Hoover Dam, 155 miles upstream; Davis Dam, north of Laughlin, Nevada; and Parker Dam to provide that water and power.

Parker Dam spans the Colorado River between Arizona and California and the powerplant is on the California side. Nearly half of the plant’s power is reserved by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD) to pump water into the California River Aqueduct, which carries it from Lake Havasu to Southern California.

Established in 1871, the town of Parker moved to its present site in 1908 when the Arizona and Colorado Railroad selected this site to build a railroad bridge across the Colorado River. The town existed mainly to provide supplies, housing and services for the railroad.

The town continued to grow and is now the county seat of La Paz County. The Parker Historic Society’s Museum, 1214 California Avenue, is an interesting collection of Indian artifacts, old mining equipment, pictures of the building of Parker Dam, and the World War II Japanese internment camp located in this area.

The Poston Memorial Monument, 11 miles south of Parker on the Parker – Poston Road marks the site of the internment camp, where 17,867 people of Japanese ancestry were interned during World War II, an action for which the federal government officially apologized in 1988.

The Colorado River Indian Tribes Museum is located south of Parker on the Mohave Road. The museum and its library reflect the history of the four different tribes who live on the Colorado River Indian Reservation. The Mohave, Chemehuevi, Navajo and Hopi tribes, each with its completely separate culture and traditions, share this reservation. The tribes’ administration center also is in the same area as the museum.
The Blue Water Resort & Casino, on the north outskirts of Parker, offers entertainment, 200 hotel rooms, a buffet, dining room and snack bars, and casino. There is a 165-slip marina near the resort-casino. There are 10 RV parks in the Parker area.
Parker offers varied lodging accommodations for those traveling by car, and has 10 RV parks on the Arizona side of the river.

Phil Robertson is a writer who lives in Salina, California.