Montezuma Castle National Monument
A five-storey, twenty-room cliff dwelling built by the Sinagua people into a limestone alcove above Beaver Creek. Misnamed by European-American settlers who wrongly attributed it to the Aztecs. The dwelling is viewed from the trail below, not entered. It recorded 379,967 recreation visits in 2024.
Facts and sources
Place
- Category
- National Monument
- Destination
- Camp Verde
- County
- Yavapai County
- State
- Arizona
- Designations
- National Register of Historic Places listed place
Visitation
- Annual visits
- 379,967 (2024)
- What is counted
- recreation visits
Ranking
- Overall score
- 66.6 / 100
- Visitation score
- 55.5
- Popularity score
- 66.9
- Significance score
- 83.0
- Confidence
- high
Visiting
- Official website
- nps.gov(opens in a new tab)
- Coordinates
- 34.6131, -111.8400
- Last verified
- 2026-08-12
Where it is
Montezuma Castle National Monument is a national monument near Camp Verde, in Yavapai County. It is one of the national monuments in this database, and appears in the statewide ranking of Arizona attractions.
How this ranking was reached
This place scores 66.6 out of 100, at high confidence. The score combines its published visitor count with public interest and tourism significance. The weighting is explained in full on the methodology page.
Note on the data: The 2025 series reports zero recreation visits for month 10, a reporting gap rather than a measured figure, so 2024 is used as the reference year.
Sources
- Visitation: National Park Service Visitor Use Statistics(opens in a new tab)
- Public interest: Wikimedia pageviews (en.wikipedia, human traffic), 2024
- Coordinates and designations: Wikidata(opens in a new tab)
- County: U.S. Census geography via FCC Area API, resolved from coordinates
- Official site: https://www.nps.gov/moca/(opens in a new tab)
Record last verified 2026-08-12.
Nearby attractions
3.5 miles away
Verde Valley Archaeology Center
A small museum with exhibits on the pre-Columbian Sinagua culture, an introduction on archaeological research, and a display prepared by the Yavapai-Apache Nation.4.6 miles away
Out of Africa Wildlife Park
A safari-style reserve for rescued large animals, very popular with children.
5.6 miles away
Montezuma Well
Montezuma Well (Yavapai: ʼHakthkyayva), a detached unit of Montezuma Castle National Monument, is a natural limestone sinkhole near the town of Lake Montezuma, Arizona, through which some 1,500,000 US gallons (5,700,000 L; 1,200,000 imp gal) of water emerge each day from an underground spring. It is located about 11 miles (18 km) northeast of Montezuma Castle. The "well" measures 386 feet (118 m) in diameter from rim to rim and contains a near-constant volume of spring water even in times of severe drought.
7.9 miles away
V-Bar-V Heritage Site
The Crane Petroglyph Heritage Site is the largest known petroglyph site in the Verde Valley of central Arizona, and one of the best-preserved. The rock art site consists of 1,032 petroglyphs in 13 panels. Acquired by the Coconino National Forest in 1994, the site is protected and kept open to the public by the US Forest Service.9.5 miles away
Caduceus Cellars
Caduceus Cellars is a winery in Jerome, Arizona, United States. It is owned by Maynard James Keenan, who is best known as the vocalist for Grammy Award-winning rock band Tool. While the winery is named after the caduceus, an ancient symbol for commerce and staff of the Greek god Hermes, the vineyard is named Merkin Vineyards, after a pubic wig (merkin).