Volcanoes
The Verde Valley and the surrounding landscape of central Arizona has seen more than its share of volcanoes over the last few million years. Southeast of town, on the far horizon is Hackberry Mountain, a volcano with a checkered past. For a part of its life, it was a viscous, silica rich and highly explosive volcano, capable of eruptions on par with Mt. St. Helens or Mt. Vesuvius. North of Camp Verde along Page Springs Road is House Mountain, a shield volcano similar to the ones currently forming the Hawaiian Islands. And atop the Mogollon Rim on the northern rim of the valley and the Black Hills looming to the south are the remains of the Mormon volcanic fields and the Hickey Formation, lava flows laid down between 3 million and 13 million years ago.