Very popular mountain drive for SUVs with great views above 6,000 ft. You can continue down east side to Hwy.188, and/or follow ridge north. Two hiking trails along Road 143 on west side head south into Four Peaks Wilderness. Entire road is open to unlicensed vehicles. See map for several fun ATV side roads north of Waypoint 02. Staging area at start of trail accesses massive Rolls OHV Area to the south.
(480) 610-3300Tonto N.F., Mesa and Tonto Basin Ranger Districts
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Provide an Update4/17/2020
Submitted by Matthew
We ran FR143(El Oso road) to hike some trails near Four Peaks. We took the northern side from Hwy 188 to FR648 and it is a very easy road but does have one hairpin turn to do. Exercise care on this section of the road to Four Peaks for oncoming traffic on blind curves. If you are just going to Four Peaks, this is a recommended route. The rest of the road from Four Peaks to Hwy 87 (Beeline) is much rougher and has several creek crossings. It is all doable with a pickup or SUV, but just be aware that this portion of FR143 to Hwy 87 is the longer section. We had a few people on this trip check this portion of the road off of their bucket list. If you want to go up and hike Four Peaks, I recommend taking the section from Hwy 188. And one more thing, if you do come via Hwy 188, make sure to stop at the Tonto Basin Marketplace. It’s a very interesting store.
03/15/2019
Submitted by Charles Wells
The main road F.S. 143 hasn’t changed much, but the side trip to Waypoint 03 on F.S. 422 gets rockier after you go past F.S. 422A. We now rate this part moderate.
3/21/2018
Submitted by Richard
Fun ride, great scenery. No issues and can be run with stock vehicles. It has a fair amount of motorbike/UTV/ATV traffic so drive accordingly.
2004 Land Rover with 2” lift and 265/75 16 General Grabber X3 tires. We did this drive on September 1st....See More
