Doors finally open
Navajo Times | Krista Allen
The La Quinta Inn & Suites by Wyndham Shonto stands open Aug. 15 in Shonto, Ariz., three days after beginning its soft opening. The 82-room hotel near the junction of U.S. Route 160 and State Route 98 provides lodging for travelers and residents and employs workers from Shonto, Tonalea and Black Mesa, Ariz.
After years of delays, Shonto’s new hotel opens with local jobs and new lodging options
SHONTO, Ariz.
A woman relinquished her grazing land so a hotel could be built in Shonto.
She lived long enough to watch the building rise from a distance, but she never walked through its doors.
At 1:07 p.m. Aug. 12, those doors finally opened.
Navajo Times | Krista Allen
Ashley Yanko, from left, project manager for Navajo Nation Hospitality Enterprise, stands with La Quinta Inn & Suites by Wyndham Shonto general manager Marcy Smith Williams and hotel staff Aug. 14 inside the newly opened Shonto hotel. In back are Kimberly Begay, Shyanne Jackson and Jose Rivera-Rosa, a Wyndham trainer. Two hotel staff members in purple stand in front of the group. The hotel began its soft opening Aug. 12.
The La Quinta Inn & Suites by Wyndham Shonto began taking guests during a soft opening after representatives from La Quinta completed a walkthrough and cleared the property to open.
Sometime afterward, the woman’s daughter came inside.
Marcy Smith Williams, the general manager of the hotel, said the woman had relinquished her grazing land to allow the project to be built. Her daughter told Smith Williams that her mother had watched the hotel take shape but died before she could see it open.
The daughter wished her mother could have stepped inside, Smith Williams said.
A 95-year-old man also came through the hotel after it opened. He told Smith Williams he remembered when a hotel in Shonto was still something discussed at the chapter level.
To read the full article, please see the Aug. 20, 2026, edition of the Navajo Times.
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