April
4, 2014: Bisbee, Arizona – Queen of the Copper Camps.
Our destination today is
Bisbee, sitting a mile high in the Mule Mountains in the southeastern corner of
Arizona just 5 miles from the Mexican border.
In the late 1800s Bisbee
was known for its minerals – mostly copper, but also gold, silver, lead, zinc,
and turquoise. Eight billion pounds of
copper were mined from the area. By 1910
the town was in its heyday touting the largest copper mine in America. In the 1970s the mines closed and peopled
moved out, leaving Bisbee nearly a ghost town.
Today, a new community of entrepreneurs
and artists have taken up residency creating the quaint, artsy mountain town
filled with antique shops, art galleries, cafés and restaurants. Many
specialty shops abound such as the Killer Bee Guy who not only sells his
“killer” honey butters and mustards in his Bisbee shop, but also kills or
corrals killer bees throughout the county.
We first met up with him at our RV resort in Benson where he was
removing a swarm of killer bees that had built their home at an RV site across
the street from us.
The Queen Mine Tour is the
most popular attraction in Bisbee. You
can also take in a game at the Warren Ballpark, the oldest ballpark in the US,
and watch the Cooper Kings Baseball Team.
Or a round of golf at Arizona’s oldest continuously –operated course,
the Turquoise Valley Golf Course, may be your style. As for us, we’re taking a walk about town in
search of food, fun, and funk.
Stairs,
stairs, and more stairs!
We come across many old stairways
weaving themselves in between buildings and up hillsides to homes hanging
precariously above. The stairways used
to be mule paths, worn into the very essence of the town during the copper
mining days. Then, during the Great Depression the stairways were built in place
of the dirt paths.
Bisbee 1000 Great Stair Climb.
The annual Bisbee 1000
Great Stair Climb is run every fall and features nine staircases connected by
winding roads that runners/stair climbers race up, around, down, and through.
Art
is in the eye of the beholder.
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| A huge fly made from ... junk! Art? |
Oh
yes – and we find our “funk fix” for the day!
Wandering down Main Street,
we poke our heads into a little shop to a treasure trove of new and used
items. The gentleman working here says
the owner has spent 25 years collecting “stuff” – all kinds of “stuff” that she
drags back to her shop. Hats, boots,
clothes, knick-knacks of every kind, books, CDs, a collection of S&P
shakers, jewelry, furniture, antiques.
This is one of those places you can take several laps through and see
something new each time. It is marvelously
funky! Jack tries on a fine riding hat
and I buy a set of very stylish “red hot pepper” S&P shakers.
 |
| Jack in his riding hat with a bit of "funk" in the background. |
Welcome
to the Café Cornucopia.
A peek in the café window tells
us all we need to know – the food looks scrumptious. We step inside and peruse the menu on the
blackboard. Homemade everything!
With our order up, we sit
back and enjoy our delectable sandwiches, salad, and homemade bread. What a great lunch! If only we had room for one of these
fantastic desserts.
A
walk up Brewery Gulch.
We wind our way back down
Main Street and turn onto Brewery Gulch.
Back in the glory days Brewery Gulch was lined with nearly 100 saloons
and nearly as many brothels. Today, life
is a little more docile. You can still
have a beer in any number of drinking establishments in the gulch, and find some
other interesting shops along the way.
 |
| One of the breweries with an outdoor patio. |
 |
| Graffiti "art" on a wall along Brewery Gulch. |
Doorways
of Brewery Gulch.
 |
| Metal doors with ore pick handles. A courtyard lies beyond the doors. |
 |
| Stunning red doors in a row! |
Bisbee
Bicycle Company: Purveyors of Fine Wheeled Conveyances.
As we meander up Brewery
Gulch, this bike catches our eye. I drag
Jack across the street for a closer look.
It’s the ultimate fat tire bike.
 |
| Surly: The very fattest, fat tire bike I've ever seen. |
As we admire the bike, the
shop owner moseys out to visit. He tells
us it was originally designed for riding on soft, sandy beaches, but it
performs equally as well in snow. He
says it also makes for a fun ride up and down the stairways of Bisbee. Yes, the stairs! I think I’ll leave that adventure for the
young and dumb.
What
have we here? Electric bikes!
The Surly does its
marketing magic – we are lured into the shop for a look at his array of
bikes. Wow! Electric bikes! He gives us the lowdown on his merchandise
and convinces Jack to take one out for a spin up the hill.
 |
| Jack takes off up the hill with no effort. |
A few minutes later he comes streaking
back down the hill. Before he even pulls
to a stop he says, “You’ve got to ride this thing. It’s really fun.”
I climb on and speed away –
yes, speed away – UP the hill. He’s
right! It is very, very fun. Space permitting in the back of the Jeep, I
think we would have driven away with two of these “fine wheeled
conveyances”. Today, we are bikeless but
considering our future options for a couple of these splendid machines.
Getting
a head start on the 2016 Campaign.
After a considerable amount
of time at the bike shop, we continue up Brewery Gulch. A Hillary supporter is getting a jump on the
2016 Campaign. It’s never too early to
start drumming up interest for your candidate.
I get the car, but I don’t understand the little blue dressing table
next to the car. Maybe just a final
glance in the mirror before heading out for a big Hillary rally.
Food,
fun, and funk!
We have barely scratched
the surface in this marvelous little town, but it’s getting late so we call it
a day. We will definitely come back to
Bisbee, but it will require a few days stay to enjoy all that it has to offer. With our goal of “Food” (Café Cornucopia), “Fun”
(Bisbee Bicycle Company) and “Funk” (the funky junk shop) accomplished we hop
in the Jeep and drive back up through Mule Pass Tunnel. At the fork in the road on the west side of
the Mule Mountains we keep right on SH80 and drive toward home. In a few days we’ll be leaving Arizona behind, moving eastward into New
Mexico. We’re looking forward to new
adventures and, hopefully, continued warm weather. Until next time – be safe.
