Cycling Across America — Part 82

Into Arizona

Eolaí the Artist
Nov 5 · 12 min read

Excerpts from the journal of my 1996 cycle across the US. Read the entire story from the introduction in Boston or see links to all segments of the trip.
(This section is from the audio tape parts of the journal)

Where am I? Safford, as intended.

Clinton won. By a landslide in terms of electoral votes, but in terms of the popular vote, well it depends which station you look at — he had 49%, Dole about 42, and Perot picked up the other 9. The perceived wisdom now is that Clinton courted women who were the biggest amount of voters.

Where was I? Lordsburg. Straight to the McDonalds. Unfortunately at the same time as bus came off the interstate, so I ‘d to wait 15 minutes before I got served. Already running late I had 7 hours with no time for stopping. Sitting in McDonalds I was watching a flag and could see the wind was in my favour so I rushed to take advantage of it in case it turned around as it had done the other day.

So I didn’t get to go to Shakespeare, the ghost town. There’s another town called Steins, only a few miles west of Lordsburg, but you can only get to it on the Interstate.

It’s a railroad ghost town, owned by Larry Link. It was once a thriving railroad station town named after Captain Enoch Steen, US Army Officer, who was the first anglo witness to sign a treaty with the Mimbres Apaches, including Delgadito and Victorio. In 1857 the Birch Stage Line rumbled though Steins and when James Birch was drowned in a shipwreck off the New England coast the stage company line was replaced in 1858 by the Butterfield Overland Stage Company. A reporter for the New York Herald was the first through passenger and thus tales of the Wild West were begun. In 1861 five men traveling west by stagecoach to Tucson were attacked by Cochise while approaching Steins Peak. Two white men were killed in the first fire. The others survived long enough to be hung upside down and burned alive. In the 1880s Southern Pacific built track through Stein’s Pass and the town was established as a work station for the railroad. Dwellings were made of rough cut lumber, adobe, and salvaged railroad ties (what we call sleepers). After WW2 South Pacific switched from steam to diesel, the work-station was closed down, and the town began to die. Today Steins is a living history preserved for serious researchers or tourists simply interested in a walk back through time.

You pay into it. I don’t trust those places where they fill them up with ‘genuine artifacts’.

Once I went south, back to the junction where I’d joined yesterday, I found myself on US 70 and I’m going across a desert.

A straight road for 28 miles. The view was amazing. Mountains all around. Different peaks. I was trying to work out which peaks were in Arizona, and which in New Mexico.

The vegetation was a lot of cacti at first, the ones where the limbs are made of joined-up plates, circles all joined together. I saw another hawk on a yucca, quite close. Yuccas are very tall. There’s tons of them. At one stage it was almost like a forest of yuccas. Of course I took no photographs. A jay swept across the road. The last time I’d seen a jay was up at Apache Summit by Ruidoso, in the pine trees where I’d seen a few jays that day similarly sweeping across the road. I remember the sun bouncing off their wings.

There was very little traffic here and a nice wide shoulder. I got a few waves, and then there was a great moment. A truck coming the opposite direction. The driver was waving so I waved back until I realised he wasn’t waving at me, he was pointing.

He was pointing over to his left. And I wondered was he telling me to get over to the edge of the road, when I’m already on the shoulder? He’s hardly pointing at the view; it’s fabulous but it’s fabulous all around, and you can’t miss it. Mountains everywhere. So I looked a bit closer and then I saw what he was pointing at.

Six deer and a stag were about 100 feet off the road, just there in the sand. The truck was well past me but hopefully he was looking in his mirror to see me acknowledge that I’d seen.

The view to the northwest after I left Lordsburg, New Mexico.

There was a small wooden sign with the word “Honey” spelt on it burned out. I was wondering if honey was for sale anywhere, but there were no houses or ranches or buildings in sight for 50 miles ahead of me. I wasn’t far from the town of Lordsburg I’d left, so there would’ve been honey back there but the sign was facing the traffic that had left the town. I realised there was no honey for sale when half a mile further on, in exactly the same style, was another sign saying “Love Ya”.

I was going about 17 mph and I didn’t want to pause in case that wind changed. The total I did yesterday was 80 miles, the same I did the day into Lubbock, Texas, the 2nd longest day of the entire 2nd phase — since Kansas City. The only day longer was the day into Liberal, Kansas, which was 88 miles.

The road then turned and dropped into a canyon. The whole time I’m wondering where I’m going to cross the mountains in the way. Then there in the canyon I get my “Welcome to Arizona” sign, with a nice flag — a copper star rising from a blue field of honour in the face of a setting sun. I stood so the sun was reflecting off it and took a photo. It’s supposed to symbolise the state’s copper industry and continued growth.

Leaving New Mexico and the Grand Canyon State welcomes me.

The State Flower is the blossom of the Saguaro, the largest cactus in the US which grows to a height of 50 feet and and lives up to 200 years. I’ve not seen any yet, though I did see a 2-foot high fat one and was wondering if that was a baby saguaro. The State Gem is turquoise, the stone used for centuries in Indian jewelry. The State Motto is “Ditat Deus” meaning “God Enriches”, and the official neckwear — how many states have official neckwear? — is the bola tie, which originated here. The silver bola adorned with turquoise is generally considered the official style. The State Bird is the Cactus Wren. Hard to know if I’ve seen it — I’ve seen lots of small birds, some wren-ish, some sparrow-ish. The State Tree is the Paloverde — “one of the most beautiful trees of the desert with its springtime yellow blossoms.” I wonder if that’s the tree I see, that’s virtually olive green the whole time?

The origin of “Arizona” is derived from “Ara Zon”, two Indian words meaning “Little Spring”. When President Taft signed the Act in 1912 admitting Arizona to the Union, it became the nation’s 48th State, the last of the contiguous, of the lower 48. So there I was, in Arizona.

Franklin was a small scattering of trailer houses, and about half a dozen brick buildings, all bar one which were dilapidated. The one which wasn’t was a store, and it was in pretty bad condition anyway. Brick buildings aren’t too common in New Mexico. When I had my meal back in Mesilla, the cafe I ate in was next door to the oldest brick building in all of New Mexico. Brick is not something you see much of.

Four miles on was Duncan, which is where I was going to eat. I went through a bit of it, declined the steak house, turned onto the main street — it looks like the town is battered by sand the whole time; it looks a hardy kind of town — and there were pizza slices. For $2.50 you could have a large pizza slice and a large coke.

So I said, “Yeah, I’ll have that please. And another two slices”.

I had survived across that desert bit in the morning with no drink whatsoever. I do this a lot nowadays; I go with no drink. I should be careful because if it gets hotter I could be in trouble. Yesterday it was somewhere in the 70s.

Leaving Duncan you start climbing. For about 10 miles. Because the road goes between a couple of peaks — Rhyloite Peak and very close to Ash Peak. The climb was great; I didn’t mind it at all. The views were fabulous. Looking back down there’s canyons and they’re crowned with a mountain range on the far side. I was going through the Peloncillo Mountains but Bald Knob and Steeple Rock I think were on the far side. They were all just so different, jutting out of the range. There were sloping angular juts of rock; there was rounded hills.

On US-70 looking back at Duncan and the mountains along the New Mexico border. Steeple Rock is at the right-hand end.

I went up to over 4,000 feet. The view was great, I loved it, but finally you lose the view as you go up and up. And you stay up there for a few miles. From one angle Ash Peak was a bit like a Mexican hat.

I went through one pass and there was this odd sensation of where my left leg felt a lot of cool air and my right leg a lot of warm air. That went on for a couple of hundred metres. Beside me was where the rock was cut to let the road through, and there was what looked like volcanic pink rock. I think the sun was bouncing off that and making it quite warm on my right hand side. There was also a big chunk of what looked like black marble. Yesterday I’d seen lots of what looked like white marble dotted around in the sand.

The whole time up there I kept thinking about apaches, because this was their world. My speed was low and I knew I’d be in trouble with darkness, but I also knew I had to descend sooner or later as the Gila River was by where I was going.

Up there was a plaque about two people who were killed by “Indians with rifles”. Looking at the dates I worked out the man was 58 and his daughter was 14. The next plaque was about the Merrills, and they were “murdered by Indians”. Reading the rest of the plaque you see that they were pursuing the Indians, who had stolen 45 horses from a settlement, and then they got ambushed by the Indians.

The road finally turns down and you’re in the Whitlock Valley by the Whitlock Mountains — where I saw another plaque. For General Kearny’s army of the West, shown the way by Kit Carson towards Occupied California during the Mexican War. He followed this route into the Gila Valley and it established a snow-free route to the Pacific.

I just kept looking up. At the top it’s flat. Below is full of dried river beds, a lot of cacti and other plants, overlooked by ridges of rocks. It was another day of pure blue skies, completely unblemished. Only at the very end of the day did an aeroplane go across leaving a tiny little trail of white.

I was picturing just Apaches being around. And I was remembering when we were kids and used to play Apaches a lot. I used to always want to be Cochise rather than Geronimo.

When you drop into the Gila Valley there’s irrigation. It’s only fertile at the bottom, 5 miles out from Safford where you hit Solomon. When I leave here I’ve got a few more towns, like Thatcher, Central, and Pima, on this side of US 70, and they are all dominated by the view of the Coronado National Forest on this huge mountain which rises a clean 7,000 feet from the desert floor. Actually the peak of Mount Graham is over 10,000.

Mount Graham is sacred to the Indians, who refer to mountains of this size as “Islands of the sky”; they’re so fertile and different from the desert below. The Sierra Blanca back at Ruidoso was sacred to the Mescalero Apache, which is why they built their Ski Apache Resort not at the summit. The summit is always sacred.

Close down in the valley there was cotton. And there were palm trees. It gave a definite oasis feel to the place. I had been in the desert all day. I had seen lots of lizards, a few tarantulas. There was a lot of sand. It was gorgeous and a truly epic day. I loved it.

I got to the Chamber of Commerce ten minutes before it closed so I was able to pick up some leaflets and speak to someone briefly about local history and the road ahead. He’s confident I’ll find somewhere for that dubious day 2 nights after Phoenix — if I can get near the Interstate. The road I’m on is actually the old road into Phoenix, he said.

We’re now at 4,670 miles in total. Have written a postcard for friends in Bonniconlon in Mayo where I told them I was thinking of Lough Talt up in the mountains today. The browns and reds and greens and yellows, the cloudless sky, and in the distance the higher snow-capped peaks of the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest. I was also thinking of Rosmuc coming down looking at this great big blue long mountain of Mount Graham. In the Coronado National Forest Mount Graham is the highest mountain in southern Arizona.

Graham is my second county in Arizona. Coming across state line I was in the small county of Greenlea. I’m still in the Mountain Time timezone, so I’ve gained 15 minutes on sunset because I’ve gone west. That’ll keep happening until I hole up in Phoenix for a few days and lose that. When I get to California — if ever — I go into Pacific Time.

With all the election coverage last night I watched some of it but it was incredibly boring. The speeches were good. I ended up feeling sorry for Bob Dole. Then worried about myself, feeling sorry for a Republican.

I passed a small town called San José today. Where there were signs for the State Prison there were also signs saying “Do Not Pick Up Hitchhikers”.

So I’m in a Best Western. I wanted to pamper myself though I’ve no real right to. She quoted a “rate” and I just looked at her and said, “Can you do any…?” and she knocked five dollars off before I’d finished asking. In their restaurant I had potato skins, chicken penne, a big salad, and garlic toast.

Speaking of the election, I just remembered Mel Carnahan, my friend the Governor of Missouri — who I met — got re-elected, which I don’t really care about. There’s a lot of focus on Hilary and Elizabeth though. Hilary because people are saying she did nothing for the campaign, that she was a negative factor. I hear people talk around cafés and things and a lot of people don’t like her. And a lot of people liked Elizabeth Dole, and think she should run for the governor or the Senate. The turnout was less than 50% which I think is amazingly low, but then you see the local coverage here and there are queues nearly two hours long to get into the booths even after the result is known. They’re talking now about doing something where you can have voting on the Internet.

I’m very sore. It’s difficult to walk because of the blisters. And I was just after saying I had saddle soreness under control. Throw in a hot day, and a long day, and I picked up a couple of blisters.

There are two paintings in my room. One is of a lone Indian warrior standing off his horse looking at a big slab of rock covered with a million pictographs or petroglyphs. I wonder if that’s a real place? And beside me over the bed is a snowscene of Indians, with a teepee, a couple of horses, a woman and a coyote.

The day was epic so I didn’t go for a drink or anything. Why on earth would I want to? To absorb everything I saw, it was just way too much. Truly wondrous. It’s hard to imagine the day is over and now I face another day. I said goodbye to New Mexico. I’ll never find out if they improve upon their 66 homicides in Albuquerque, and their bank robberies which averaged at one every one and a half weeks.

I’m going to miss New Mexico — but I already love Arizona.

Read the next segment Part 83 - Reservation.
See:
links to all segments of the trip
Read from the beginning of the trip in Boston

Eolaí the Artist

Written by

Artist. FB: LiamDalyArt, cycles long distances; draws cartoons: http://t.co/b2bN3TuF0s; has a dog, a beard, an XtraCycle. A Dub. Drinks tea.

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