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Cold? Try a ride in Arizona this weekend
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Tombstone, AZ
Just about this time of the winter a few years back I was getting in miles in the high desert around Sierra Vista, AZ. One of my favorite rides was Charleston Road from Sierra Vista to Tombstone and back. Tombstone is a great little town. It’s home to the OK Corral and so many re-enactments of the famous shootout there that you hear gunfire all day long while browsing the antique stores and art galleries. The crème-de-la-crème of Tombstone society seems to be the local gunfighters. You see them everywhere in town, tall, mustachioed pistoleros outfitted in black leather vests sporting huge revolvers on their hips. They look twitchy and dangerous, but if you approach slowly and carefully you’ll discover they are all hired marketers, armed with nothing more dangerous than coupons for pizza joints and coffee shops. If winter is getting you down, take a quick trip to Sierra Vista for this ride.
The last time I was in the area I was faced with yet another warm and sunny day. I’d been planning a 40 mile ride to Tombstone and back, and with no credible weather-related excuses available, I got on my bike and headed east to Charleston Road. The traffic getting out of Sierra Vista was heavy enough, but once away from the city, traffic thinned nicely. For many miles I rolled along, enjoying a slight downhill route to the San Pedro River basin. Once across the river, the slope tilted upward severely, giving me a chance to struggle for a while. A group of cyclists went by, going the other way. I’d been amazed to see quite a few cyclists out on this day, assuming some type of organized ride must be underway.
Serious climbing brought me to the top of a ridge, which I gratefully crested. Spread out below me was the scenic town of Tombstone. As I pedaled down the backside, I imagined I was riding into town with the Clantons and McLaurys on a fateful October day in 1881. Reaching the OK Corral, completely involved with my daydream, I pictured Ike Clanton, nominal leader of the gang by virtue of stunningly bad judgment, calling out, “OK, boys, dismount!” I lift myself out of the saddle, stretch for a second or two, then slouch along one of the corral walls with the other outlaws.
Within a few minutes, someone yells out, “The Earps are coming and Holliday’s with them!” Leaning nonchalantly between Billy Clanton and Frank McLaury, I can see everything perfectly. The Earps, all clad in string ties, vivid white shirts and funereal waist coats, stride purposefully toward the Corral. Doc Holliday, sweating and trembling from the tuberculosis that was rapidly sucking the life out of his body, walks slightly behind Virgil, the double barrels of the shotgun he carries in his right hand idly drawing circles in the bright blue air. Ike: “OK, law dogs! You wanted a fight and now you’ve got one!” Virgil: “That’s not what I want!” Wyatt: “Hey, who’s the tall sissy in the shiny short pants with a bowl on his head?” Billy: “We thought he was a friend of Doc’s!” Doc (aiming the shotgun directly at Billy’s midsection): “He’s a Daisy if he is, you low-life, yellow-bellied huckleberry! Take that!” BLAM! BLAM! And thus would begin the most famous gunfight in the history of the Old West, triggered by a geeky bicyclist who stumbled into the party by accident. With gun shots ringing in my ears, and outlaws dropping like flies to my right and to my left, I suddenly came back to the 21st Century, courtesy of four bicyclists who were blowing by me about five miles outside Sierra Vista. Before I could even register what was going on in the real world, I marveled at the wonderful diversion a great fantasy can provide when you’re in the middle of a long bike ride.
As the four riders went by, I asked them what was going on. “Race!” one of them gasped as they eased away from me. Having nothing to prove, and no ability to prove anything anyway, I let them go and settled back to the grind into town.
Note: It’s been a few years since I rode in this area, so check with local bike shops to make sure Charleston Road is still safe for cycling.
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