A place you just can’t “visit”, you have to experience it.

 

What draws us to return year after year to this quirky, little bohemian town is the colorful little houses scattered over the hill side, the unconventional residents, random art throughout the town, numerous music venues with varied genres and finding the unexpected.

Returning after a four year hiatus, we were sad to learn our self-described hippie friend, Bruce, had passed away. Bruce was the first person we met on our inaugural visit. He introduced us to the music venues throughout the town.

 

Through Bruce, we met Keith (aka The Blues Wizard,) whom we learned has recently moved to Mississippi.

 

Also, no longer in Bisbee is the blonde, blue eyed Jesus.

We found music choices were limited to only a couple of venues during the weekend. The Stock Exchange closed after the owner had died and The Copper Queen was doing a private event. But The Grand continues to have music Thursday thru Saturday.

We miss the folk style we enjoyed on previous visits.

The vibe in Bisbee has also changed as it is becoming quite the tourist attraction, with which many of the residents are not pleased. Overheard in a conversation (ABN is prone to eavesdrop on occasion) affordable rent is hard to come by as houses are increasingly turning to more lucrative short term rentals aka AirBnB and VRBO.

 

Meeting up with friends, Steve and Adele from Colorado, we revisited some of our favorite hangouts. Like The Grand

and the Bisbee Coffee Company where ABN overheard a conversation about capitalism (the speakers were not in favor.)

And, of course, the “hike to the cross.” ABN, knowing the hike was above her current level of fitness, decided to wander around town as Captain led our friends. Well, it should be said “he attempted to lead.” His 10+ year-old boots had blowouts before they reached the cross.

Steve and Adele continued without him.

 

Taking the recommendation from “new friends” we met at The Grand, passing the Lavender Copper Mine,

we walked over to the Lowell Community

for brunch at The Breakfast Club.

Seen in Lowell

Returning to Old Bisbee we took a brief tour of Shady Dell.

Should we consider a spot in our outdoor space for The Wanderer when it is time for her retirement?

 

The Bisbee locals seem to think The Hitching Post over in the Warren district is a great venue for music.

Have you ever seen a chicken in a bar? Neither had we. It seemed to be quite at home and the two dogs paid no attention.

 

Being so close to the Mexican Border, it seemed reasonable to check out “the wall” in Naco.

Nothing much to see here.

It’s not all fun as we travel about. We do have to take a bit of time for chores, like laundry. How convenient to find a laundry next to a Brewery. The Electric Brewery hosts a craft group every Tuesday. While Captain did the laundry, ABN slow stitched and visited with the locals. Perfect! (for ABN.)

To truly experience Bisbee, one has to walk; and walk we did. Starting out with no plan or destination, we just wandered. At times we found ourselves above the town

and at other times we found no street, just steps.

ABN’s FitBit recorded close to 25 miles over the week. Keep in mind, in these miles were many stairs and hills.

 

Walking around Bisbee, this is what we found. (We tried to not duplicate photos from previous trips. If you want to see more photos of Bisbee, click on the links below.)

Waking up to about 1 inch of snow this morning, we decided it is time to leave Bisbee.

 

For more photos of Bisbee, click here.

 

Discover Bisbee Visitor’s Guide

 

Please excuse the inconsistency of the text in this post. Could be issues with the Blogger host or (probably) user deficiency.

 

 

 

 

 

 

75 and Sunny

is what we would like to say about our Winter 2019 Adventure, but that was not to be. We have experienced a week of cool, cloudy, often rainy days here in our favorite bohemian town of Bisbee. On a couple of days it was so windy we didn’t leave our tiny home. But that hasn’t kept us from enjoying the quirkiness of this small town in southern Arizona.

Bisbee calls us every winter to return and embrace our free spirit. We started our week by attending the Covenant Presbyterian Church on Sunday afternoon; okay, actually the week started on Saturday evening at Old Bisbee Brewing Co. which was our first stop (love the Mayan Stout!), 

followed by listening to Cat Daddy and the 12 Barz Blues Band at the Grand Hotel. During the week we returned to The Grand to hear a favorite, Becky Reyes, and stopped by the Copper Queen to hear cowboy, Johnny Bencomo and his 18-string guitar. (Local music is one of the draws to return to Bisbee.)

We checked in with Rob at Bisbee Olive Oil Company

he introduced us to a couple of new flavors like Chocolate Raspberry Balsamic and Garlic Parmesan Olive Oil (yep, we have a couple on board.)

We popped in to Lunatic Fringe Luthiery to see what is new with Keith

The Wizzard has been busy! Loving his cigar box ukuleles and the upright wash tub bass!

Captain is nursing a strained knee and decided climbing the hills and steps would not be a good thing, so ABN set out on her own and found some new treasures.

Just one of the streets in Bisbee.

Of course, being by herself, she did a bit of shopping and discovered a new store that fed her artsy soul. Art Home requested she not take photos but directed her to their web site, Art Home. (be sure and scroll down to see the furniture.

Another new discovery is The Quarry, 

a made from scratch restaurant that had good reviews on Yelp. The food was okay but the most interesting part is the extensive description on the menu. Below are a few excerpts.

“We do not do things fast, we do things well. If you are in a hurry or have a bad attitude, please go elsewhere. No matter how many people Yelp about it, we are not going to change.”

“Our scraps go to a local heirloom pig farmer.”

“Our average food wait time is one half-hour to one full hour, please plan accordingly.”

“Happy hours are stupid, we are always happy.”

Our last evening in Bisbee was spent listening to Juniper Jazz Ensemble at The Grand.

Walking back to The Wanderer, we asked ourselves what exactly is it that brings us back each year.  For Captain, it is no question, the live music every evening. He questioned how a town of about 5000 can support such a variety of talented musicians. The answer to that is one of the things that draws ABN; most of the folks do not seem to be interested in making a lot of money. There is a feeling of contentment doing what they love, earning enough to live on. In other words quality of life over materialism. ABN also loves that, when in Bisbee, one can be their self without judgement. (And she really likes all the color!)

Our inner hippy has been inspired; 

if you are not familiar with Bisbee, you might want to see more photos from our earlier posts here. 

Today we are headed north to Lost Dutchman State Park. Once again we will be off the grid and most likely will not have dependable WiFi and cell service.

Note to email subscribers, hitting reply to the email notification of a new post will send your reply out somewhere in cyber space and we will never know of your comments.  If you wish to comment, please do so in the comment section on the blog site or send a note using the email address you have in your contact list.

Embracing our Bohemian Spirit

Many of you have heard us speak about the funky little town of Bisbee, Arizona and may have read our post 2 years ago. Our first visit was such a surprising and amazing experience we were concerned we might be disappointed on our return. We were not! In fact we are even more captivated to the point we took so many pictures we couldn’t decide which ones to share with you. So we have added a Bisbee Page that will provide a more detailed snapshot of this quirky little bohemian town in southern Arizona, about 11 miles from the Mexican border.

The best way to explore any town is by walking and so we did. Laid out as a pedestrian town in the early 1990’s, paths led to homes built on the hill side; later wooden stairs were added. As part of FDR’s New Deal project in the 1930’s, the wooden stairs were replaced with concrete. To navigate this artsy maze of stairs we downloaded the popular Bisbee1000 Stair Climb map and followed the blue arrows. We did half of the route one day and the other half another day. These are just a few of the colorful houses and street art; more can be seen by clicking here.

Garden Gate

A concrete wall

Located down Hwy. 80,

 about 1 1/2 miles from our RV park is the Lowell neighborhood. There is a sidewalk that allowed us to walk along the highway and past the now defunct Queen Mine open pit.

Once a thriving community it is now somewhat of a ghost town. It felt like folks just up and left in the 50’s, leaving behind automobiles and buildings.

Across the highway we strolled into the Shady Dell Vintage RV Park. Here we found a collection of RVs from the 1940’s and 1950’s. Refurbished, they now serve as guests houses and are available for rent. We were in luck that we just happened to be there the day before their season began and was able to get a tour that included the interiors.

More photos here.

With the recommendations of our friend, Keith, we hiked up to see the shrine cross that overlooks the city.

As Keith told us it was a “heart thumper” but worth the hike.

Trail Marker

Made it!

View of Bisbee from the top

Keith was correct!

The Wanderer was parked at Queen Mine RV Park overlooking Old Bisbee on one side and the Queen Copper Mine open pit.

Note the Prayer Flags!

From the park it is a short walk into town. On our previous visit we became acquainted with Bruce who lives 6 months in Bisbee and 6 months in Minnesota; we were happy to see he is still here as he is a wealth of information, especially on the live music venues. (Travel tip; we have found talking with locals and reading other travel blogs provide us with more interesting information on places to visit, things to do and places to eat than the tourist information centers.) We caught up with Bruce shortly after we arrived and took his suggestion to check out Johnny Bencomo playing at the Copper Queen Hotel that evening.

A classic tenor, he sang mostly western ballads and folk songs, including a couple about Kentucky. We had a chance for a short conversation and learned he was a cowboy until his body couldn’t take it any longer and now he puts his heart and soul into his music. He is one of the best folk musicians we have heard.

On Wednesday evening we made our way to The Grand Hotel to hear what Bruce described as a “jug band.” The Whiskey Lickers are an 8 piece mountain music band consisting of 2 guitars, 2 banjos, 2 fiddles, a mandolin and a wash board. They were just fun!

You may recall that on our previous visit we met creative luthier and musician, Keith Edwards aka The BluesWizard. We stopped by his studio to say “hello” and to check out his current projects. Keith uses unique items to create string instruments; he demonstrated a banjo using a hubcap from vintage V8 Ford.

Keith is quite pleased with the way his business, Lunatic Fringe Luthiery has blossomed since moving to Bisbee two years ago. We stopped by Ana’s Seasonal Kitchen Sunday morning to catch a performance.

You can learn more about Keith on his Facebook page and YouTube channel. He showed us his latest project involving a skateboard but ask us to not show a photo as he will be doing a big launch in the next few weeks.

On our previous visit our friend, Bruce, invited us to a jam session of local musicians in the back room of a woodworking shop. As we were walking one day we passed the shop; the door was open so we stopped to inquire if he still hosted the jam session. Yep, on the first Monday of every month, it is a pot luck and we were welcomed.

Steve’s shop has Captain drooling; large space, organized and appointed with very nice tools. Another large room in the back of the shop is where the musicians gather and the food spread was laid out. With a quick count, we determined there were about 75 people of all ages. Probably about 25 musicians playing guitar, banjo, fiddle, piano, drums, harmonica, stand up string bass, mandolin, melodica (aka a blow organ or key harmonica) and those are just the ones we remember. We so wanted to take photos, but declined as we didn’t want to be rude. As was the last time, this was a highlight of our visit. 

Sunday we attended service at the beautiful Covenant Presbyterian Church. It was a very small but friendly congregation of about 15 heads with gray hair. We wonder what will be the future of the church.

It has been a pleasantly sunny week here in Bisbee with highs in the low 70s, lows in the upper 30s. It is quite windy at times, but we will take the wind over the freezing temperatures, ice and snow at home. 

Sorry this is such a lengthy post but truly you cannot describe Bisbee with a few words and photos. We are leaving today with plans to return again next year.

This week we will be in a couple of state parks and have no idea if we will have cell phone and internet access. Our aging laptop is limping but hopefully will stay usable until we return home. If not, we will be blogging with an iPad app which is not exactly user friendly. 

Note to email subscribers, hitting reply to the email notification of a new post will send your reply out somewhere in cyber space and we will never know of your comments.  If you wish to comment, please do so in the comment section on the blog site or send a note using the email address you have in your contact list.