Tombstone AZ

We had an easy drive from Tucson to Tombstone, thru Benson where I read a lot of RVers winter. Tombstone tho is higher elevation, on top or at least the side of a hill (mountain?) so it was much cooler than Tucson. In fact, the storms that rolled thru Friday & Saturday had me wearing my  “winter” coat outside.

Since we’ve been living off solar power pretty much for the past 2 months & staying free on BLM land, we decided to spring for full hook-ups at Wells Fargo RV Park, just a block away from Tombstone’s infamous main street. Any veteran, AARP, Good Sam’s, or AAA discounts are already built into their $34/night charge & there were a lot of rvs crammed in that little block. BUT. . .we dumped our tanks in the sewer spout, filled up with fresh water even tho we used campground water, & had electricity to run the coffee maker AND. . .the microwave. The pickup sit still for 2 days. OMG, I really didn’t feel like I’d been doing without the past couple of months, but it sure has been nice to not have to schedule when to charge up cell fons, MiFi, computers, or camera, & I could watch the Weather Channel all day long if I wanted! We even ran the heat strip on the A/C for warmth at night instead of using our propane for the furnace.  Plus it drowned out the sound of highway traffic right next to us & any other town noise. We forgot all about plugging in the little ceramic heater (much quieter).

So Saturday morning we started out investigating Tombstone about 9:30am. I’d already been warned most events were after the tourist dollars, & since we’ve seen several historical shows on TV about the town & Wyatt Earp, we didn’t spend the bucks for the shows & skits that were more Hollywood than fact. And since we live in such a small space, I sure didn’t spend much time & definitely no money on souvenirs. That’s why I take pictures! These characters were roaming the street drumming up business for the various shows ($$).

There were three different stage rides available all day long that might have been fun, but taking a photo was easier. While walking Kira that morning, all three stages came along the street on the way to work, so Kira got have her first look at horses. She stared but didn’t bark. She was either thinking they were very big dogs, or just didn’t even want to KNOW what they were.

We definitely enjoyed going into Big Nose Kate’s Saloon tho. First, the front windows are gorgeous stained glass and it’s FREE. The owner even welcomed us & took this photo of us! Really, we’re both there.

They have both historic & visitor pictures all over the walls & a basement gift shop with a view into a small room where a miner dug a large hole in the floor.

After a short rest at the trailer, we walked the other direction (north along Hwy 80) to see Boot Hill — also free except for a $3 donation to receive a listing of all the known people buried there. The earliest graves were in 1879 & the last in 1954 (must have been an old resident). All the graves were covered with gravel & reminded me of the cemetery at the Yuma Territorial Prison we visited.

The OK Corral victims

  Hard to real, but this was a former slave.

 

By late Saturday afternoon, we were plumb tuckered out after having walked everywhere all day long. Must have been 5-6 miles! It’s a good thing we wrapped up our sightseeing when we did because it actually sleeted twice (only for a few minutes each) shortly after getting back to the trailer.

Sunday morning (2am) most of the U.S. went to Daylight Savings Time — but NOT Arizona. So we simply changed time zones without moving an inch (from Mountain to Pacific). Changing times confuses me normally so this was a real head-scratcher to adjust DirecTV for our current time.

The day was clear & sunny but still cool as we loaded up & headed east — more or less to Bisbee.