Tuscon Trip, Day 4: Chiricahua National Monument and the Bisbee Ghost Tour

March 19
We got up and packed up our stuff because we were moving on to the next rental home, towards Bisbee. We stopped a few places before getting to our new rental house. Our first stop was Chiricahua National Monument, but the road was blocked so we could go in. Instead, we stopped by a park area on the way out and went for a short hike by a stream. We spotted a deer (doe) on the hike back. It was a long(ish) drive to Bisbee, and the scenery reminded me a lot of Utah.

Reminds me of driving up I-15 

We arrived in the town of Bisbee just after 2:00, and ate a small called Cafe Cornucopia. I ordered the meatball sandwich with chicken tortilla soup. I don’t usually order drinks, but the coconut lime spritzer caught my eye so I ordered it. I liked it, but I would have preferred more coconut and less lime. The rest of my meal was pretty yummy. I enjoyed seeing the town of Bisbee, it is unique and artsy and quite a bit hippyish.

Our vacation rental, River a Ridge Ranch, was 30+ minutes outside of Bisbee. It was a very nice house and we were very impressed with it. There was a piano and even a hot tub! Also a pantry full of supplies (lots of tea), a garden, a bicycle for Elisa to ride, and chickens, ducks, and a bunny on the lot that the kids enjoyed looking at. We didn’t stay too long because we had made an appointment for a ghost tour at 5:00.

The tour started in front of a museum, where I noticed the “Thurber Bricks”. I asked my dad about the bricks, but he didn’t know much about them, although there are lots of bricklayers and masons in his extended family. Anyway, the ghost tour guide met up with us, he was an older gentleman in his 60’s or 70’s. He took us on a short walk around the town of Bisbee, and gave us some history, fun facts, and of course, ghost stories. I liked the tour and I thought the stories were neat, but I was hoping for more stories and I also would have liked to actually go into the buildings we stopped by. We did go in one building at the very end of the tour, The Copper Queen Hotel. The tour guide told us that a total of 16 different ghosts have been said to haunt the place. After the tour was over, we went up the stairs in the hotel and looked around for a bit. There was an old square grand piano that I tried to play but it was missing so many strings that it was impossible to play. I didn’t see any “ghosts” but I did have a light sizzle and pop at me (but it didn’t go out) at the exact moment that I touched the window ledge to look out the window. I took some pictures of the hallways, but nothing showed up. 

Thurber Bricks

Elisa in front to the 9/11 angel sculptures that guard a gate.  One comforts those who remain on earth, and the other guides the dead to heaven, or so we were told.

The hallways.  They are creepy on their own, ghost or no.

After the tour we went back to the ranch house. The kids enjoyed going in the hot tub. We didn’t eat dinner (again) because we were still full from lunch. Grandma and grandpa, Erik, and Gabe all played a game of Pandemic, appropriate for the time.

The mine, visible from the road

Hot-tubbing

A game of Pandemic