Bisbee Side Trip: San Pedro River, a Winery and Tombstone

 From February 2022

One day, we explored to the west of Bisbee and checked things out.  First, we hiked some of the trails in San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area.

 

The landscapes here provide a stark contrast to the green of Wisconsin. We continued on to Sierra Vista, which didn't seem to have a defined downtown area.  We know people who have retired here, but decided that it wasn't our vibe.

After putting up with all of my brewery stops, it was only fair that I visit a winery for Julia.  Arizona has a bunch in the Elgin area.  We stopped at Flying Leap Vineyard.  Our early adult experience with vineyards was in northern California, where the wineries, tasting rooms and grapes were all in the same location.  That's not so around Elgin.  The tasting room employees told us that the grapes were mostly grown several hours away and that land was very difficult to buy for grapes in the Elgin area.  The fields that we did see were more like representations of their fields near Wilcox.  It was still a pleasant stop.  

 

In the afternoon, we drove east on Hwy 82 until we ran into Hwy 80 south.  We couldn't resist checking out Tombstone, although we knew it would be a tourist trap, which it was. 

Don't shoot; I'm not armed

 

Belize: Days 4 and 5

More frivolous fun

On Day 4, we boarded a catamaran to sail to Caye Caulker, another island.  San Pedro is the city on Ambergris Caye.  Twenty years ago, San Pedro used to be a quiet little place without paved roads, where the pace was slow.  Today, the big hotels are moving in, and golf carts on the downtown streets often crawl in congested golf cart traffic.  Caye Caulker is what San Pedro was like twenty years ago.  Progress?

Travel on the catamaran was smooth sailing, despite windy conditions. Bean bag chairs lashed to the front deck provided ultimate comfort.  It didn’t hurt that the crew came around with snacks and rum punch.

Caye Caulker is my kind of place.  I don’t need an adventure every day.  I’m pretty sure that I would be content for a long time here before getting bored. While people back in Wisconsin dealt with the polar vortex, Caye Caulker offered summertime, and the living was easy.

As my mother always told me, there’s no rest for the wicked.  On our fifth day  on the island, our hosts booked a full day of snorkeling, fishing and a cookout.

While I was screwing around catching little fish that the locals call “grunts,” our captain snorkeled out to the reef and harvested something more substantial for supper.

As we drank rum punch, the captain prepared and cooked the food over a fire of coconut tree husks.   It was easily better than any restaurant meal that we had on the trip.

We spent one more day on the island before taking a ferry ($15) back to the Belize mainland.  I think you probably can guess that there was beer and island drinks involved, We then parted ways with our friends and headed off on our own adventure to San Ignacio, base camp to visit the Mayan ruins.

Belize: San Pedro (Days Two and Three)

On Day Two, we went fishing.  I’m not a fishing enthusiast.  I’ve probably fished a couple of dozen times in my life, and most of those times have been through the ice.  San Pedro is best known for fishing and snorkeling.  I’m not much of a swimmer either, unless something is chasing me.  So besides drinking beer and rum punches, my companions strongly suggested that I select an excursion.  I chose fishing.  Julia, the daughter of a serious fisherman, was the only wife who wanted to go fishing.  Kim and Michele went shopping instead.  I don’t like shopping either.

Brent and John have fished many times before in Belize and knew a guide with a boat.  This was unlike any of my previous fishing experiences.  The guide and his helper netted a bunch of sardines during the first twenty minutes and then chopped up the sardines into little pieces to use as bait.  Then they baited our hooks every time we needed bait, and they pointed out where to cast to catch the fish.  If I caught a fish, they took it off the hook, sorted out whether it was a keeper or not, and later cleaned all the fish for supper.  I think we ended up with about 35 keeper fish between the four of us.  Most of the fish were different varieties of snapper.  Julia caught an ugly fish known locally as a Slippery Dick.  It was quickly released and sent overboard.  This was my first fish.  It was not deemed a keeper.

On Day Two, we hopped on the golf carts and went bar hopping to the north side of the island.  The island is quite skinny, so it isn’t hard to find a beachfront bar.

Kim is being a good designated driver with her Coke.

In the last post, I forgot to include the an excerpt from my A.T. Trail Journal.  I would plead jet lag but there was no time zone change.  Here is the next entry.

UnBelizeable

The stars had to be almost in perfect alignment for our trip to take place.  Caregivers for Justin were being hired at the last-minute.  Julia’s Dad was still having post-stroke complications.  A major weather system moved through on the day before departure, cancelling hundreds of flights at O’Hare when a jet skidded off the runway.


In the morning, I drove to Whitewater to drop Justin off at school.  The long access ramp to his dorm was not plowed or shoveled, and I had no way to get him in the building.  I ran down the street and chased down a university employee who found two shovels.  I started at one end, and he started at the other.  Justin shivered in the cold, but we did get him in the building.

In the afternoon, Julia and I loaded up the car with our suitcases, along with Allie who needed to be dropped off at her school.  We drove to Milwaukee, dropped off Allie at her apartment, and then drove to Chicago.  We had found a stay, park and fly deal at the O’Hare Hyatt, which allowed us to stay overnight and park for less than the price of two weeks parking at the airport’s economy parking lot. We ate at the hotel bar, while watching the gusts of wind blow snow around in circles.

Early the next morning, we took the hotel shuttle to the airport and headed for the gate.

Despite the horrible weather and the understaffed TSA employees working without pay, we made it through security and were at the gate less than an hour after taking the hotel elevator down to the front door.  I would definitely recommend the O’hare’s Hyatt Regency’s park, stay and ride offer for up to two weeks free parking in the enclosed parking structure.

Our United non-stop flight left on time, and we were in Belize City by early afternoon.  From there, we boarded a small plane for San Pedro, an island about fifteen minutes by air.  It was the smallest plane that I’ve flown in for awhile.  I sat close enough to the pilot that I could have tapped him on the right shoulder. The woman sitting next to the pilot was another passenger.  There was no co-pilot.

Our friends Brent and Michele own a condo on San Pedro that we were invited to visit about fifteen years ago.  When we saw them in Alaska last summer, I asked if the invite was still good. “Of course,” they replied.  We texted that we had arrived early, but Brent didn’t get the message until about an hour later.  We passed the time by drinking the national beer, Belikin which is amazingly not too bad, even for a beer snob like me.  The brewery was started by a German who faithfully followed the requirements for German beer: malted barley, hops, water, and yeast.  No additions of rice or corn. Belikin offers a regular lager, light beer, stout, and holiday beer.

Julia says one of those beers is for me, but I’m not sure about that.  There are worse ways to wait for a ride.  Brent arrived by golf cart, the main way to get around the island.  On the way to the condo, we stopped to support the local grocery store by getting more Belikin for the thirty minute ride to the property, which had lovely views of the Caribbean Sea. This was a brewed journey worth the wait and effort.