Shooting Walk This Way

Bisbee rhymes with Frisbee, and if you look hard enough, there's probably a piece of art in town made of the famous flying disc. Bisbee is like that. It's full of hidden treasures, which is why it's best explored on foot. Walk, don't run. That's the only way to appreciate Southern Arizona's queen city.

WALK

Just west of Bisbee, that historic town nestled in the Mule Mountains of Cochise County, stands an automobile tunnel. Completed a half-century ago, it's one of the very few tunnels in Arizona road builders out here, it seems, preferred to climb up and over the faces of rocky impediments rather than blast through them and ruin a good thrill ride. Bisbee was noisier back when the tunnel was built, when great machines hauled loads of copper from the earth, and dynamite was readily available to punch holes through mountains.

The Mule Pass Tunnel is a fine thing as tunnels go, but when I head to Bisbee, I prefer the old approach, over the Old Divide Road. As its name hints, the road, which climbs over Mule Mountain and over the tunnel, crosses the Continental Divide at an elevation of 6,030 feet. As it arcs its way up to the summit, the road affords superb views of the town and the giant Copper Queen mine pit. Looking down into the town's maze of winding streets, alleys and stairways, the view also suggests any number of routes an intrepid traveler can take while getting around on foot.

Unlike newer, more spread-out cities in Arizona, Bisbee is hemmed in by rugged mountains and steep canyons that confine it to a walkable scale. Thanks to geography, the heart of Bisbee can be covered in a pleasant hour. A more adventurous tour, heading for higher ground and working one's way along the rim of the mountains, can take hours longer, cover a much bigger chunk of territory, and involve a marathon run-

ner's dose of exercise. Both possibilities offer many attractions.

I'm a perambulator myself, inclined to a more philosophical approach to the business of getting around. First comes a single step; another step follows, then another, and we're walking - something our species learns at an early age. That's reason enough to celebrate getting out of a vehicle and strolling. On an easy pass, a walker can burn 200 to 300 calories an hour, shedding pounds with minimal exertion, which makes it about the gentlest form of exercise there is. But the benefits of walking go well beyond the purely physical. More than any other activity, walking is a sure way to jump-start our brains, to set thoughts in motion and calm our troubles.Prompted by modest exertions, our bodies - just minutes into a walk - begin to produce endorphins, chemical compounds that reduce pain and stress, enhance memory and judgment, and increase feelings of well-being as they course into the brain. Along with endorphins, walking produces increased levels of serotonin, an important brain neurotransmitter that further serves to reduce stress, which is why doctors increasingly recommend walking as a treatment for mild depression and anxiety.

That, I think, is the reason ancient Greek philosophers prided themselves on being peripatetic - a fancy term for “walking around” - and why great thinkers ever since have taken to the quiet lanes to get their pondering done. Which brings us to Brewery Gulch, the spiritual center of Old Bisbee, and a place where any amiable amble of Bisbee should begin.

Brewery Gulch has a brighter visage than in days past, when, to put it charitably, many of its old pieces seemed in danger of crumbling to dust. Things have been patched and painted and restored, and new shops and galleries line the winding road. Even so, chances are good that the people you'll meet will have a philosophical approach to the business of making a living. In other words, one works in order to live, but one does not live in order to work. "I got this job just because I needed to work for a couple of days a week," said one young woman in a beautifully appointed art gallery next door to a suspiciously subversive rendering of the Mona Lisa. "I needed something to give my life some structure and direction." I sympathized, of course, but then considered my deadlines and the mound of paper piled high atop my desk and thought, a little grumpily, that I could use a bit less structure and direction myself. I've been strolling up and down Brewery Gulch for a third of a century now, and it's been ever thus. That is, in some circles here, work is most definitely a four-letter word. But, ambler that I am, I've taken at least some of my cues from an uncharacteristically ambitious walker who, no matter where I was in town, could be seen in the distance striding purposefully up a hillside or down the canyon, ever in view. He knew the good paths, and I was careful to watch where he went and to follow at a discreet distance, getting a good workout in the bargain. Stories were whispered about him, and they seldom agreed on particulars except that he'd been a NASA scientist assigned to a tracking station in the middle of the Australian desert, where he was alone for months at a time. The darkness and space were too much, the stories continued, and he quit, thereafter to wander the streets of Bisbee like some landlocked ancient mariner. I haven't seen him in years, but as I wandered up Brewery Gulch on a recent bright, late-spring morning, I thought of our last encounter. I was climbing a stairway one moon-washed evening when he came around a corner, silent as an owl, and grinned at me. The moment might have done Boo Radley proud, and I nearly jumped out of my skin until I made out the features of his face in the moonlight and recognized him. I greeted the man, and he treated me to a tour of the night sky that would have cost a hefty admission fee at any planetarium worth visiting - a tour, I might add, whose details I remember vividly whenever that time of year comes and the constellations line up in the same order.

the upper end of the street, which makes a turn to the northeast at the geological landmark called Castle Rock, where it turns into Tombstone Canyon Road. I stop at the rock to pay homage to the ghost of miner George Warren, who lived alone below the rock, far from any other buildings, back in the 1880s. George was fond of the bottle and incapable of passing up a bet, and for a time he cooled his heels in the Territorial insane asylum, but he still managed to make enough discoveries to have merited the city's richest mining district being named for him. It didn't take long for Tombstone Canyon to get filled up with houses, and by 1910, the lower elevations of Castle Rock were lined with twoand three-story buildings. Some of them, such as the magnificent Muirhead House, along with their modern descendants, still stand there, neat as a pin and happily shaded by tall cottonwood trees. One of my favorite houses in the whole of Bisbee stands just beyond the rock. Once the town's bus station, it's been owned by a succession of bohemians and artists, the last of whom - one a painter, the other retired from a symphony - have turned the exterior walls into a kind of folk-art museum enshrining old bicycles, Etch A Sketches, tools, hard hats, furniture, cooking utensils and other bric-abrac, all painted a can't-miss shade of orange. The place is up for sale as I write, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the new owner decides the admittedly For Brewery Gulch seems to be sprucing up a little, then Tombstone Canyon has gone positively upscale. Beginning below the city's grande dame, the Copper Queen Hotel Main Street passes the beautifully refurbished Phelps-Dodge Mercantile building, which now houses a couple of restaurants, gift shops and offices. Main Street then winds past the Copper Queen Library, established in 1882 and one of the handsomest such institutions in Arizona. Bookstores, more restaurants, gift shops and a few antiques outlets that draw collectors from all over the country grace the upper end of the street, which makes a turn to the northeast at the geological landmark called Castle Rock, where it turns into Tombstone Canyon Road. I stop at the rock to pay homage to the ghost of miner George Warren, who lived alone below the rock, far from any other buildings, back in the 1880s. George was fond of the bottle and incapable of passing up a bet, and for a time he cooled his heels in the Territorial insane asylum, but he still managed to make enough discoveries to have merited the city's richest mining district being named for him. It didn't take long for Tombstone Canyon to get filled up with houses, and by 1910, the lower elevations of Castle Rock were lined with twoand three-story buildings. Some of them, such as the magnificent Muirhead House, along with their modern descendants, still stand there, neat as a pin and happily shaded by tall cottonwood trees. One of my favorite houses in the whole of Bisbee stands just beyond the rock. Once the town's bus station, it's been owned by a succession of bohemians and artists, the last of whom - one a painter, the other retired from a symphony - have turned the exterior walls into a kind of folk-art museum enshrining old bicycles, Etch A Sketches, tools, hard hats, furniture, cooking utensils and other bric-abrac, all painted a can't-miss shade of orange. The place is up for sale as I write, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the new owner decides the admittedly deeply eccentric décor is worth keeping. To do so would fit in perfectly with the overall spirit of the town, which has always been ... well, deeply eccentric.

FAIR BIS-NESS Viewed from the intersection of Subway Street and Tombstone Canyon Road, the three-story Fair Building houses the Bisbee Restoration Museum. Photograph by Karen Strom PEACE, BROTHER Painted by local artist Rose Johnson, Bisbee's Peace Wall embellishes the base of Castle Rock. Photograph by Stephen Strom BED SPRINGS The Inn at Castle Rock, built in 1902 as a rooming house, has a natural spring in its basement. Photograph by Karen Strom ORANGE YOU GLAD YOU CAME? A private residence displays the homeowner's fondness for orange. Photograph by Stephen Strom

If you look closely outside this impromptu museum, you'll see what might be one of the greater architectural curiosities in all the land: The houses on the east side of the street are built atop thick concrete slabs spanning a deep arroyo that flows swiftly every time it rains. Considering that much of Old Bisbee was burned to the ground in a catastrophic fire on October 14, 1908, perhaps the builders felt more comfortable having a source of flame-dousing water so close at hand. More likely, the slabs offered a kind of solution to the shortage of real estate in the narrow canyon - if you want to build a house, first you have to build someplace to put it, over water or in thin air, as the neighboring houses on stilts attest.

The architecture is a little improvisational, a little iffy, but certainly interesting, and proof positive about what Tucson poet Richard Shelton wrote of Bisbee, a place in which, generation after generation, “everything breaks down and goes wrong and everybody laughs, picks up the pieces and tries to patch them back together again.” Every street, every alleyway, every path in this part of town leads to a surprise - a sculpture, a bank of stained-glass windows, a well-tended postage-stamp-sized garden, an old truck whose like hasn't been made for a half-century. Every one of these trails offers fine views, with some at the higher elevations commanding vistas that take in the whole town.

But the streets aren't the only places to explore here. No visit to Bisbee would be complete without at least a quick detour up the city's signature staircases, nine of which comprise the course that marks the city's annual 3-mile-long Bisbee 1000 Great Stair Climb, held on the third Saturday of October.

The course begins at the city park band shell up Brewery Gulch, climbing 73 fairly easy stairs. As it wanders up Brewery Canyon, the course then meets the 100-step set deemed Opera, leading to a road that eventually arrives at the old opera house. The course flattens out along the aptly named High Road, and on to what's called the Subway. There, at the Bisbee Visitor Center, the course becomes more challenging, assuming Everestlike proportions for the untrained stair-stomper. In quick succession come the 181-step Maxfield segment, the 79-step Spalding, and the 151-step Rose. You'll be forgiven if you feel a little winded after all that climbing, but the hard work is done; all that's left now is to wander down Clawson Avenue and back to the starting point, with a detour down Tombstone Canyon if you wish.

You don't have to have anything particular on your mind to justify lacing up your walking shoes and heading out the door to Bisbee, Arizona's pre-eminent point of perambulation. Henry David Thoreau sang the praises of “sauntering,” that is, of walking with no destination or end in mind, and he counseled that every walk be undertaken in the spirit of some unknown adventure, the walker prepared for the unforeseen possibility of wonder.

Thoreau knew that wonder would come, quickly and of its own accord, for, as we saunter, poking along at a 3-mile-an-hour gait, we see and encounter things that, hidden behind walls or windshields, we would probably otherwise miss. So it is in Old Bisbee. “Life is already too short to waste on speed,” Edward Abbey wrote in The Journey Home, and he was right. Down these winding paths lies plenty of evidence for why it's well worth the trou-ble to slow down - and plenty of unexpected treasures as a reward. All Gregory McNamee is the author of Monumental Places (Arizona Highways Books, 2007), as well as several other books. He lives in Tucson.

when you go

Location: 95 miles southeast of Tucson Getting There: From Tucson, take Interstate 10 east to Benson, then State Route 80 south about 40 miles to Bisbee. Turn left at West Boulevard, then left onto Tombstone Canyon Road. Information: Bisbee Chamber of Commerce, 520-432-5421 or bisbeearizona.com; Bisbee Visitor Center, 520-432-3554 or discoverbisbee.com; annual Bisbee 1000 Great Stair Climb, bisbee1000.org