Monday, October 6, 2008

Day 3 - Top of the World

So today we road to the Top of the World. No I did not take a wrong turn or mess up navigating with the Zumo and direct us to the Arctic circle. We went to Top of the World, Arizona. A little community just outside of Globe, Arizona where the day ended.

This morning started earlier than expected thanks to a mix up in time zones. But as day light was breaking we headed into down town Silver City to find breakfast. The intended cafe was no where to be found and a near by cafe was closed so we headed back to a cafe Doug saw on the way called Grandma's Cafe. Breakfast was good and service was pleasant. Just before 8am local time we're leaving the cafe and heading out on the road toward the Devil's Highway.

We head out of town on 180 toward Buckhorn. Then we hang a left on to 78 over to Three Way. A right turn onto 191 leads us over to Clifton. We filled up in Clifton and headed out of town. We stopped at a scenic overlook to check out the copper mine in Clifton. It's HUGE!!! There were monstrous dump trucks going everywhere picking up and dumping massive amounts of earth.

After taking in the scene of the mine, it was time to get back on 191 and head north into twisties. And boy were there some twisties to be enjoyed. I did get to find out how the Micatech cases would perform. I'm happy to say the foot pegs are still the first thing to drag. I didn't find out of the cases or the engine guards will be the next thing to drag. I was having plenty of fun just dragging the foot pegs from time to time. This road makes yesterday's 152 seem mild. 191 from Clifton to Strayhorse is jam packed with tight technical corners. After the Blue Vista however the road opens up into kinder, gentler sweepers but it's still fun all the way into Alpine.

Once into Eager we picked up 260 west toward ShowLow. The scenery was nice and the pace was gentle through the reservation thanks to a 55mph speed limit.

Taking 60 south out of Showlow took us into the next set of twisties for the day. Things started getting interest until we caught up with the lane striping paint convoy. When we finally got around them we were stopped due to a lane closure while they were grinding the center stripe. Once past that we pulled off to snap some pictures of the Salt River canyon. Thanks to this lane closure stuff traffic was a real bear for the next 40 miles into Globe. There are some really great curves along the way but finding the road wide open and clear might be a real challenge.

When we got to Globe, it wasn't quite 5pm so we decided to roll through town and head up to Top Of the World to check it out before calling it quits for the day. Well Top of the World sits at 4,600 feet which is higher than Globe but the local copper mine has managed to make mountains taller.

The mileage for the day was 384 miles and took about 11 hours. Tomorrow the plan is to head over to Kingman, Az. And eventually  we'll end up in Paniment Springs on Friday night. And in between Kingman and Paniment Springs we're going to jump over into California to check out those big Sequoia trees. Keep reading!

1 comment:

Vlvtelvs said...

Sounds like this is right up your alley. If you are nice, maybe Doug will want to go with you again next year.....