Seemed like we’ve been away longer, but it was just the

2nd day—yea! That Saturday afternoon after a leisurely

morning, undaunted and yet hopeful of finding a decent place to park the Bambi for a few days to take side trips, we headed to Willcox, about 35 miles east on I-10, home to famous cowboy Rex Allen who starred in western moves. There’s the Rex Allen Museum in his honor… and Rex Allen Days are celebrated every year the first weekend in October.

Willcox is also “apple country” in Arizona. So while we were there we decided to check out “Stout’s” which is famous for their piled-high apple pie and cider. They didn’t have any cider that day. (What’s that all about?  It was Saturday, after all.) We did buy a small apple pie for later…which turned out to be a huge disappointment. We’ll probably be stoned for voicing this opinion about a highly-touted local institution, but Terry’s apple pie is far better. Sorry. Maybe we’ll come back during Rex Allen Days to see if they have cider and if the apple pies are any better. Maybe not.

Between the apple lore and Rex Allen we thought Willcox might have more to offer travelers…but it didn’t look like it. We used to have a friend who lived in Willcox, so we were a little more familiar with it than we were with Benson…and even back then we wondered how he survived there. Guess it was just home to him, and made total sense. We drove by this family’s store near the historic train station and found a funky little antique (= junk) shop that yielded an interesting and chatty proprietress and a few pieces of fun yard art. That’s something, anyway.  We also located the road that leads out the south side of town across the train tracks toward the Chiricahuas. We’d be coming through there again before the week was out.

There were a couple of “possibles” in terms of RV places to stay but nothing that reached out, grabbed us and said, “Stay here!” The interesting thing is that all of

the RV parks were fairly pricey we thought, whether they were good amenities or not. ’Tis the season. Inestead of finding better accommodations in Willcox, they

seem more dismal than Benson.  We must just be spoiled by state parks.

On the way back to Kartchner, we passed through Texas Canyon, a wonderful geological anomaly on the Arizona landscape. Out in the middle of high desert, suddenly there is an outcrop of rugged hills strewn and piled with huge smoothed boulders…it looks as though the gods decided to dump the last of a load of weathered rocks meant for a much older terrain in this one area before moving along to other tasks of nature… The interstate goes right through the

                       middle of it and there’s a rest stop in both directions of the

                           Interstate—a good spot for passers-through to stop for a closer

                            look. Just as quickly as you come upon Texas Canyon area

                           you  are passing out of it…so don’t blink! As you near the

                           western side of Texas Canyon is an exit for Dragoon, Arizona… Isn’t that a great name? Dragoon. It sounds interesting, no? And it is...it’s a small community just south of the Dragoon Mountains (which include Texas Canyon), and home to the Amerind Foundation, a private museum, library, art and research center dedicated to the study and education  and preservation of Native American art, history and lore.  We have not visited the Amerind Foundation as yet…we decided to save that for a later trip when we plan to stay at the Triangle-T Guest Ranch, nestled nearby among the boulders of Texas Canyon. We stopped in at the Triangle-T to look the place over…they have a saloon, restaurant, cabins, pool and RV spots for both hook-up and dry camping…horse back riding, hiking, etc… We will go back there at a later date for a closer look…seems like it could be fun for a long weekend!

Dragoon itself is a very casual place…well hidden, and feels like you could live there with considerable privacy and not be disturbed too much despite the fact that the interstate is just minutes away to the north. We stopped at the “Whatnot” antique shop to see if there were any whatnots we needed...and a neighboring complex of small buildings…we weren’t sure if the outbuildings were there to look through, if they were shops to buy stuff in, or if they were someone’s private homes, and nobody available to explain…so we didn’t intrude too much. There was one odd little place that was obviously a shop with things for sale. It specialized in—of all things—African art objects, soaps and scented oils…right there in Dragoon, AZ. Go figure. There weren’t any people around…but we enjoyed seeing the resident peacocks.

By this time we had decided that neither Benson nor Willcox offered an RV accommodation that tempted us to make either our “headquarters” as we continued to explore the area over the next several days… So we outlined our options: (a) move to Benson for a few days, stay in a parking lot situation with cable and WiFi  for more bucks than Kartchner and do an awful lot of back tracking on the same routes as we made our side trips; (b) move to Willcox, which is closer to the Chiricahuas (one of our day trip destinations) but further from other things we wanted to do, stay in either a crowded OK RV place or a parking lot situation with cable and WiFi…again, for more bucks

than Kartchner…and do a little less backtracking; (c) remain at

Kartchner our sight-seeing from there. But that seemed like a

long time to spend at the Kartchner Cavern campground—

and we would still be doing a lot of backtracking.  So we

added another option: (d) stay at Katchner Caverns through

Monday when we could do our sight seeing to the south…

then move to Roper Lake State Park which is 45 miles

northeast of Willcox, making that our base camp for going to the Chiricahua National Monument which is south and east of Willcox…that would mean less backtracking overall we felt…and oh, did we mention…Roper Lake is only $16/night! We chose option (d)…stay at Kartchner through Monday night, followed by Roper Lake. Ah, resolution!

Now Kartchner does not have WiFi or cable, and our Internet connection with the air card was not the best (OK outside at the picnic table, but not stable inside the Bambi…too bright outside in the day time and too chilly outside in the evening…) but we weren’t there to be on the Internet all the time. We were there to check out the caves and use it as a base for day trips.

Back to Kartchner for another quiet, blustery evening. We were winding down for the day, and we happened to look our the window of the Bambi…there was a guy walking his little black dog… “Gosh, he looks familiar.”  Then we knew who he was!  He was Tom, a guy we had met on our trip up to Buckskin Mountain State Park just after Christmas…he was from Washington…

                               soloing with his dog, Charlie, after a recent break-up with

                                   his wife. Terry jumped out of the Bambi and hollered a

                                   “hey” at him and we caught up on stuff…he’s been busy!

                                    Very busy. Has a new girlfriend who had flown out to

                                    meet him. Hmmm. And he’d sold his old trailer and truck and bought a new big fifth wheel and big ol’ truck to haul it with from an RV dealer near Huachuca City. And he’d signed up for a camp/working situation in Oregon somewhere...he was having a blast in his new life. Good for him! What a small world. Wonder who we’ll run into next?

Click on the “Slide Show” below to see pictures of this segment...click on any one of the other parts of our trip to go there, or click on “Other Trips” at the end of the photos to take you to our main trip page. Have fun!