Globe Historic District, which is on the National Register of Historic Places; it includes 18 buildings dating from the early 1900s, including the Post Office, the Gila County Courthouse, and several churches. The area’s history as a mining center is apparent in the landscape, especially in the neighboring town of Miami, where you can still see the pit and the smelters, the tailings and leaching ponds—the bleak destruction that mining can inflict on the landscape. These mines aren’t played out. The infrastructure is still intact, waiting for the price of copper to rise enough to make these diggings economically viable again.
While you’re in Globe, consider a visit to Besh-Ba-Gowah Archaeological Park, a mile outside town atop a ridge overlooking Pinal Creek. There you can see ruins of a Salado pueblo dating to AD 1225. The pueblo was built of stacked cobblestones bonded with clay mortar, and it rose several stories high. In its heyday, as many as 400 interconnected rooms surrounded the central plaza, like an ancient apartment building. The pueblo was built with great care, but the years have taken their toll. Part of what you see today is a restoration, and most of the walls have been stabilized, to prevent further deterioration. A small museum showcases artifacts found during the excavation, and there’s a model of what the pueblo might have looked like before it was abandoned, around AD 1400. There was an extended drought around that time, which quite probably forced the people in this region to migrate north.
| Globe Highlights |
| Apache Gold Casino5 US 70, San Carlos, AZ 85550(928) 475-7800apache-gold-casino.comBesh-Ba-Gowah Archaeological Park1324 S. Jesse Hayes Road, Globe, AZ 85501(928) 425-0320globeaz.gov/visitors/besh-ba-gowah |
Superior
US 70 terminates in Globe, at the point where it merges with US 60, which you’ll follow out of town as it swings toward the west. The portion of US 60 that runs from Globe to Superior is known as the Gila-Pinal Scenic Road, and the landscape along the way is stunning. After passing through the mining town of Miami, you’ll wind your way up curves and switchbacks all the way to Top-of-the-World, so called because at 4,528 feet it’s at the high point of this stretch of road. There’s not a lot to see these days at Top-of-the-World—if you blink, you’ll miss it—but back in the 1950s, it was a happening spot, with a guest ranch and … let’s call it a dance hall.
After Top-of-the-World you’ll pass through Devil’s Canyon, a jumbled maze of granite pillars lining the hairpin turns of the road. Beyond Devil’s Canyon, you’ll come to the quarter-mile-long Queen Creek Tunnel, which is immediately followed by the Queen Creek Bridge, a steel arch that crosses the deep gorge of Queen Creek Canyon. The completion of the bridge and tunnel in 1952 cut the time required for the journey between Globe and Superior in half, and made it considerably safer. The old “winding ladder” road can still be seen in the canyon below, slowly crumbling into ruin.
Like Globe, the town of Superior began as a silver camp and quickly turned to copper. The fabulously productive Magma Mine kept going longer than most, but it closed for good in 1996, forcing much of Superior’s population to search elsewhere for work. Much of the old town is boarded up now, and very worn around the edges, giving it a gritty ambience.
World’s Smallest Museum, Superior, Arizona
There are a couple of things worth checking out. The World’s Smallest Museum, which is contained entirely within a 134-square-foot shed adjacent to the Buckboard City Café, includes among its exhibits a 1984 Compaq computer, a Beatles poster, and other “artifacts of ordinary life.” A few miles outside town is something quite a bit more spectacular: the Boyce Thompson Arboretum. This world-class botanical garden, set on 320 acres, was created as a private garden and plant research center by William Boyce Thompson, the owner of the Magma Copper Company, who collected more than 3,000 species of both rare and common desert plants, including 800 different varieties of cacti. The arboretum, which attracts more than 200 species of birds, has walking trails and large greenhouses open to the public.
Boyce Thompson Arboretum, Superior, Arizona
| Superior Highlights |
| World’s Smallest Museum1111 W. US 60, Superior, AZ(520) 689-5800Boyce Thompson Arboretum37615 US 60, Superior, AZ 85173(520) 689-2723cals.arizona.edu/bta/ |
US 60 to Phoenix
Beyond the arboretum, US 60 becomes a divided road headed west. After about 10 miles it merges with AZ 79; 15 miles more and you’re in Apache Junction, the official eastern edge of Metropolitan Phoenix. As you continue west into Mesa, US 60 turns into an urban freeway, soon opening up to six lanes in each direction. That should give you an idea of the volume of traffic carried by this major road during the morning and afternoon commutes. Since 1950, Phoenix has grown from the 99th-largest city in the U.S. to the 6th-largest, and it is on pace to become number 4 by 2020. That’s big, and it happened in a hurry—over the course of a single lifetime.
Stay on US 60 until it merges with Interstate 10, bringing you back to the road you left in Lordsburg. If it’s anywhere near the commuting hours (6-9 a.m. and 4-7 p.m.), you’ll want to get off the freeway as quickly as possible, because all major routes leading into and out of the city center slow to a crawl during those times. If you have some time and you’d like a good look at what this vibrant city has to offer, consider the following optional loop.
Phoenix: A Self-guided Loop Tour
This optional scenic loop takes you on a grand tour of Arizona’s sprawling capital city. The total distance is about 60 miles, all on surface streets, so you should allow at least 2 hours just for driving it. If you stop at any of the many attractions, the reconnaissance mission can easily become a pleasant, full-day outing. Use the map for turn-by-turn guidance on this route; if you have a GPS, you can use the listed attractions as your waypoints. Just be sure to select the routing option that avoids major highways, or you’ll end up touring the Phoenix freeway system.
From I-10, take Exit 155 to West Baseline Road. Follow that west to Central Avenue, then head south to:
1. South Mountain Park. At 16,000 acres, this is one of the largest urban parks in the world, and it features prominently on Phoenix’s official “Points of Pride” list. Roads inside the park will take you to the summit of the highest peak, where you’ll get a broad view of the city below.
View of downtown Phoenix from South Mountain
From the park exit, follow Central Avenue north for 6 miles, through the heart of downtown Phoenix, before turning west to:
2. Arizona State Capitol Museum. Located on the grounds of the copper-domed Arizona State Capitol, this small museum has several worthwhile exhibits on the history of Arizona government dating back to the days of the Arizona Territory.
Arizona State Capitol, Phoenix
From the Capitol, head back to Central Avenue and an even better museum:
3. Heard Museum. Founded in 1929 by Dwight Heard, a rancher turned newspaper publisher, the museum has grown exponentially over the years, and is widely considered to house one of the world’s finest collections of Native American art and artifacts.
From the Heard, follow Central Avenue north about 4.5 miles to Glendale
