Roadtrip from Phoenix to Globe-Miami, Arizona

To get to Globe from the Phoenix area, you need to find Hwy. 60. Get on to Hwy. 60 and head West. You will pass through Mesa, Apache Junction, Gold Canyon, Florence Junction, Superior and Top of the World before you get to Miami and then Globe.

Just before you get to Superior, you will see Picketpost Mountain. At the base of this mountain is the Boyce Thompson Arboretum – a beautiful place to visit (when it’s cooler outside). The area at the base of Picketpost Mountain is also where Apache Tears come from. What are Apache Tears?

Superior

Superior is also an old copper mining town. Old downtown Superior is kind of interesting, in a ghost town sort of way. When the new Hwy. 60 was constructed (a long time ago), they by-passed downtown Superior – which used to be right on the main highway to Phoenix. Once that happened, the downtown businesses failed pretty quickly and now its just lots of old buildings and ruins of buildings.

Here are some pics from downtown Superior

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After you leave Superior, you will drive through some beautiful mountains where there are sometimes waterfalls (after a good rain). About 20 minutes after Superior, you pass through Top of the World, a very small town. After you leave Top of the World, look off to your right and you will see some large open pit mines – kind of neat looking, though not very environmentally friendly. What is Open Pit Mining?

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Miami

Next is Miami. Downtown Miami suffered the same fate as downtown Superior when Hwy 60 bypassed the main road through downtown. But downtown Miami has fared a bit better than Old Town Superior has. There are a lot of very good antique stores in downtown Miami now and a few of the buildings have been nicely renovated. It still could use some work, but it is an interesting place to visit.

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Globe

Downtown Globe has also seen better days, during the boom-times of copper mining. There are a good many empty store fronts in Globe now. But, there are still quite a few nice places to visit in downtown Globe. A great candy/fudge shop, lots of antique stores and a nice clothing store called Simply Sarah – to name a few.

My favorite Mexican food place is in downtown Globe – La Casita. At the end of downtown Globe is where you will find the renovated Train Depot.

Also, the old Globe Theater burned down a couple of years ago (sad, it was a cool historic theatre) – but the owner, Bobby Hollis, has just finished building a nice new theater where the old one used to sit.

There are so many places to visit in the Globe area. The Historical Society runs a historical home tour, there are many historical homes that have been well preserved. There are also mine tours available. The Nofsger Hill B & B is pretty neat – I went to 4th grade at Nofsger Hill, it was the last year it was open.

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Old Dominion Mine

The Old Dominion Mine is an interesting story. Ore is no longer mined there, it is used for the other mines water supply now. During operation in the early 1900′s, the miners hit an underground river. They were able to keep the mine operational with pumps for a while, but I guess that became too expensive or the ore vein ran out (a combo of both probably). So now, the mines just pump the water out of the Old Dominion for use in the other mining operations at other locations. My grandfather used to work for the mines and I have been up to the old vertical shaft at the Old Dominion Mine – if you stand on the lift, over the shaft, you can hear the underground river running hundreds of feet below you – it was very cool thing to experience when I was a “young-un.”

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When I find links and stories about stuff to do in and around Globe, I’ll post it on my blog/link roll. Also, don’t forget – there is always the Casino when you run out of other stuff to do (Apache Gold Casino). Be careful, don’t gamble it all away – you need to save that money for your next road trip!

Here’s a great link for information about the Globe-Miami area – also has local events. Thanks Linda for sending this to me!

http://www.gmteconnect.com/

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