Scout’s Honor Cross-Country Motorcycle Ride Part 3

Editor's note: Justin Coffey and Kyra Sacdalan, partners in the travel documentary company WESTX1000, are taking on a new challenge with the help of Motorcyclist—leaving behind their lightweight dual sports to wrangle a pair of Indian Scouts across the country, from California to Daytona. Follow along...

From far enough away, Arizona doesn’t look like much. The colors blend together into a sandy red. Adobe inspired architecture and low-lying structures make up endless rows of strip malls and townhouses. A sheet of silt veils the blue mountains in the distance so that they’re merely shadows in the horizon. But in time, the diamonds begin to reveal themselves. Quaint coffee shops, outstanding breweries, historic homes and southern culture sheltered within city limits. Step just outside the lines and find the blushing cheeks of booming canyons, the succulent freckled faces of tall mountains, wide expanses of mesmerizing nothingness and the rivers that divide them. Arizona is so much more than a desert, a retirement community or collection of flagrant college towns. It took a few weeks to discover just what drew us to the Sweetheart State, and it wasn’t her copper. The small towns that caught our attention were rich in history, blessed with beauty and lush with windy roads.

Ode To Prescott
It's not 'perfect.' That's a word best reserved for opinion. Prescott's just one of those places. A place where you could kill a cup of Joe while keeping your clients happy on the cafe's Socialist Wi-Fi program. Hit the road by nine, whiz through the woods, dig your tires in dirt and make it back to town in time to have a sandwich, soup and a slice of pie at a dessert joint that's not as "rusty" as its namesake. The town feels small, though it has everything a big city should. Downtown, live tunes tickle your eardrums. Two miles out and the only song you'll hear is sung by crickets and croakers. Local eateries stuff food in eager faces, and the Tap of Life pours bread and circuses at three respectable breweries.

Ask to see what Heaven would look like if God were an outdoorsman, and I’ll show you Prescott. Where green and tan are one miraculous color, and they cover the hills that roll endlessly into the distance. Gaze down at your feet to find them leading you up a mountain. Look up to see contrails crisscrossing the sky, following the Earth’s bend down to the horizon. The atmosphere there was light, and the thin air made my head spin in a tremendous way. I felt a spark, and immediately, I was hooked on Prescott.

Wyatt Earp, The O.K. Corral, and Other Weird Western Attractions
A tumble weed threatened to complicate my ride. Many more followed as the wind picked up – it was the first time on this trip we'd ride through a dust storm. Justin's father had been urging us to visit Tombstone since #Scouts_Honor was nothing more than a bar napkin idea, so with his excitement vicariously coursing through our veins, we braved a trip to the infamous outpost. It was sadly and gloriously exactly what we'd expected. A couple of avenues lined with aging timber so short and meek that you'd have missed it if you blinked. Dismounting somewhere between here and there, I found the place that people flock to: Allen Street. The O.K. Corral reenactment made us laugh, uncomfortably. Rows and rows of faux saloons, hotels and banks rivaled the sets of Spaghetti Westerns, and the characters couldn't be distinguished from the tourists. But what saved our story, and for which we were thankful, was the Birdcage Theatre.

A saloon, gambling parlor, theater and brothel, the establishment opened its doors the day after Christmas in 1881. A second home to the likes of Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson, The Birdcage was known as The Elite before ultimately closing its doors in 1892. Short-lived as it was, the patrons and hired hands picked up and left their memories behind battened doors. Not a soul set foot in the forgotten fortress of immorality until the 1930’s when new owners found the artifacts untouched. Ever since it has been an antique treasure abundant in tales of what was. The painting of a buxom belly-dancer covers a bullet ridden wall. Ornate carvings etch the original bar, which sits just inside the door with uneven steps once leading to pleasurably bad choices disappearing into the nest. Fourteen Cages, often called ‘Cribs,’ edged the main hall where lusty ladies and their benefactors drank, fornicated and shouted at the stage with only a thin sheet to shield them. Gambling filled the floor below and entertainment was set on stage. My imagination ran rampant as I read the plaques and eyed the pristine relics giddy at reliving a past that wasn’t mine. But as I pulled myself back into the present, my smile never faltered... Because like the many who stumbled or sauntered into The Birdcage, I was on an adventure.

Bisbee's Odd Accommodations & Epic View Of Mexico
I thought I had found true love in Prescott. Then I met her soft-spoken more voluptuous sister, Bisbee. Tucked between several peaks at nearly a mile into the sky, it's hard to call such a sheltered whistle-top something as fast and tainted as "town." On our first night, we slumbered in 1954 aboard a quaint, albeit overpriced, vintage trailer resembling a rocket ship. The day left us wandering and lusting for 'the quiet life' as we pictured a quirky homestead facing Mexico and the rising sun. Musicians, Birkenstocks and Snow Birds breathe life into the steep narrow roads that form a web around the cute coffee shops and acclaimed wine bars. Artisan pizza was stuffed into our pie holes, as a lack of space on the Indians left no room for leftovers, and when the kind retirees pointed us upward to "see the border from there," we found ourselves perched on a hundred-year-old water tower that creaked in our presence, and beneath our feet.

The third time we spotted a “classic” Indian Chief, it was parked outside a 50’s themed gas station on the outskirts of town, just feet from our modern Scouts. The first time, however, was the morning after our stay at the Shady Dell – the Chief parked aptly adjacent to our Indians. I left a card. Then, we found them tucked beside a wall in the town center with a reputation preceding them. It was only after we discovered another portal in time that we met its pilot and passenger. Two Vancouver residents - sun-kissed and worn by fulfilling existence – who lived their winter months in America’s Wild West and saw it from the front and back seat of a ‘commanding’ motorcycle. We had something in common. They were familiar with Bisbee and encouraged us to take our time through Lowell, a single street frozen in time by collectors and historians alike - built beside a massive hole in the ground once hiding a copper fortune. A co-op, breakfast joint, a storefront filled with Americana and open doors to a garage were the only active shops to line the sidewalks. The rest of the windows were paradigms of the mid-twentieth century. Harley Davidsons and, more poignantly, Indian Motorcycles were displayed in the glass of their former dealers - like the beautiful cars parked in the reflection - as if the clocks had stopped ticking during happier days left for those in the present to long for the past.

We rode onward to the next new destination, surprised at what we had found and a little sad that we were leaving. Arizona left us perplexed by its secrecy, complexity and allure. Contemporary meets antiquated meets blue-blood and open-carry. The cities flat, villages unsuspecting and the thoroughfares diverse. With red rock spires in our rearview, we contemplate over our headsets: Would we go back? Oh yes, but this time we won’t be taking off quite so soon. I’m afraid, I said to Justin, that the bar is set quite high...