First Day on the Road Motorcycle Camping in Arizona

There's my hotel on the left the Jungle Motel down here in Bisbee , Arizona .

We're going to take a ride through the historic district on the way out of town here .

We've got a cafe , a pizza restaurant , a Mexican restaurant and a Vietnamese restaurant .

All one block away from the motel , which is really nice .

If you come down here , stay the night with us , you can just walk to go get something to eat or drink .

And if you walk a little further , you're in downtown Old Bisbee here .

You can see how steep the hills are on both sides of the street here .

It's in a , there's lots of old hidden staircases .

It's a really fun city to walk around in it .

Kind of has a European vibe .

It's quite unlike any other city in the United States , to be honest .

And there's more historic architecture here than anywhere else in the state of Arizona .

And this was a big copper mining town in its heyday .

It was the wealthiest city between ST Louis and San Francisco and about 30,000 people lived here .

Now there's about 5000 people and it's more of a tourist and arts town .

Well , this is the first stop on the journey here .

I'm only about a half an hour from home as you can see by the sign , it's the Coronado National Memorial and we're really close to the US Mexico border .

In fact , just over my shoulder there in the distance , you can see a little bit of the border wall peeking out .

And that's kind of the newer , bigger , larger border wall that they've built where we're going to head down the road here .

We'll get a chance to ride next to the older style border wall , which is really just kind of a , a barbed wire fence .

I'm wearing a brand new tour helmet and I'm so appreciative that they sent me this helmet because my old one was about six years old and it was pretty worn out .

So it's really good to have a nice new , modern , clean fresh adventure riding helmet .

This is an area that I really come riding a lot because it's so close to home and it gets me right into the mountains here .

These are the Wachuka Mountains and you can actually get up an elevation to 9000 or close to 10,000 ft .

It's actually a lot cooler down here at this elevation than it is further north up in Tucson and Phoenix .

And so a lot of people can't imagine that you would head south of Phoenix towards Mexico and get cooler .

And that's one of the things that I like about living down here is I get to live in the desert , but it's not that extreme heat like you get in the cities further to the north .

Right now .

We're at about 5000 ft of elevation .

It's a really nice little paved road heading into the Wachuka Mountains here .

We're going to go past the visitor center in a minute and then the road will turn to dirt and we're going to climb up into these mountains and we are just about to encounter our first dirt road .

We're going to stick to some relatively easy roads on this adventure .

And I want to show you guys how much fun you can have .

Just take the normal back roads , be they dirt or pavement that you don't have to ride super aggressive or extreme to really have a good time .

I have to say that this is a big heavy motorcycle .

I'm back on the big bike and all of the luggage that I have on the back , but I know it will come to me really soon and I'll get used to it .

And before I know it , it'll just feel like any other motorcycle , nice switchbacks here to get the blood flowing and get used to balancing the big heavily laden bike .

So this is the view point .

You can see Mexico down here and that's the border wall .

This is going to be another big long adventure .

I'm really looking forward to it on so many levels .

My plan for today is to ride through these mountains and then cross the interstate over by Nogales and then continue on the other side through some more mountains to the town of Arivaca .

So you can see this is how I've got my gopro set up in the back .

I've got this mono pod attached to the rear of the bike and a mono pod is , is like a tripod with a single stick that you could set your camera on and just kind of use it to stabilize .

But I've got it turned upside down as you can see , it goes up and down so I can change the height and using some different ram mounts has got a GoPro attached .

Hopefully that go pro in the back is , well , it doesn't look like it's pointed in the right direction .

Let's have a look , it's rotating .

We've got to fix that somehow .

Ok ?

I just mounted the GoPro down on the crash bars to get a different angle .

And because I know that it wasn't quite working out back there and it certainly won't work through this rougher section here .

And there is the US Mexico border wall .

You can actually ride along it right here for about 15 or so miles and it's a really fun , fun dirt road with lots of steep hills and sharp corners .

There's no warning signs , no curve ahead .

So you really just have to pay attention .

This is not a road that gets much traffic .

You really have to be careful riding on this road because there's a lot of sharp corners and hills and they can be really surprising and just come at you very quickly and if you're not paying attention and going too fast , you'll go over the side of the road before you know it , we're into this metal fence over here .

Neither of which would be a good idea .

Further complicating things is the fact that you can really get going on some of these straightaways as well .

But then like I said , all of a sudden , you've got a really sharp curve right here .

If that's ok , you just have to use your own judgment , be safe and as responsible as you think you should be .

So you can see now that I have at least four different go pro positions , the one from the helmet camera , the one over my shoulder , the one looking at the front tire of the bike and then this one facing back towards myself and it's going to be nice to have that versatility of shots and some of the riding sections on this trip , roads like this one are kind of the perfect alternative to the pavement for me on a big trip .

I'm not looking for the hardest roads on this adventure ahead .

It's not going to be me trying to show you what a bad ass rider I am .

It's more me trying to be safe and enjoyable but in remote back country locations , traveling through the San Rafael Valley now , which is an area of grasslands and there's a real sense of calm and tranquility out here .

I just love riding through here , passing through Loki now , which used to be an old border crossing .

It's no longer active .

It's a historic , small old town .

There's a church over there , a schoolhouse and up here on the left you'll see this big cross right here .

A monument to the first European to come into what is current day Arizona , Frey de Marcos and he was a Spanish missionary explorer .

This is cool .

Now we're getting up into the mountains again after those grasslands , some kind of old mining structure up here .

It's pretty interesting .

There's a really nice view .

Look at all of that landscape out there .

We're heading down towards the town of Nogales .

Now there's a nogales on the US side of the border and a nogales Mexico , very windy out .

And as you can see , I've got my rain jacket on because I got caught in the rain twice today .

It looks like the skies are mostly clear in this direction .

So fingers crossed .

I won't get any more rain , but I do have to say it's not so bad .

The last time I left Arizona on a motorcycle ride , it was over 100 degrees for five days in a row .

And today the thermometer on my bike said that it was actually down to 68 degrees .

So I've got everything I need for camping out tonight .

So I'm going to go find a good spot .

Pick up some groceries in town and see you guys down at the campsite .

Is that I am .

Yeah .

Yeah , I made it out here to Arivaca Lake and I've camped in this spot right here before , but I think I found a better spot right down by the lake .

Let's go check it out .

Well , I would say that today turned out pretty gosh , darn good .

I headed out hoping that I would make it to this location and as it turns out here , I am with plenty of daylight left time to cook a good meal and really nice to be heading out of here with some cooler temperatures and getting to spend my first night in a place like this .

This is gonna be an awesome camping spot , but I'm just really looking forward to cooking some dinner here and watching the light change on this peak over here in the distance .

Just gorgeous .

Right .

Look at the light on that mountain over there in this beautiful little lake .

One thing to notice on my motorcycle over here is that I figured out another use for the mono po .

I've got my hamp kitchen hanging from it and my jacket and my helm .

So that's pretty awesome to keep that stuff off the ground .

So what do we have for dinner tonight ?

Stopped at the grocery store and I've got some , uh , Parmesan fettuccini pasta .

I'm going to cook that up .

I'll make a little salad here with a tomato and an avocado and just on a whim .

I picked up some sriracha salt .

So we'll put that on our little salad .

I've got a couple small bottles of Black Oak merlot from California and if I'm still hungry and I need some dessert , have a piece of , this should be pretty good .

We're not gonna be eating too bad out here tonight .

It's gonna be a good , a good first night on the road .

A good first meal .

I'm looking forward to cooking meals on this trip and having you guys over for dinner with me , so to speak .

I've got some , uh , some good ideas , some , some , some new things to share with you guys .

It's a big part of , uh , a trip like this for me .

I said it in the last series .

Is that at the end of the day , there's three things that I want a cold , drink , a hot meal and a comfortable bed to sleep in .

But there's some criteria that I look for .

And the first thing is is that it really has to be a beautiful camp .

It can't be some trashy , dark hollow with other people's trash in it or whatever .

It's just , it's got to have that aesthetic appeal .

The second thing that I would like to find is that it's free .

There's a lot of free opportunities for wild camping , boon docking , things like that out in the west .

And if you know where to look , you don't really have to pay any money this place .

For example , there's a sign right here saying that it's completely free .

I like it to be not too crowded .

And fortunately for me with the kind of vehicle that I'm riding , I can usually get to some places where there aren't too many other people around .

And that's nice for me .

I know a lot of people don't necessarily want to camp all by themselves because they don't have the experience or they're afraid of animals or lots of things , which I understand .

But once you get a little experience under your belt , it's pretty enjoyable to be in a place like this and have what you need to have a good night .

And the last thing that's nice is if I can find water , I can camp next to water that just always elevates my camping experience .

Number one , you have a source of water and I have a water filter .

So if I need to fill up my water , I can do that .

The second reason is I could go for a swim , clean off a little bit .

That's always a good consideration .

And then the last thing is that it just makes the cooking process a little bit easier , especially the clean up aspect of it , if there's a body of water and if I can use some water by the lake and then come back to the shore and in the proper environmentally responsible way , do my dishes .

And I guess I would say the other thing is , is that it should be a legal place to camp as well .

You know , when I'm out looking for campsites , that's also one of my criteria is that , that it is an acceptable legal place to camp .

Unfortunately , there's a lot of national forests and B L M land and things like that .

Those are generally places where you can do dispersed wild camping and there isn't a charge and there's a time limit , but it's like 14 days .

So if I'm just going to be in and out , do my thing , clean up after myself , leave no trace .

I can find places like this and we sure found a good one here tonight .

The light is so incredible right now on these mountains over here .

Absolutely gorgeous .

I found another use for this mono pod here too .

It's a good attachment point .

If I want to string up a line and use it for airing out my clothes .

I've got this new Merino wool T shirts and underwear and socks .

Merino wool really has some properties that keep your clothing from smelling and you don't have to wash it nearly as often .

So I'll definitely tell you some more about it in the future .

But right now I've got this little clothes line set up and I didn't wash anything .

I'm just airing it out .

That's what I was instructed to do .

They said don't even worry about washing it every day , just let it air out and it'll be good to go .