The rutted dirt road we had been creeping along in southern Arizona near the Mexican border %26#151; the perfect setting for some over-the-top S.U.V. commercial %26#151; suddenly vanished into a murky creek. Skeptical that our rented sedan could slosh through, we used a stick to test the water%26#8217;s depth before inching across.
Then, our amateur fording complete, a United States Border Patrol helicopter that we had noticed earlier in the distance suddenly swooped out of the sky and hovered in front of us. We felt as if we had just become characters in some cut-rate thriller.
The pilot and a spotter with binoculars were clearly visible through our windshield. When they finally lost interest in us, after a quarter-mile or so, the helicopter thump-thumped away toward the border, just a couple of miles south. A bit shaken but determined, we pushed on, heading east toward a paved road that would take us back to Interstate 19 and Nogales.
An Indianapolis friend, Richard Beach, and I were on this backcountry road as part of a trip to explore some of the smaller towns on either side of the 70-mile I-19 corridor between Tucson and the Mexican border.
Most tourists driving south out of Tucson stop at a strikingly designed Native American casino, a couple of Spanish Colonial Mission churches, or the arts and crafts center in Tubac. Many are going to Nogales, where they can park and then walk across the border for a day trip to Nogales, Mexico.
For the more adventurous, though, there are any number of tiny, funky towns surrounded by a visual feast of high desert, mountains and rolling grasslands. Then there%26#8217;s the region%26#8217;s vibe, its strangely attractive desolation. There are ghost towns, and living towns that seem to be on their way to becoming ghost towns. It%26#8217;s a place for lovers of deserts who crave the yelp of coyotes at night, a fading hippie haven that serves up stirring vistas of a kind of Southwestern heaven.
Our journey started in Green Valley, about 25 miles south of Tucson, and snaked through towns like Arivaca, Sasabe, Nogales, Patagonia and Sonoita. Along the way, we took in the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge and the Madera Canyon Recreational Area, and crossed the Santa Rita Mountains. Total distance traveled: 212 miles.
The entire loop can be driven in a day if you don%26#8217;t linger. But the region is full of hiking trails and other temptations like bird watching and bar-hopping. Plus, a more relaxed two- or three-day trip allows time to hang out at the local coffee shop or general store and meet the people who give these towns their quirks, charm and funk.
One warning: The border area of southern Arizona is ground zero for drug smuggling and illegal immigration. Many back roads, especially near Arivaca, should be avoided after dark. It%26#8217;s also open range country, so watch out for wandering cattle.
Arivaca, with its rustic wooden buildings and commercial emphasis on ceramics, art, yoga, meditation and herbal remedies, is like traveling back to the late 1960s and early 1970s, except the hippies are grayer and heavier. During those years, Arivaca was discovered by the counterculture, some of whom established a nearby community called California Gulch. Many later moved into town and stayed on. About 1,200 people now live in and around Arivaca.
Mary Noon Kasulaitis is a local historian and the librarian at the Caviglia-Arivaca Library; she has deep roots in Arivaca. Her family arrived during the 1870s silver-mining boom; her great-grandfather was a local doctor and prospector.
%26#8220;The hippies came here in the %26#8217;60s and early %26#8217;70s because it was a pleasant, warm place %26#151; and isolated,%26#8221; she said. %26#8220;By buying up mining claims, which many of them did in California Gulch, you could get cheap private land protected by national forest land. Isolation, self-reliance, anonymity and peace %26#151; that was what they came for. Those who stayed are now the mainstays of the community.%26#8221;
One who stayed was Jeanne Ferris, the associate librarian. Her first son was born in a tepee in California Gulch. %26#8220;I was part of the antiwar movement,%26#8221; she said, %26#8220;and wanted to do something different.%26#8221;
Another was Tom Shook, who runs the Gadsden Coffee Company on the eastern edge of town. He roasts and sells about 1,000 pounds of coffee beans a week. He came to live in California Gulch in the early 1970s after organizing chapters of Students for a Democratic Society in Texas and Oklahoma and later selling flowers in Tucson. He is a Libertarian and a Tibetan Buddhist. He ran for state mining inspector on the Libertarian ticket in 1982, getting 5 percent of the vote.
%26#8220;Arivaca is a place where you can do your own thing with no interference from others,%26#8221; Mr. Shook said, stroking his long, ZZ Top-style beard. %26#8220;I don%26#8217;t look back; I live in the present. Hell, I never thought I%26#8217;d make it to 30. It%26#8217;s a real thrill to be looking at 60.%26#8221;
FROM Arivaca to Sasabe, the road cuts through the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge, which is well worth a stop. The refuge has a permanent herd of about 60 pronghorn antelope and is popular with bird watchers and hikers. The refuge also operates the Arivaca Cienega, on the east side of Arivaca. It%26#8217;s a rare desert wetland %26#151; featuring a two-mile handicap-accessible trail %26#151; fed by a spring that makes it a haven for migratory birds; it also attracts local critters like coyotes and deer.
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