Cross-Country Ramble 16: Life After Globe

Sent: 96-05-03 02:33:48 EDT

 

A couple of messages ago I told you-all the route we expected to be following. By now, sharp-eyed readers will have noticed that we're not where we said we'd be. That's because we examined our maps of the Silver City part of our planned route and saw two steeper, longer grades than the Superior to Globe grade--and we flinched. We found an alternate route that took us over the continental divide via a road so flat that, with the wind behind us, we were able to go 60 miles in a day with relative ease. What we saw--flat brown desert without flowers--couldn't have been as interesting as going through Silver City, but discretion is the better part of valor, right? Please say yes.

 

We spent today in Deming, NM. We visited their historical museum and were quite impressed. We hadn't expected such a small town to have this large a collection so well presented. Deming is one of the nicer towns we've visited. It has a center, it has a good variety of businesses and things aren't too run down. It's too bad, but Deming is the exception. Most of the small towns we've gone through appear to be dying--or dead.

Ken in a Besh-Ba-Gowah dwelling in Globe, AZ. Ken in a Besh-Ba-Gowah dwelling in Globe, AZ.

Globe, AZ, was another town that impressed us. This small town has excavated and partially restored a prehistoric Native American town called Besh-Ba-Gowah. We enjoyed climbing ladders up to the roofs of the one- and two-story dwellings, then descending into the windowless, doorless rooms via holes in the roof. We have seen dwellings like this embedded in cliffs, but these were on flat land.

 

Globe's business district even includes a bike shop--the One-Stop Bicycle and Trophy Shop, which, in addition to bicycles and trophies, sells used furniture.

 

The owner's girl friend--the owner was off working at his day job--sold me some spare spokes and a Hyperglide free-wheel remover tool. Unfortunately, she couldn't tell me how to use the tool and I couldn't figure it out. Perhaps one of our readers will be able to answer my simple question: which way do I turn it?

 

We also bought some Slime--day-glo phosphorescent green slippery goo that only a 12-year-old boy could love. One of our seemingly trustworthy active correspondents recommended Slime to us to prevent flats.

 

As luck would have it, we got the opportunity to try out our Slime the very next morning when we discovered that Carol's back tire had gone flat overnight. Rather than remove the tire and patch the tube, I simply injected a cup of Slime into the tube and pumped it back up again. It held! Apparently the little fibers imbedded in the Slime had plugged the leak, something like the way platelets clot to stop bleeding.

 

Later that day, Carol's back tire got a little low, so I pumped it back up again. Later, we began to hear a new sound--like Carol's tire was rubbing on something. We stopped a couple of times to check and found nothing, but the strange rubbing sound got louder and louder. When Carol's tire got soft again, I decided it was time to patch it right--the old-fashioned way.

 

It was at this point that I learned something new: releasing the remaining air from a slime-filled tube can give you a wonderful day-glo green slime fountain! I also learned another thing: that hadn't been a rubbing sound--it had been a squishing sound. It was the sound of Slime that had leaked through a too-large hole in Carol's tube and which was now occupying the space between the tube and the tire. I still believe that Slime could plug a small hole, because I saw that lots of fibers that had almost plugged that large hole. But next time I work with a Slime-filled tube, I'll hold the valve stem higher than the rest of the tube and give the Slime time to flow down before I release any pressure--and I'll point it away from me.

 

Ken Lyon

 

PS: Carol and I really enjoy your comments. Keep ‘em coming.

 

Itinerary:

  • Day 30-31: Lordsburg, NM
  • Day 31-32: Deming, NM

The pace of our trip is slowing down right now because we are ahead of schedule. We have to fly out of El Paso to do some business in Washington nine days from now. We're only two or three biking days away from El Paso. We'll use the extra days to take some side trips or to just goof off.

 

PS:  In Deming, another newspaper reporter spotted us and wrote us up in the Deming Headlight newspaper.

Some nice coverage in the Demin Headlight newspaper. Some nice coverage in the Demin Headlight newspaper.

Ramble 17: Chateaubriand for Two.