The Bummer at Bisbee

The weekend of April 14th we took a trip and stayed in Madera Canyon.  I have heard about the shopping down at Bisbee and wanted to take the opportunity to check it out.  Lucky for me, my husband indulged this desire of mine.  We got down there and things started off well.  We got out of the car and then my husband spotted a trolley tour of the town, so we hoped on!


The tour guide was great, he was friendly and honest.  When he suggests being careful of the local drivers when walking because they don't slow down for anything take him seriously!  He knows the great restaurants to stop at and shared some great stories about Bisbee!  We had a great time on the tour, plus the ticket gets you a discount at a few local places.

We took the tour guides suggestion to eat at a place called The Table.  The decor was industrial trendy and very interesting to look at, but our favorite decoration was right on the table.  They had old Trivial Pursuit Cards!

Seriously, this place was made for us!  Our cards were from the 1980's, so we were on even footing (sort of, my hubby is really smart, I mean seriously he is teaching himself Arabic).

We checked out the menu and while it was a little pricey  we were on vacation and decided the little splurge was alright.  I order the Brie plate and my husband ordered the Mountain Mussels.  The food was amazing!  The fruit on my plate was super sweet and ripe!  The Mussels on my husbands plate practically melted in the mouth and were perfectly seasoned!  The splurge was definitely worth it!

The tour guide told us about these crazy, long stairs in Bisbee that ever October their is actually a contest held where people run up them for the best time.  Their is even one stairway where the contestants have to carry a huge cube of ice up and down it!  I think I'll pass on all of that craziness, asthma and a touch of the I-mnot-that-crazy bug, but I did want to get our picture taken on them because some are painted with great images as you can see.

As we shopped, we found ourselves to be bummed out.  As much as the local drivers don't care if you are crossing as warned by the tour guide driver, many of the shop owners were amazingly rude.  Some didn't acknowledge you until you were at their register, others interrupted a conversation from the street as you passed by with words that indicated you weren't smart if you walked by their store, others challenged your opinion or seemed to push their own agenda far past what any normal person would see as acceptable.

All in all I was discouraged and found the selection in the shops to be lacking.  Many of the shops had very similar products with steep prices.  I think I found one shop that could be considered to be a true Antique shop, it was the first we walked into and the shop-keep had on semi-professional wear and made sure to acknowledge us and answer any questions we had which was awesome!  The rest seemed to more thrift shops with some antiques mixed in with some garage sale quality items.  I stopped going in some after the 3rd disappointing antique shop.

I did find a few shops where we were welcomed and smiled at, even if some we didn't buy from I was happy that some of the people were following proper business etiquette.  Their was a bookstore of sorts that while not acknowledged right away, we could see it was because the cashier was busy with a line and when we got up to buy things they were very warm in their reception of us while checking us out.

I found a few things to get as we went store to store, but honestly thought I would come home with a lot more bags and a better experience.  We headed back down the road we had gone up and my husband, fed up with the poor treatment we got, headed back to the car.  I had one store that I wanted to see because I had read about it and was willing to risk being annoyed one more time to check out.  I was glad I did.  It was the Olive Oil store.  The owner made sure to welcome everyone.  He even walked over to everyone he wasn't able to instantly chat with once he was free and made sure they knew about the products they were looking at and that they got a hello.  They even yelled Hello to the trolley when they heard it whistle.

Their were a lot of bars in town, but we didn't visit any being that it was morning to early afternoon, so I can't speak on those.  If you are interested in checking out the bars, the trolley guide did tell us that they have a great Octoberfest each year, oddly right around the same time of the stair run competition they have.  Color me not surprised, after running some of these stairs, I'd probably need a beer too!

So, while as a whole I was disappointed in the shopping that had been hyped up to me before this trip, I will say their are a few diamonds in the rough in Bisbee.  Despite the diamonds in the rough we managed to find we left Bisbee with the rest of the places sort of ruining the enjoyment we found in those diamonds.  What is the saying, one bad apple ruins the bunch?  I guess that doesn't work in reverse and a few good apples can't fresh-on the lot.  In the end it was a bummer in Bisbee.