Arizona republican., 1907-01-18
AN OVERLAND TRIP
 PACED BY DEATH
Two Phoenix Young Men Who Might Have Lost Their Lives in a Variety
 of Ways.

1 imetaphorical, hyberbOlical or OVer-
 descriptive in this statement. These
 gentlemen made their trip at the psychological moment when ally the large adjectives and expressive phrases
 applied to any and all parts of the ter
 ritory embraced in the journey to Tue
 son and back, were timely and if any
 thing beggarly, in their meaning. The
 tour was planned as a motorcycle out | ing; one of those pleasurable jaunts
 one reads about before he buys a mo- torcycle. This story is the way he
 feels about it after he has had tour;
 when the natural instinct of duty to-
 ward mankind in general leads him to
 confidential relation of his ex- periences for the benefit of humanity.
 The young gentlemen set out on Mon
 day morning. They did not feel it an | imperative duty to go to Tucson but | they had heard of that station on the Southern Pacific and supposed that
 was as good a place to go as anywhere
 and they really felt that they had to go somewhere. A motorcycle is of no
 more value to a man when it is stored in the barn than is conscience which he keeps in his church Dew and never uses except on Sunday, so these en- 1 thusiastic Wheelmen decided to oil up
 and hit the grit. They took the Flor ence route not feeling that they could depend on the Gila bridge and they
 knew there was a good ferry at Flor { ence. over the Gila river. To be fair to the wheels it should be admitted that they reached Florence without encoun-
 4l,.. -fFser any really irritating incidents.
 After crossing the Gila they pulled
 for Red Rock with all the strength of their gasoline muscles, but the weather was threatening. rain had preceded them, was following them and in fact was all the time lurking by the road side while the path was heavy and dis couraging. They reached Red Rock
 Monday night pretty well tired out but mighty glad they got somewhere where a roof could be crawled under, before it got to raining real hard. IL rained all that night and most of Tues day and by Tuesday afternoon they had made satisfactory negotiations with Nr. Harriman's representative a. Red Rock for the transportation of
 
 had money enough left to buy them selves tickets to that division point. as they rolled out of Red Rock Tues day afternoon they looked across the country to the south and beheld the Santa Cruz river. What they saw was not the sand wash folks make fun of when they laugh about the Santa Cruz, but was the really and truly raging Santa Cruz. three miles wide and ap parently almost as deep. Anyhow it didn't look good to a wheelman and they blessed the name of the man who invented railroads.
 They were glad they brought their motorcycles though for they would cer- tainly have a fine time speeding over Tucson townsite and through the beau tiful sandy hills over and beyant." But when they reached Tucson they found that village under water. prac- ticslly. Of course the houses stuck up through the swamp and here and there patch of street or sidewall. was in evidence so the above statement strictly construed might seem a little over overdrawn, but from a wheelman's standpoint the city was hopelessly and calamitously submerged. It was time then for hasty action. There was no hope for relief by the bicycle route so they packed their machines and while MT. Carr was shipping them to PhOe- nix. C. O. D.. Tom was wiring Paw" for money. Pending a satisfactory re- ply they applied at the river front to know who the 1907 Noah was and to in- quire how the building of the new ark was coming on; also if there was any room left in the steerage.
 The money came all right and they morning but were told at the depot that the railroad was out of business A dozen or so freight cars had been piled up on the right of way at Bowie. 1t was understood, by the explosion Of a car of dynamite. They later learned however that there was no explosion and it was just d commonplace wreck A train did arrive though about noon and brought upon it a badly injured railroad man who was hurt in the wreck. They took the next train west connected at MaricOpa with the local train which had been held and imag- ined their worries were all over. But there has been enough happen between here and Maricopa to break up families and ruin life prospects. Their hair had hardly got to lying down flat on their heads before they reached the Gila river and one glance at that stream raised it up again. The Glla was Gais- ing again, tumbling and cavorting like all possessed and giving an imitation of a storm on the Atlantic ocean. lf was not a bad imitation, as a number of other people said who were there at the time.
 The trainmen sniffed the air a little bit, squinted down the bridge to see if the piles were still fairly we'll in line. and decided to cross. They did so m safety of course, for the NJ. and r. men never yet dropped a car in the Giia river and their special pride is their ability to shake the Gila bridge and tell by the feel of it, whether it is safe to run a train over. Nevertheless the pas on the train imagined they could feel the bridge doubling up every ! few yards and every time a wave would swish by they would experience i feeling of uauSea as much as tO say |