Alpine is a mountain town that most Arizonans have never seen. It lies at about eight thousand feet in the White Mountains, a few miles from the New Mexico line, in a valley of meadows ringed by pine forest and with the long dome of Escudilla Mountain standing guard to the north. Winters are cold and snowy, summers are cool and green, and the town of a few hundred people feels like a ranching village in the northern Rockies that took a wrong turn south.
Its history is cattle and timber. Settlers came in the late nineteenth century to graze livestock on the high grasslands, and families have worked the land since, with cattle still wandering the verges and horses in the fields. Escudilla, one of the highest peaks in Arizona, inspired the conservationist Aldo Leopold, who wrote about it in his essays on the wilderness and its grizzly bear, killed in 1911, the last of its kind in the state. The mountain is now part of a wilderness area, and its rounded summit is a good landmark on a clear day.
Alpine marks the northern end of a famous road. US 191, the Coronado Trail, runs south from Springerville through the national forest to Clifton and is celebrated for hundreds of twists and turns, but the stretch near Alpine is gentler, running through open meadows and aspen groves with long views. Surfaces are mostly good, but frost heaves, loose gravel and elk on the road are all possible, so keep your speed within sight distance, especially at dawn and dusk. Weather changes rapidly, with afternoon thunderstorms in July and August, and snow from late autumn. September and early October are especially pleasant, when the aspens turn gold and the air is crisp.
Alpine has the basics a rider needs: a petrol station, a couple of small stores and cafés, a few motels and cabins, and a diner that serves big breakfasts. Eagar and Springerville, about thirty kilometres north, have larger supermarkets and more choices. South of town there is little for a long way, so fill the tank here and check your reserves. Carry water and a warm layer, and be prepared for patchy phone signal.
Stand outside in the evening and listen. At this height the sky gets dark and the stars come out in numbers that city riders never see.