Day 8: 2,592 miles End of the Road..this one anyway.

At approximately 3:20 pm today we arrived at the Santa Monica pier the end of Route 66. The Route today was nearly all off of the Interstate which is great.  That's the good news. The bad news is that the Route goes thru the heart of LA on its way to Santa Monica which used to be a small rural community along the coast. We went thru Pasadena, China Town, Hollywood, Beverly Hills and a multitude of other "suburbs" that used to be bedroom communities that Route 66 passed thru on its way to the coast.  These communities wiith the exception f maybe of Hollywood and Beverly Hills, have completely lost their identity and so has the Route along this stretch.  It took us literally 7 and 1/2 hours to travel 150 miles.  Here are some photos from the travels up to and  thru LA..

This is the "bottle farm" between Barstow and LA..  Not sure the point or goal of  having a bottle farm but that certainly fits with previous "attractions." No rhyme, no reason.

This is a concrete pillar on one of the bridges outside of LAX up in the mountains.

This tower labeled Santa Fe but iti is actually in California and was built because of the Santa Fe railroad.






Here is a photo of one cool motel right outside of LA.   Still open and it looked very clean. Could you imagine pulling up to these with kids back in the day?








When we arrived at Santa Monica Pier we immediately looked for the 66 to Cali End of Route T-shirt  shop operated by Dan Rice perhaps the top promoter of Route 66 in the country these days. While his focus is on improving California's marketing of Route 66, he is an unbelievable proponent of the entire Route. He is a Made in America guy who truly, truly believes in the importance of thee Route to America's heritage and history. We were disappointed he wasn't there to meet us but his right hand man Henry was there and confirmed everthing about Dan that we had heard from Ramona and Bob from Lincoln, Mo, Kevin and Nancy in Tucumcari, Gary from the DX outside of Carthage and  Bill from Shea's automative in Springfield, Ill.. I am hopeful to meet Dan in the future and hope that Henry keeps his vigor about the Route.

Here is the sign from the outside of his shop and the style he is promotiing. If you stop by his little kiosk be sure to sign the guest book as they are trying to prove to the State of Californian that over 600,000 folks travel at least some part of the Route every year and a large number of them end up in California. From our travels, we can tell you he is not far off in his assessment.
     The Route is not just an American thing...we met folks from Japan, Austuralia, Scotland, Italy, France, Germany and New York(a foreign country in some eyes). One couple from New York had flown to Amarillo Texas and driven to Santa Monica. They rolled down their window on the Route in the middle of LA to confirm we had been on The Route. They had recognized the red mud on the side of the car(again sorry Angie..not my fault).  We ran into the couple again on the pier and talked to them like we were long lost friends.  They understood where we had been and understood why had wanted to go there in the first place.  This isn't the first or the last conversation like this I sense. If you have driven on Route 66 you get it.

Here is a photo of the three us on the Santa Monica pier at the official end of trail sign.


I really can't believe we are at the end of this road trip. 8 years or so of conversation and "you know what we should do" talk along with 8 months of actual planning and scheduling and the Route 66 Road Trip 2012 has for the most part come and gone. I'm not sure about the other two guys but this trip has affected me in a number of positive ways. 





First of all, there are simply things in life that you cannot control. When you travel the Route you see business after business that invested their livelihood into a dream only to have something completely out of their control undercut them at the knees...The interstate went in, no exit or too far from their business and End of Dream. Sometime that just happens.

Second, life truly is short and not only should you take advantage of opportunities to do these types of things, you should aggressively and proactively chase after them.

Third, life for all of us needs to slow down. I'm as guilty as the next person of being a bit of  a work-a-holic driven to achieve or succeed or whatever the standard is.  Every now and then(or as often as possible) you need to slow down and take the two lane scenic route instead of the "hell in a hand basket" 4 lane.  You never know what you will see or who you will meet or what you might discover.

The trip has been a blast. I would definitely do this or something like this again. I hope I have the opportunity to see some of the folks we met again and see how things continue to change on The Route. I get this feeling that more and more people are going to start appreciating these types of adventures. I truly hope so.


TJ

Day 7: ARIZONA STILL ROCKS PLUS NUMBER 367,317, 28,118, 130 AND 230.

We ended the night last night in Williams Arizona the self proclaimed Gateway to the Grand Canyon. We stayed at the recently refurbished Grand Canyon Hotel right on main street Williams which is the oldest hotel on Route 66. This hotel to put it bluntly was a fire trap and a dump before Amy and Oscar got ahold of it 7 years ago. They now have it completely refurbished with as much of the original details from before and even have remodeled the old stable into an amazing pair of suite type rooms. We stayed in one of those rooms as it had a king bed and a futon plus a bathroom large enough to park the convertible in.  So no large cockroaches to wrestle last night so we settled in and wandered into the town of Williams which is essentially a 3 block long area of shops, bars and restauarants. We had a blast as we bounced from place to place and ended up sitting outside listening to an entertaining guitar player and getting the crowd to sing along.  Here are some photos from Williams...a town that I will definitely have to return to some day.

 

 That's Dennis and Scott with the mayor of Williams. I asked him if Williams had always been this vibrant and exciting because well you know, it's not like the Grand Canyon just showed up a few years ago.  The town was filled to the brim with folks from all over the world and it was only Wednesday.  There was a 20 minute wait at the restaurant we chose and every other place was packed. We saw people from Germany, Italy, Japan, France and I'm sure a number of other countries and quite honestly I had never heard of this town. Well the mayor at first told us with a twinkle in his eye and a wry smile that it was all due to outstanding leadership.  A little self promotion I guess..actually he said the change only started maybe 10 years ago and has finally taken off with the help of people like Amy and Oscar at the Grand Canyon Hotel who were willing to invest in the community.  He also went right down the list of other places we needed to visit including his son's diner down the street..naturally.  It would have been great to spend more time talking to him but he was busy dragging people in off the street to his bar and restauarant after the gunfight(yep they have one twice a day). You could tell he was quite the character....and speaking of characters..




















 You know the second guy long rumored to be dead. Apparently he just moved to Route 66 and nobody has paid attention yet.  Funny story..as this version of The King came into the diner, he went straight to the bathroom. As soon as the door to the bathroom closed someone in our party yelled..Oh my god don't die!!!!! Those of you old enough know what that means.  Won't say who said it but it wasn't Scott or Dennis...I believe at least two other tables in the diner got it. Fortunately, The King returned and took his seat at the counter for a root beer shake or something. Apparently this Elvis is the Early years thin Elvis.  The Eagles and Elvis...Arizona truly Rocks!!!!
     The first guy is Angel Delgadillo who with his brother Juan(now deceased) established Seligman Arizona as an absolute must stop for Route 66 travelers. When we arrived there were no less than 3 tour buses there and Angel was indeed giving a hair cut to a German fellow who couldn't understand a word Angel said and vice versa....lucky Angel didn't get confused and give him a perm or something.   Juan ran the drive in that has a ton of great memoralbilia.  Here is one of my favorites....


It says Car Wash- Best Hand Job in Town----Yes it's a legit and yes that is a replica of Mater from the Cars Movie which is based on Route 66 in the background.
















 The majority of today was spent on the old original Route 66 in Western Arizona and Eastern Arizona...here are the numbers I listed above....
367---total miles travelled
317---miles you would have travelled if you went interstate
28---the total miles we actually spent on the Interstate of the 367
118---the high temp hit around 3 pm in Needles California
130---the number of residents living in Oatman, Arizona
250---the number of wild burros living around but mostly in Oatman, Ariz.

This was the most rural portion of the Route and in addition to Seligman, AZ mentioned about we went thru Oatman, AZ.  Here are the photos that explain the numbers above...




















These burros run the town..and of course, bring in the tourists. Pretty cool except for the little pile of surprises they leave all over plus I was a bit worried that the FiberOne bars we had in the back of the car would lead a donkey/burro attack on the convertible--top up or not. We were able to hold them off and find time to get a cold beer before departing. 

Regarding the top of the convertible..we held on as long as we could but 118 is flippin hot and oh by the way THIS IS THE MOJAVE DESERT.  People died there. We survived 105 with the top down in New Mexico but had to give in for most the afternoon today and put the top up to run the air.
    












Here are some photos of the scenery from the day and you can understand why we hid under the lid..




That is water in the photo..it's the Colorado river and apparently that has no impact on temp since it was 118 right there too.
When you travel this stretch of The Route you really begin to appreciate the effort given or question the sanity of those that followed this road west. Of course, that could likely be said about three 50 year old guys with seemingly better things to do..work, kids, wives etc. etc...Sometimes there is no reason for going West..there is just the need or desire to do so.

I can't believe we are one day from the end of the road(this road anyway). I leave you with a cool photo we took today  along with my conclusion from this trip that life really isn't about the destination but it truly is the journey. 








Oh wait..one other thing...we did disprove an age old adage used time and time again.  The adage is
IF YOU BUILD IT THEY WILL COME. Well, that might work with Field of Dreams but not on the Route, Otherwise we wouldn't have witnessed this built along a long dead tourist stop on the Route.

Easter Island just can't compete with the Eagles and Elvis.  More tomorrow on our journey thru California and our final day with the three of us all together.

TJ

Day 6:  ARIZONA ROCKS..........
Although we started the day in New Mexico, we were only there for another hour or two as we drove toward Arizona. I may have been a bit hard on New Mexico and the day yesterday.  I'm writing it off to the realization that happens on every vacation/trip/adventure that you are halfway done with the trip and in a few short days you will back to work.  To say today was an amazing day is an understatement.  Not really sure where to start. So let's start with one of the two highlights.  Arizona Rocks for a number of reasons(see the landscape photos below) but I have to tell you, one trip to Winslow Arizona is all you need.  Here is the photo....

That is us "Standing on a Corner in Winslow Arizona, such a fine sight to see." This town has embranced the Eagles' classic song and made the best of it, putting a gift shop, wall mural and statute on the "corner in Winslow Arizona."  On the route, some people point to Cadillac Ranch or any one of a dozen other locales, but for me, this is one of the top 3 places I've visited on The Route. It is such a quaint, quiet little town but  you can't help but walk around with that song in your head.  Truly a kind of Mecca for us 50 year old Eagles fans.

On to other views from the day.... here are some photos from the Western part of New Mexico and Arizona..truly beautiful areas.

Now, if you ever want to venture out on this trip the maps often say.."it is impossible to travel the Route uninterrupted" plus they will have notes that say  "continue this direction AS CONDITIONS PERMIT" ...well what the hell does that all mean. What they mean to say is if you go this way you might be frickin nuts but you may be rewarded with some exciting times.  Here are a couple of the highlights from those routes...

Yes those are horses, coming thru a tunnel right at us on the road and yes that is the shiny new mustang crossing a 20 foot wide stream of mud and water(please, please don't tell Angie).
 Again, back to my point in earlier posts..these are the things that simply don't happen on the "antiseptic just get from one point to another" interstate highway system.  The Route thru New Mexico and Arizona requires you to get off the Interstate seldom but when it does the rewards are great.  Here are the 3 of us enjoying a cold beer at the highest point eleveation wise on Route 66 which was on one of those routes that said specifically "as conditions permit."

And here are more rewards...yes those are Albino Buffalo..ever see those in Iowa???
 and check out the view from the car going up  one of the mountains.























One last thought on the day and it involves one very simple picture.

This is a highlight for one basic reason. By my count, I have been up and over the Continental Divide no less that 20 times driving and/or hiking. Some folks that I know cannot say they've been over it once. Of those 20 times, the vast majority of those trips have involved Scott and Dennis. To have friends that feel the same sense of adventure is a blessing..we truly have had some great times going to and coming from the West Coast. This trip is no exception. Oh yeah, and with what friends would you ever comfortable just riding a jackrabbit?

 Can't believe we have come this far. Seems like we have been gone a month and only a day all at the same time. Onward west tomorrow. Roughly 500 miles to the coast left but much to see and do.  Excited to see what it brings.

TJ

Day 5: New Mexico, New Mexico, New Mexico....keep saying it and maybe you will believe it is new.

There is nothing new about New Mexico these days. Despite being one of the last states to join the United States, the entire massive state is filled with seemingly old things. Old towns, old mountains, old signs and well NOT MUCH NEW. We started the day where we ended it, with Kevin and Nancy at the Blue Swallow Motel. Great coffee with big mugs in the lobby and the two of them bustling around the property checking people out, selling souvenirs, watering plants, cleaning rooms and oh yeah making a little breakfast for themselves.   That's life of an independent business owner. Here are a couple more photos of their motel.

From Tucumcari we set out West toward Santa Fe, the Pre-1937 Route 66.  I shouldn't be so hard on the State of New Mexico as Santa Fe truly is a vibrant city..filled with art, shopping, amazing restaurants and oh yeah...tons and tons of OLD buildings. The age of Santa Fe actually adds to its charm and I'm truly excited to have my daughter attend college there the next couple of years. It is too, too far away but every kid should spread their wings at some point.  Here are a couple of photos of old hotels signs in Santa Fe and the road leading to Santa Fe.



















 Unfortunately all the Motels of note are closed and have fallen either into disrepair, the wrong hands, down, or some other misfortune. After visiting the Munger Moss and Blue Swallow Motels, you can envision what these once amazing properties could have become if someone had grabbed them in time and cared enough to work hard at them. Maybe with the revitalization of the Route more of these properties might make a come back.
   Here are a couple photos on the road today. 

I show these because there are times on the Route in New Mexico that you have to get on the Interstate. I must be becoming a convert or addicted to this or something because quite honestly...the Interstate Sucks!!!  I couldn't wait to get back on two lane...the Interstate is too fast, too loud(convertible car remember) and too boring. You  can see these sights from an Interstate but you simply aren't going slow enough to enjoy them and usually you are dodging Peterbilt semis determined to relive scenes from the movie The Duel......one other thing...the smells(again thank you convertible).....a number of times today we could smell the evergreen trees, the grass being mowed along the Route and after a brief rain shower, the fresh, fresh desert air.
A couple of additional thoughts from the day.  First, while I initially seemed to complain above about New Mexico being old..it truly is a beautiful state. Albuquerque has a beautiful downtown and the rural areas of the State are incredible. We seemingly dodged rain all day but given the size of the valley shown in the above photos..the rain likely was somewhere south of Canada..we could just see that far.
     Second, while New Mexico appears to be a State the never throws anything away or tear anything down, you have to give credit to these folks for living here in the first place. We wondered today and yesterday in the car if some of these towns weren't started simply where the family moving west had their last wagon wheel fall off.
     We ended the day in Grants New Mexico, ate a huge and delicious steak and headed back to the Sands Motel where upon entering the room, we had to kill what Scott thought was a cricket but I'm pretty sure was a cockroach slight smaller than the Mustang. Not an "iconic" location but it will do.(just had to kill/flush or second large bug..a large beetletrying to escape the downpour outside--not a roach though..whew!!!!)

 I hate to see New Mexico go but am glad I will be back here in less than two weeks.We are off to, up and over the Continental divide tomorrow.  We have survived 1500 miles, one sleaze hole of a motel, 100 degree temps, crossing seemingly millions of cattleguards, one alligator sized roach and long 12 hour days of sitting on our rear end in a small car.  I am truly enjoying my time with these two long time friends. The car is dirty(sorry Angie) and we have had to take it thru a couple spots that weren't exactly perfect for a low riding Mustang. Here is one....

  
It was mostly just red muddy water so no biggie. We did actually turn around on one road that turned to gravel so I should get bonus points for that...right.
   More tomorrow as we continue the trek west.  Hopefully more photos...sorry I'm a little long winded today...did I mention I'm moving my daughter out here in two weeks?  Yeah...that will get you thinking.  More driving and thinking tomorrow. Till then.......

TJ

Day Four: A Somber Beginning, A Hot Middle, and a Retro and Classy Finish

Began the day in Oklahoma City and while a tour of the 1995 bombing sight is not on the traditional Route 66 tour we knew we had to go. I don't believe I have any words to describe the feelings one has as you tour the site. Only questions....here are some of the photos.

The photo on the left is the entrance to the bombing memorial and the photo on the left are chairs symbolizing everyone on of the 168 victims that died in the bombing. The small chairs symbolize children and the chairs are organize in rows symbolizing the floor on which they were killed.

Above is another photos of the chairs and a photo of the last remaining wall of the Murrah Building.
It is impossible to fathom what drives one person to do such a thing to innocent people. I expected this trip to be different from the memory standpoint. Seeing this memorial certainly adds perspective and reminds me again of how random things are. Here these people were simply going to work, or for a walk, or filing for social security and their lives came to an end....suppose that's part of the motivation for this trip. Life truly can be short...okay enough serious stuff for today.
      After downtown Oky City we headed west and to say it was hot was an understatement. The thermometer on the car read 107 at one point..pretty sure the temp on Dennis' forehead was another 15 degrees higher in the back seat as he rode in the "photo op" seat of the Mustang. Here are some of the photos from today....

Wild Fires to the West of Oky City....no worries we were quite a ways away.




















This is a tunnel/underground walkway going under Route 66, the second one we've seen.  The Route used to be so busy that they built tunnels to allow the town folks to cross under and avoid the massive traffic....it is simply impossible to imagine such a day in the past. Later on the outskirts of town we actually found areas of a 4 lane Route 66 and our guide book confirmed that at one point the State of Oklahoma in an attempt to help with traffic made the Route 4 lanes.  Nowadays, you can drive those stretches of road and see maybe 2-3 cars every 10 miles.  It is almost eerie.

We ended our day reaching the 1/2 way point of the Route, having some dinner and ending up at yet another amazing classic motel. Dinner was jalapeno chicken fried steak with a jalapeno cheese gravy that promptly put me in a coma. It was amazing along with the calf fries(look them up) and the fried okra..I see a trend here in the Southwest when it comes to cuisine.
 The Blue Swallow Motel is a must see if you travel this way and Kevin and Nancy the proprietors are all in when it comes to Route 66 and are the nicest people. The have refurbished the motel and I am sitting in the deck chair out front right now having an iced vodka writing. I will definitely have to wander thru here again in the near future. Here a couple photos from the end of the day.

  

Off to Day 5...spending the day in New Mexico.  I hope that I end up really liking this State.  I'm delivering my little girl Kara to Santa Fe in 2 short weeks to spend the next 2 years of her life. More tomorrow.  Back to the iced vodka.



TJ

Day 3 An Iconic Motel,The Birthplace of a Legend and a Blue Whale??
Started the day in Lebanon Mo with the great folks at the Munger Moss Motel. Their classic sign was posted in my previous blog. These folks are true American business survivors. 41 year owners of this classic hotel and they have made it thru countless business downturns including the gas crisis of the 70's, the advent of the large chain hotel, and a thousand other reasons to wipe the smile right off their face. These folks are 74 years old and have prided themselves in maintaining the hotel in it's original 50's condition.  Check out this shower.....

Is that the coolest, or what???  They are nicest folks...Bob and Ramona are the types of folks you cannot tear yourself away from talking too, nor do you want to. Of course, they orginally are from Iowa(West Union) so it figures they were hard working and simply  damn nice.  They got us hooked up with the owners of the Blue Swallow Motel in Tucumcari, NM and we have reservations there tomorrow night...can't wait.
     On to what is probably the highlight of my day...The Commerce Comet. Now anyone that even knows me a little knows I'm a bit of a baseball fan(course I pale in comparison to my son Tyler). On Route 66 was an unexpected highlight, even if it was in a very depressing little town.  The  town of Commerce OK is a very depressed community. It appears to have some industry and perhaps some economic vibrancy but overall it is dank, dirty and run down. Smack dab in the middle of run down homes with cars in the front yard and toys and junk scattered every where we found the following photos.

The following plaque explains what it is.

Yeah...I got nothin here...The Mick still leaves me mostly speechless.  As we drove on from Commerce, I wondered why I became less enthralled and excited about the miles we had to travel to Oklahoma City.  It dawned on my as I sat down to type tonight that it was The Mick. When you look at the humble little town  and surroundings he grew up in and the surroundings you realize that greatness can truly come from anywhere.  However, after driving thru South Chicago, Joliet, St. Louis and some of the depressed rural areas of Missouri and Oklahoma, I truly wonder if our country will allow such greatness to show itself anymore. I could go into a long political conversation but won't..that's not the point of the blog but as much as I am still in awe of The Mick, I have now have a greater appreciation for the Mick...that and I wished little kids everywhere would start "making up games" again and getting outside. 
     On to some of the other sights.   Here is a photo of the "sidewalk" road that once was part of The Route...yes we drove the Mustang on it..I'm hoping my wife doesn't read this blog...please don't tell her... This is a real road...no wider than one lane and the white lines are the edges that drop off 2-3 inches. You can see the Route 66  marking in front of the car.

Here is a photo of yet another character on The Route...Gary from Gary's Sinclair that is literally out in the middle of nowhere...unless you call being 1 mile down the road from a delapidated casket manufacturing building "somewhere."  Gary knows as much about The Route as anyone, gives you an autographed photo for free, a free coke or water and will pull out a picture book showing you the "don't miss" items and people on The Route.  He, like the Sheas and Bill and Ramona from Moss Munger motel, is worthy of a full blog on the stories he can tell.

We reached a point today where I think all three off us were a little overwhelmed or maybe numbed by the things you see on the Route. From the excited Gary and other folks mentioned previously to the dreary, delapidated hotels that are now nothing but an old broken neon sign and buildings that quite honestly look like crack houses. The guides books and phone app we are using are showing us amazing historical evidence of The Route's glory days gone by but yet when speaking with the folks we have encountered there seems to be hope. Unfortunately, the folks we encountered are old enough to be our  parents(well mine anyway since I'm the youngest of the 3). Scott wondered aloud if there were younger generations to pick up the Route 66 memories and history and run with it. I wondered what "modern" things we were driving by that will be Route 66 type memories 50 years from now.  Of course, these are all very serious thoughts and maybe we shouldn't worry about such things. I don't think there is a rhyme or reason to what stays and what doesn't.  After all, if there was such planning and reasoned decisionmaking would we be left with the following as a primary tourist attraction in a town?

Yep...it's a blue whale. In the middle of Oklahoma...you try to explain it.

One last note...for those that think this Trip is easy.  Driving two lane(or less) roads is NOT EASY and it takes a hell of a lot longer than we are used to. The good news is The Route makes you slow down.  The bad news is, given just 8 days to make it all the way across The Route, we are locked in to long days.  Roughly 12 hours in the car  each day since and up to Friday.  Thank god for great company, great music(800 songs from 1976-1980) and a great car.  We are having a blast.  Can't wait for tomorrow, the rest of Oklahoma, Texas and into Tucamcari .  More later....

TJ