The Trip Home

The Trip Home:

According to my navigation system, I would have to travel 1,829 miles and 25 hours/23 minutes to reach home…I started out with great weather and not sure how far I’d go before stopping for the night so today would be handled much more “off the cuff” than my fairly carefully planned trip when heading west!.

As I said, the weather started out very nice and included a nice drive to and then across the Hoover Dam on my way to picking up I-40. From what I could see, it looks as if they are close to finishing a new four-lane road to replace the current two-lane and although I haven’t checked into it, I suspect they will eventually stop all traffic from actually driving “over” the top of the dam as they are building a big, new suspension bridge to handle the new four-lane and crossing the river.

The weather got very “odd” as I neared Flagstaff…I had been running into/out of rain for while and stopped for gasoline just before entering Flagstaff. Within a couple of minutes of getting back onto the road I had to stop and wait under a bridge as it was hailing so much it looked like snow (giving about as much traction)…temps dropped from the 80’s down to 49 degrees in just a couple of minutes. I was probably held-up for at least 20 minutes before continuing out of the mountains of Flagstaff and back to the high desert east of Flagstaff!

Rain would prove to be the “main story” for much of my trip home. I decided to eat dinner in Gallup, New Mexico and got a couple of good “rainbow” pictures while heading out of town. I also decided to stop for the night at the same hotel I used in Albuquerque at the end of Day Three.

For the day; I had traveled 586.6 miles in 8 Hours/56 minutes.

Today’s Pictures

The Trip Home – Continued:

I tried to get an early start on the day after a full night’s sleep and headed out by 8AM after a very light breakfast at the hotel.

There was one predominant word for today – rain!

It rained on me for the vast majority of the way from Albuquerque until I stopped in Amarillo at the Big Texan Steak House for lunch. The Big Texan is quite a place to say the least. One of the things it’s known for is its 72oz. steak which is free IF you can eat it all in less than one hour. While I was there, one fellow actually tried to do it and actually ate the whole thing in a lot less than an hour!

The weather in Amarillo was about the only respite from the rain I was to see that day as I ran right back into rain almost as soon as I was out of town and boy did it rain…it rained for almost 900 miles and in some cases it rained as hard as I had ever seen it rain anywhere. I kept going for the whole day but finally stopped about an hour west of Memphis at about 1AM and decided to sleep for about five hours. A lot of people apparently had the same idea and I think folks were simply tired of driving in the rain.

After a quick fill-up and a McDonald’s breakfast, I started my final 300 or so miles home and got back just about 10:30 AM.

From the time I left Albuquerque I had 1,257 miles/16 Hours 56 Minutes to go before reaching home; I accomplished that averaging 25.1MPG and an average speed of 71.8MPH. It actually took me 17 Hours and 37 Minutes (not counting the five hours of sleep) and 1,256.6 miles (I think the rain slowed me down quite a bit).

Total mileage for the trip – 4,237.4 Miles!

A Few Ending Pictures

I may have some more thoughts to add later but for now, I wanted to mention some of the books and such that I had as references. As I mentioned in my initial post, U.S. Route 66 doesn’t officially exist anymore and generally won’t be reflected on any modern map. So; anyone considering a trip down Route 66 needs help to know how to find the route as well as interesting facts to know alone the way…below are some of the ones I relied on and definitely recommend to anyone considering a trip of their own:

First; check out the Historic Route 66 website which includes a forum I belong to (Robert_TN).

You may also want to check out the Legends Of America site for a lot of interesting reading!

As for books, I highly recommend the following:

EZ66 Guide For Travelers (ISBN 0-9709951-4-8)

Route 66 Traveler’s Guide and Roadside Companion (ISBN 0-312-25417-2)

Route 66 Dining & Lodging Guide (ISBN 0-9709951-5-6)

Traveling Route 66 (ISBN 0-8061-3326-0)

Let me also say that a lot of what I’ve written in this blog, while my own thoughts and observations, include facts and bits of information I gathered from a variety of places including the internet, people I spoke with along the way and some facts/figures taken from some of the references above…I didn’t intentionally copy anyone else’s work but I do want to acknowledge the help offered by the above references.

Day Seven - Las Vegas, Nevada

Day Seven:

I’m not really a gambler and that’s not why I come to ‘Vegas…for me, it’s simply an exiting and interesting place to be. However, for this trip it was also a place to rest/re-charge before starting my trip back home.

I think it was about 9PM on Thursday night when I arrived at my hotel on the North-East side of Las Vegas (not far from Nellis Air Force Base)…I hadn’t eaten dinner yet so I wound out at a Denny’s (always open you know!) for dinner.

The next day (Friday) I slept in and then went to give my 370 a good bath and get it ready for the trip home (putting the front end bra on, etc)…after the car washing and a good brunch, I went back to my hotel for a nap (planning on being up late that night).

I had decided to take in a late evening movie (Transformers; Revenge of the Fallen) and then spend some time in downtown Las Vegas…the movie was quite good and the drive into and in Las Vegas was great. I know business is supposed to be down in ‘Vegas but you couldn’t tell it from the amount of traffic on Las Vegas Boulevard at 1AM!

I tried to take some decent “night” pictures…I’ll let you be the judge of how they turned out. Anyway; got back to my hotel about 3AM and slept in until about 8AM the next morning and heading for home!

Las Vegas Pictures

Day Six - Flagstaff to Oatman (then on to Las Vegas)

Day Six:

What can I say about my last day on Route 66? It's been a great trip but today proved to be the best I think as both the weather and the road were near perfect today. This part of Arizona offers the longest section of uninterrupted Route 66 still in existence with almost 159 miles of real Route 66; most of which leaving I-40 completely out of sight (although you do cross the I-40 a couple of times).

Some good photo opportunities presented themselves but the first big treat of the day was when I reached Seligman. Seligman is called the birthplace of Route 66 (or rather, the effort to bring the old highway back to life). I spent some considerable time talking with Angel Delgadillo's son (actually I never truly clarified if it was Angel's son I was speaking with but I'm fairly certain that's who it was!) who related the story to me. It seems that Angel, who ran the local barber shop/pool hall, didn’t want to see his town die…for nearly ten years after I-40 bypassed Seligman, Angel lived with essentially no income – he used to say that you could lie down in the middle of the street and never have to worry about being run over. So, refusing to listen to all the “nay-sayers” he set out to bring Route 66 back to life. That gave birth to the Historic Route 66 Association of Arizona (http://www.azrt66.com/ ) which was run from a small wooden desk in Angel’s shop.

That was in the mid 80’s…Angel is pretty much retired now (he is in his 80’s) but he’ll still give a haircut or a shave to “out of towners” only! His barbershop/pool hall is now filled with Route 66 memorabilia. I had a chance to meet and talk with Angel for a few minutes and his son took a picture of us together!

Next up was Kingman, Arizona - an interesting town with a lot of Route 66 businesses left including “Mr. D’s” diner where I had lunch (Datsun/Nissan aficionados will appreciate one of today’s pictures). I have to say, I had one of the best hamburgers I’ve had in many years and the inside of the diner was really a treat to see.

However, the highlight of the day had to be Otaman…called the ghost town that refused to die, Oatman is truly a step back into time. Billions of dollars worth of gold was taken out of the mines in Oatman but that changed when it became illegal to own gold (however that's changing again as they are preparing to begin mining operations again given the current price of gold!).

One of Oatman’s trademarks is it’s wild burrows…when the mines closed, the burrows were released into the wild and now, every day, they come out of the hills to get food from the nearly one million tourists that come through Oatman every year. Each burrow has a name and the few residents of Oatman know them all by their names and look out for them. Two colts had just been born about three weeks ago (see pictures). The burrows are friendly and don’t seem to know they are wild at all!

Oatman not only has a history of being quite a successful gold mining town but it's also been used for movies including "How The West Was Won"...one of the buildings (see pictures) boasted that Debbie Renyolds and George Peppard had "walked through these doors"...unfortunately the building, now used as a museum, was closed while I was there (only open on weekends).

Also while in Oatman, I had a chance to meet up with Brian (aka “TheEditor” on http://www.historic66.com/forum/ ....he was traveling the route from Albuquerque and going to end in ‘Vegas.

Essentially, this ends the “Route 66” part of my vacation – it’s been a great trip with mostly great weather (and even a couple of days that were quite mild) alone with some great sights; great people, and some great driving.

After spending about three hours in Oatman, I headed out for a couple of hours drive to Las Vegas…more about ‘Vegas in my next installment.

Perhaps more than anything, Route 66 represents what most of us take for granted – the ability to just get in our car and travel from one end of the country to the other without anyone’s permission…it’s about freedom…about the ability to see just how large and diverse our country is. In the midst of all the Walgreens and McDonalds and the dozens of other cookie-cutter franchise businesses; it’s nice to know that there are still businesses that exist in only one place!

I didn’t keep track of the exact driving time from Oatman to Las Vegas but it wasn’t a long trip; I’d guess about two hours. I averaged exactly 27 MPG today at an average speed of 46.4 MPH…total distance traveled today was about 396 miles.

Today’s Pictures