Monthly Archives: August 2012

Getting Hotter!

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I’ve made it to the last of the eight states that Route 66 goes through. I’m in California, Needles Calif to be precise. It’s been a day of long distances between towns, endless dessert vistas, windy roads and heat, and I mean HEAT! I’ve just been to a store in Needles and noticed that the metal door handle was wrapped in towelling to save people from burning their hands! The highlight of my day was meeting AngelDelgadillo, a real hero of the Route 66ers: http://www.route66giftshop.com/angel.html. I’m real pleased to say that Seligman was heaving with people ans obviously thriving economically, in stark contrast to some of the places I’ve visited on Route 66.
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Another Big Hole in the Ground

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This will be a short blog today as there’s not too much I can say in words about my day. I visited the Grand Canyon as a side trip from Route 66. About all I can say about it is it’s big, really big, I mean bigger than the next big hole in the ground. Really! Also it’s visually stunning and deep, very very deep. I’ll let the pictures tell the story on this one I think (by the way, no captions as I can’t think of that many ways of saying “A view of the Grand Canyon”!)

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A Heavy Night in Flagstaff

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I had a late start from Holbrook and did a quick tour of the town first to take some pics. My route today is mostly on the Interstate with a few quick trips off for short stretches. On one of them I did a trip up a dead end spur of the old road. It was quite depressing seeing all the closed businesses and then come to the end of the tarmac and see the old road become a dirt track :(

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Petrified!

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Today has been one of serendipity. My only goal at the start of the day was to reach Holbrook before 9.00 pm to be able to check in at the Wigwam Motel, but the day provided a couple of unexpected pleasant surprises and one unexpected unpleasant (but not terrible!) surprise. I’m now in Arizona, and to confuse the unwary my time has changed again, even though I’m still in the MST time zone! Arizona doest subscribe to Daylight Savings Time so, although I’m in the same time zone, Arizona is an hour different from the rest of the time zone. Confusing, or what? To cut to the chase as they say, I’m now 8 hours behind UK time!

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Santo Domingo Pueblo

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Today has been a little different from the rest as I took some time out of my riding schedule to visit the Santo Domingo Pueblo. I’m so glad I did so. I had such a warm and friendly welcome from everyone. Everyone I passed in the street asked how I was and most asked if they could help me. Drivers of passing cars waved and when I found the library I met Cindy, (if it’s Sindy I apologise, I only heard her name, so am not sure of the spelling, but I’ll use Cindy here) she is the the Tribal librarian. I spent about 40 minutes talking to her about the tribe; their history, current activities, way of life and hopes for the future. I don’t have any pictures of my visit because the taking of pictures (or even sketching) is against the tribe’s beliefs and I respected that. I hope I can therefore paint a picture in words for you.

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New Mexico

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It’s been a very pleasant day on the road. I’d initially planned to get to Santa Rosa (about 140 miles), but as the road was running across desert and there were many miles be3tween stops I covered ground quickly and pressed on. At Santa Rosa I had to make a decision – Should I follow the later alignment, or take the, older, Santa Fe loop? The later alignment mostly follows, or is on I40 and I have been longing to visit the Santa Domingo Pueblo (http://www.indianpueblo.org/19pueblos/santodomingo.html) which is off the older alignment between Santa Fe and Albaquerque. As I’m ahead of schedule it’s a foregone conclusion and so now, after around 260 miles of riding I’m in Santa Fe, New Mexico on the pre 1937 alignment.

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Finding the Old Road

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As I’ve mentioned that I’ve got lost several times I thought I would share with you how I, and many others, find the old road. I’m using a book by Jerry McClanahan called Route 66: EZ Guide For Travellers (http://www.amazon.com/Route-66-Guide-Travelers-Edition/dp/0970995164/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1344513633&sr=8-1&keywords=ez+guide+for+travellers). It’s spiral bound with directions and information on each page. The instructions on the top of the page are for west bound travellers, like myself, and the instructions on the bottom of the page are for eastbound travellers.

A sample page from Route 66 EZ Guide for Travellers

A sample page from Route 66 EZ Guide for Travellers

Depending on the complexity of the route pages need to be turned every few miles, sometimes as little as 5 in towns or sometimes 40 or 50 miles in the open countryside. For me that means stopping, extracting it from my map holder on the top of the petrol tank, turning the page, putting it back in the holder and then reading the new instructions. A bit time consuming, and the reason for so many wrong turns (my memory being what it is!)

It is however the ‘bible’ for anyone wishing to travel Route 66, and I thank Jerry for his hard work putting it together and keeping it updated.

Time to go and start using it now.

Abandoned Businesses

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Not a lot of words to say here. Just how sad it is to see these monuments to the Mother Road brought to their knees. These are the pics of the abandoned businesses that I said I would post in the ‘Half Way!’ post. No captions, the pics say it all. You don;t need to know where that all are, however many are from one place: Conway.

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