Thursday, September 18, 2008
Day miles: 231
Trip miles: 3,704
I'm running behind in my blog posts again. I'll try to get caught up in the next day or so with several more brief posts.
We started out the day on old Route 66. Along the way we passed many small old towns. Some don't even exist anymore. Newberry Springs (see picture below) is just a marker along the highway. The Bagdad Cafe was a popular stop along Route 66. The original building is gone - replaced by a new building with someone trying to capitalize on the old name. So many of the businesses that thrived when Route 66 was the main route are now gone.
There are several old volcano sites along the way. The black rocks are lava rocks. The final picture in this group is "going 66 mph on Route 66!!"
We are in the desert!!! The road goes on and on with very little vegetation. Roy's Cafe (see picture) is a famous old stop. The motel and cafe are still there but offer no services. You could buy gas for $5.00/gal. There were many motorcyclists stopped there. There was a group from France and a group from Germany. We've met many Europeans along the way - they rent motorcycles in L.A.
Goffs is another town lost to the interstate. The general store was a popular stop along Rt. 66 many years ago (left picture). Oatman is a town that has survived by transforming itself into a real tourist trap. They advertise "wild donkeys roam the town." There were donkeys roaming in the town, but they were really tame. The donkeys tended to hang out near the kiosks where tourists could buy food and feed the donkeys. They didn't look too wild to me.
Many places along the way there are remains of the very very old original Rt 66 road bed. You can see part of the dirt Rt 66 road in the picture to the left. The gas station below is closed, but nicely maintained. The old gas pumps are really neat.
An exciting part of our trip today was crossing the mountains via Sitgreaves Pass. This is a very steep winding road with many twists, turns and switchbacks. At the bottom of the pass there was a memorial to a motorcylist who was died earlier this year when he went around a curve too fast and drove off the side. The interesting?? part is that the person was from Osceola - a town about 20 miles west of Goshen, IN.
2 comments:
You know its bad enough that you take off on this M.A.W.G. dream vacation while the rest of us still in our day jobs are left to lick up a little wonderlust vicariously from your bolg, and then you go and leave it unattended for days on end. You make it tough, man.
MAWG, you are so jealous that you just have to try and make me feel guilty!!!
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