Another travel day today and the second to the last leg of the Route 66 part of our trip. We got up and just had cereal because we had a very long day of travel ahead of us. Although we couldn’t take Route 66 the whole way because of road conditions and pulling a trailer, we were able to take it at least part of the way. Since we had already been to Williams, we jumped on Hwy 40 which is Route 66 until Ash Fork. Tiny town but they did have a gas station converted into a barber/beauty shop with a 1960 DeSoto on the roof and a Route 66 sign out front. You think you’ve seen it all… From there it was a bit of a drive to the next town of Seligman. But along the way we encountered the neatest thing. Small red signs along the road with one line sayings on them that culminated into a joke with the last sign saying Burma Shave. I didn’t get pictures of the first one but it said: It twould be more fun…To go by air…If we could put…These signs up there…Burma Shave. Oh my god did we laugh. We were able to get the rest on video and it sure made the drive between towns fun.
The next town of Seligman really loves the Route 66 history. The entire town looks like it did in 1930. The storefronts, the shops, the gas stations and some of the original hotels. One of the store owners established the Historic Route 66 Association of Arizona so that the history would be preserved and remembered. I of course took tons of pictures and we spent time walking around town. Really fun. We drove through a lot of very small town and enjoyed many Burma Shave signs. The scenery was beautiful and the ride was lovely. We ended our original Route 66 travels in Kingsman. It was now after 1 and we were hungry. Also we really couldn’t further because the road (the Oatman Hwy) was rough road with winding hairpin turns. No way we could do that with a camper. So we stopped at the Route 66 McDonalds (didn’t know they had them in the 1930’s did you) and then picked up Hwy 40 to take it into California.
Now once we crossed into California and went through the agricultural checkpoint (no we weren’t stopped and searched) we could have picked up the National Trails Hwy/Route 66 but it looked funny on google maps and we still had a long way to drive. It’s a good thing we didn’t as most of the road was closed for construction. Glad I followed my gut. We were able to pick it up again in a small town called Fenner, through Amboy where we got gas at Roys Motel and Cafe and followed it until it was again closed for construction. At this point we had to just continue on to Joshua Tree which is where we were camping for the next 2 days.
I had of course gotten a campsite at the furthest campground in Joshua Tree National Park, Black Rock Campground. From where the park started to where our campground was took another hour plus to drive. It was hot, it was flat, it was desert. We did encounter some very strange sights along that empty drive like the sculpture of a woman with a giant hotdog sticking through her stomach and a sign that said foreign object. So weird.
We arrived at Black Rock at 5:30 after 8 hours of driving. Our site was large but kind of tricky for parking but Keith did a great job fitting it in. We set up, got situated and made tacos for dinner. The days were hot and windy but the nights were really cool. And since it was the desert we were able to have our second fire of the trip. Registration was closed so we were doing that in the morning. Time to relax after the long drive and stare at the stars.
Desert Day 19