The Current Plan

Purpose

This is where the rubber meets the road (pun intended). I'm posting the most up-to-date trip plan and asking for your input.

We'll be driving an Acura TL; I'm interested to know if there are parts of the road that we should avoid because we aren't in an SUV.

D-Day - 2

We'll head out of Portland (maybe on a Friday morning) and head south towards Los Angeles. I figure it will be a two day drive. We'll do the bulk of the driving the first day.

D-Day - 1

We'll stay in Los Angeles / Santa Monica. This should be a relatively shourt travel day. We'll check into a hotel; go swimming; and relax. That night we'll head to Dodger Stadium to catch a game. I've been a Dodger fan since they moved to LA. I still get chills listening to Vin Scully calling the games

It's Go Day. Santa Monica to San Bernadino

Like the prior day; this day won't involve a lot of distance - but will probably take a while to navigate.

• We'll head to the Will Rogers Plaque at Palisades park, then head out from Ocean Ave and Santa Monica Blvd in Santa Monica. I think this is near the pier.
• I grew up in Southern California; north of Los Angeles. and don't know how excited I am about driving the freeways and surface streets through LA. The last time we went to the Southland, it took us 2 hours to get from Mulholland Drive and the 405 to Dodger Stadium! Let me know what I should not miss! Especially any sites where I can get some good views of trains or historic Route 66 stuff.
• We'll get into San Bernadino and head up to Cajon Pass to grab some photos of the BNSF and Union Pacific.

Day 4 - San Bernadino to Kingman

This day may have more driving than I want. We might go all the way to Barstow the first night

• If we didn't make Cajon Pass the day before, we'll catch it on the way to Barstow.
• We'll catch the California Route 66 Museum in Victorville. This will be a nice spot for me; it is where we caught Route 66 as a child on our drive from Palmdale to Winslow.
• In Barstow we'll see the Harvey House and Santa Fe depot. Yes, I'll take more train pictures. Where is a good vantage point for pictures?
• We'll take the old road, where possible, through Daggett, Amboy, and head into Needles.
• From here we'll cross the Colorado river and head into Arizona.
• We'll stop for the night in Kingman. We'll eat burgers and shakes at the Sno-Cap drive-in.

Day 5 - Kingman to Winslow

It looks like most of this drive will be on I-40.

• We'll take the old road through Grand Canyon Caverns, Seligman, Ash Fork and Williams.
• We'll stop for lunch in Flagstaff. I have a cousin (my only cousin) who lives there. Flagstaff is a beautiful city. I almost ended up going to college at NAU.
• Then we'll drive into Winslow and check into the La Posada hotel for a few days

Days 6 - 8: Winslow

If we have a "destination" it would have to be Winslow, where my mom lived and where my grandpa took me to the train station to watch the grand old ATSF passenger trains stop for servicing. I still have an uncle and two aunts who still live not far away. We'll take a side trip into Sedona to visit my aunt. I think my uncle and his wife (my other aunt) may come up to meet us in Winslow. My uncle was a teacher and principal in Winslow for many years. It's a gas to walk around town with him. I guarantee that you can't go 30 minutes without someone coming up and introducing themselves to him and saying what a great teacher he was.

We'll also take some day trips north of Winslow to see the sites.

Day 9 - Winslow to Gallup

I haven't thought much about this phase yet. But we'll definitely check out Holbrook where we'll see the Wig Wam motor hotel. I don't have a lot of memories about this part of the road; though I travelled it with my grandma and grandpa to visit an aunt who lived in New Mexico.

Days 9 - 13: Head Back Home

Time to go home.

• We'll turn north on Highway 491 putting our back to the Mother Road.
• We'll head through Colorado and Utah with a stop in Boise. I went to college in Caldwell, ID (not far from Boise) so we'll stop and see some friends (unless they've read this blog and have scheduled "vacations"!)
• It's a day's drive on I-84 from Boise back to Portland. The scenery through Eastern Oregon and up the Columbia Gorge is beautiful.
  

Conclusion

So there it is. What do you think? What should I do differently? What should I be sure to see? What can I afford to miss?

Resources and Links

Purpose

This page will hold links and other references for materials I've found useful.

The toughest thing I've found so far is that most of the resources assume you'll be driving from east to west. This is natural, I guess, since it is the path most people travelled in the early days of the Mother Road. Nevertheless, it takes a little work to work out the directions in reverse!

But, I'm not altruistic; I'm hoping y'all will send me comments with other sites and resources. I'll try to post the best here.

Web Sites

When I first started planning this trip down Route 66 from Santa Monica to Gallup, New Mexico I searched the web.

• More than likely, if you've found this blog via a search for information on the Mother Road, you've already found The Mother Road: Historic Route 66 I find it to be the best site out there. In addition to the turn-by-turn instructions, I like the forums where people share ideas, plans, and experiences.

Maps and Books

The first three links are books and maps that I've purchased.

• I've just started looking through a couple of the maps in Here It Is! The Route 66 Map Series by Jim Ross and Jerry McClanahan. It is a series of 8 maps - 1 for each state. I found the link of the Historic Route 66 web site and purchased it from Amazon.
• At the same time, I purchased Route 66: EZ66 Guide for Travelers by Jerry McClanahan. A bonus for backward travellers (driving west-to-east), it has directions for travelling east-to-west or west-to-east.
• Carla bought me the Route 66 Traveler's Guide and Roadside Companion - 2nd edition. She picked this up at the Flagstaff train station during our sojurn to Arizona for a family reunion at Thanksgiving.

Background and Introduction

Introduction

My name is Howard; my wife (Carla) and I are planning a road trip on part of Route 66 this summer. We live in Portland, Oregon. We'll start by driving to Santa Monica, California for the start and then head over to Gallup, New Mexico, then head home. . We figure it will take 2 days to get to Los Angeles; we'll take a little more than a week on the Route 66, then head home from Gallup; stopping in Boise to visit friends.

Purpose
The purpose of the blog is three-fold.

• Share our planning and solicit feedback
• Gather suggestions to improve our experience
• Share the results and pictures of our trip so we can provide help to others who plan to do the same.

Background

I grew up in Palmdale, California (Mojave desert) in the 50's and 60s. My mom came from Arizona (Holbrook, Winslow, Flagstaff). In the summers we would drive from Palmdale to Winslow, Arizona to visit my grandparents, uncle and aunts. We'd head to Victorville to hook up with the Mother Road and head through Barstow, Daggett, Needles, Kingman, Seligman, Flagstaff, and into Winslow. My grandparents lived just 2 blocks off the highway on West Aspinwall.

My grandpa, H.H. Baker, would take me over to the La Posada hotel and the train station in Winslow. At that time Winslow was a major stop on the Santa Fe Railroad. We'd watch the Chief, the Super Chief, and the El Capitan passenger trains come in for a crew change, top off the diesel, an inspection and service. It was FANTASTIC. Certainly the highlight of the vacation for me, and a beautiful memory.

This past Thanksgiving we had a family reunion in Sedona and Cottonwood, where my aunt, uncle and his wife live. We took a day trip to Winslow and looked around. It was then that I knew what our summer vacation plan would be: a road trip. We'll go to California and re-trace our steps from back in the day.

That will teach my wife. When she plans a vacation we go to Hawaii or Europe; when I plan a vacation we drive out through the desert to take pictures of trains!

I remember the drive as exciting (but LONG). Of course so much of Route 66 lives on in our culture and zeitgeist. Along the way, we'll stop at the museums, the burger joints, motels, and what-not. I'll take some pictures and post them.

The blog will evolve, I'm sure. At the outset, I plan on having a page publishing our current plan and solicit feedback. We'll also have some pages with notes and pictures of our trip. If possible we'll post some entries along the way.