Woke up feeling all excited about going to the Route 66 shop – then I realised it was Sunday. Not only was it a Sunday, it was Easter Sunday too. “Oh no, the shop’s not going to be open on a Sunday, least of all Easter Day,” I said to Pauline, “just my luck.”
We checked out of our Howard Johnson motel, one night had cost us £55.
We drove into town to find the Route 66 shop. I had to go and see it even if it was closed and in fact we had to drive down Route 66 to get to it. When we got there, believe it or not, the shop was open! Inside there were Route 66 T-Shirts, sweatshirts, casual shirts, books and tapes. The Route 66 logo was plastered on drinks coasters, fridge magnets, wall signs and posters. I wanted to buy a full-size Route 66 road sign for the garden but wouldn’t have been able to get it home so I settled for a T-Shirt instead.
Then it was off to a place called 29 Palms to stay for the night. 29 Palms is very close to The Joshua Tree National Park so it was an ideal place to stay to give us easy access and plenty of time to drive through the park tomorrow. We left Williams, re-tracing our route back westwards to Kingman on Highway 40. At Kingman we followed Highway 40 south and then west towards 29 Palms. Once across the State line and back in California we continued on the freeway until we saw a turn off for 29 Palms and this, to my surprise and delight, took us onto Route 66 for the next few hours of driving.
Because Route 66 is such a relatively old road (the section we were on only had one lane in each direction making me feel quite at home), all the newer faster roads are built around it and Route 66 doesn’t seem to get used much.
It stretches across the country from east to west so if you plan to motor west just take my way, that’s the highway that’s the best. Get your kicks on Route 66. Well it winds from Chicago to LA, more than 2,000 miles all the way. Get your kicks on Route 66. Well it goes from St Louis down to Missouri, Oklahoma City looks oh so pretty. You’ll see Amarillo and Gallup New Mexico, Flagstaff, Arizona don’t forget Winona, Kingman, Barstow, San Bernardino. Would you get hip to this kindly tip and go take that California trip. Get your kicks on Route 66.
Although the road was old and in many places in a bad state of repair, it was still a very fast road. It was dead straight as far as the eye could see in both directions and we were the only car on the road all the way. The whole of this day’s driving was going to be across the Mojave Desert also called the High Desert because it’s around 2,000 feet above sea level and for the most part is deadly flat with just the odd Joshua tree growing here and there. According to the map there were only two towns along this part of Route 66 before we had to turn south to 29 Palms. Shortly after we’d hit Route 66 I noticed that we were getting low on petrol. Pauline said, “Don’t worry, the first town we come to, called Essex, will probably have some services of some sort.”
We drove and drove through barren wasteland until we suddenly shot past a couple of shacks near the roadside.
“That must have been Essex,” Pauline said.
The next and only other town we’d pass through was Amboy another sixty or so miles away and I was beginning to get slightly worried about the petrol or lack of it. I mean, what do people do if they run out of petrol in the middle of the Mojave Desert? Walk sixty miles to the nearest point of civilisation? I didn’t want to think about it and it was with great relief that I eventually saw a petrol station in the far distance. Pauline said, “That’ll be Amboy. We turn off there to 29 Palms and that’s where we can pull in and have a bit of a rest.” As we approached I saw a notice that said “Amboy. Population 20” and as I pulled in I could see nothing around me except this one petrol station. As far as the eye could see across the desert in all directions, there was nothing. I suppose all twenty people must live in this service station I thought to myself, either that or they’ve all died leaving this one Mexican to run the place.
I started to fill up the car while everyone else went inside. It wasn’t until I’d filled the tank up that I realised the price of the petrol was $2.99 a gallon as opposed to $1.70/$1.80 a gallon everywhere else. Not surprising really I suppose, seeing as we were stuck in the middle of this massive desert and it was the only place for miles around. We didn’t stop to eat here, who knows what the miserable money grabbing Mexican would have charged us.
Reached 29 Palms and eventually booked into another Motel 6. It was late and we’d already looked at and turned down three others. One was run by some Asians and the room was really grubby, another had a pool but it had no water in it and the third one had a pool but was so crowded it put Emma and Sophia off.
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