Day 13 on Route 66: Unlucky for sure!

Wednesday, Oct. 6, Peach Springs, Ariz. --

Sun! Glorious sun! Although the weatherman predicts more thunderstorms, we're surrounded by lots of blue sky. We see a study in contrasts -- mesas, craggy rock outcroppings, pointed peaks and even perfect pyramids rise out of the sagebrush and golden grasses. 

At the tiny town of Truxton, we see a "junk art" sign, rusted bullet Studebaker and an old pickup truck. A weathered wooden sign points the direction to all of the towns named in the Route 66 song, but the wood is so soaked from rain that we can't see much.

We're headed to the Hackberry General Store, renowned for being among the funkiest on Route 66. One sign says, "Tourists treated same as home folks" and another says, "Hippies use side door." And out back are some antique cars and a Burma-Shave sign:

Big mistake

many make

rely on horn

instead of brake.

Inside, it's an assault on the senses: a cigar-store Indian, an old Texaco gas pump, a soda fountain mock-up and much more. The men's room walls are covered with photos of pinup girls; the ladies' room features full-size mannequins costumed as dance-hall girls complete with feather boas. Outside the front door is a 1957 red Corvette (hiss, boo) positioned just right for us to line up a T-Bird photo op. 

Unlucky incident No. 1: As we drove this morning, Gordon and I heard more and more "gurgling" from under the hood; some of the exhaust vapors were escaping and making noise. We opted to stop in Kingman to get it looked at by a muffler shop. Twenty minutes later it was pronounced OK to drive home -- a new connector would be needed once we were back.

From there it was just a few short minutes to the wonderful Arizona Route 66 Museum, where we met up with the huge group of motorcyclists we’d seen the night before. Turns out they are all from the same motorcycle club in England and on a tour of America's Main Street with Harleys rented from Chicago to L.A. (and a detour to Las Vegas) – 39 bikes in all – some singles and many couples. The worldwide fascination with Route 66 never fails to amaze us. Here we thought it was just an American thing!

This museum takes a different page from Route 66 history and focuses more on how the famous route came to be. In 1858, Lt. Edward Beale surveyed and cleared the Beale Wagon Road, the precursor to Route 66. So great was the constant need for water, the route was designed to take travelers from one spring to another. 

(In 1915 etiquette expert Emily Post and her son, Edwin, drove west on what was then called the National Old Trails Highway in a Mercedes Touring Car. They planned to write a guidebook on the route, but by the time they got to Winslow, Emily had had it and took a train home. Readers were none the wiser, however, because she wrote the book anyway.)

Clever life-size dioramas depict the evolution of Route 66, from travel by horse-drawn wagon to the huge exodus by dust bowl refugees during the Depression. Apparently when some of those refugees reached the California border, signs told them that they were not welcome in California and should turn back. According to the museum, only 8 percent of the refugees stayed in California, most returning to the Midwest within a few months. This doesn't jibe with other reports we've seen that say many people made their new homes there.

Gordon and the '57 T-Bird sign he bought off the wall at Mr. D'z.

And now there was a lot of discussion amongst the group about whether to take Sitgreaves Pass to Oatman. The Route 66 pass is steep with sharp drop-offs and no guard rails.  And you're out there basically by yourself in the loneliest portion of the route. With all the rain of the past few days, we decided that we might encounter washouts or other hazards and opted instead to take the long way around. All right -- go ahead and say it: We chickened out!

This route around took us through the desert on some heavily patched sections of 66. Les and Jo were ahead of us, and the rest of the group was behind us. We were solo on the road, winding around mountain peaks, soft hills, pinnacles, and even a chartreuse forest of short cacti, then dipping into shallow valleys. The only signs of civilization were huge power lines that just like the road seemed to go on forever. 

Unlucky incident No. 2:  The good news was that we found Les and Jo immediately upon our arrival in Oatman, and about 15 minutes later the rest of the group arrived. The bad news was that Duane was back on the highway just short of Oatman, with a T-Bird that had boiled over. As we set about gathering water to take back for the radiator, Bill heard from a motorcyclist that Sitgreaves Pass, which we’d avoided earlier because of potential washouts, had been in perfect condition just hours earlier. Bill and Doris decided to drive the pass back to Kingman, and lobbied us to joint them; because we didn't make a decision, the senior couple in the group sucked it up and started off to drive Sitgreaves Pass from west to east and planned to join us later that evening in Needles, Calif., our overnight spot.

Dollar bills (and more) stapled to Oatman Hotel walls, ceiling

Now – about Oatman. What a hoot! This western-themed town saved itself from extinction by being relentlessly western -- in a good way. (Sort of how Leavenworth, Wash., is relentlessly Bavarian.) A boardwalk, saloons, the famous 1902 Oatman Hotel (a favorite of Hollywood stars in the ‘30s and ‘40s) where Clark Gable and Carole Lombard honeymooned in 1939, plus the ever-present T-shirt shops, Kettle Corn tent, jewelry shop, and even a tattoo parlor. The Oatman Hotel has thousands of $1 bills (some larger) stapled to its walls and ceiling. The waitress said they had recently counted the bills and came up with some $70,000 just hanging there!

And as if that wasn't enough the other thing  Oatman has that sets it apart from other western towns are many feisty four-footed panhandlers, a herd of wild burros that roams the town streets looking for handouts, braying loudly for attention and following visitors to their cars. The shops used to sell carrots to feed the burros, but now they’ve opted for little squares of burro feed because the burros had become too aggressive with the carrots.  This Wednesday afternoon the town was jumping – lots of motorcyclists and other tourists; all the greedy burros were happy burros; Gordon bought a bag of burro feed and is immediately mobbed by a half-dozen of the creatures.

Unlucky incident No. 3: With a radiator full of fresh water, things once again looked good for Duane and Nancy. But it was not to be. Somewhere along I-40 they boiled over again and pulled off onto a side road; we all followed and set about trying to fix the errant thermostat. Silver Lining Sidebar: We were parked across the street from  a housing development with a fountain at its entrance. Voila! All the water we could ever need! Many jugs of water were poured over the radiator and a new thermostat was installed. But still the overheating problem continued. Finally, the thermo was removed, and we were all able to continue on to our Super Bargain motel in Needles, CA-- $35 a night – the least expensive motel on the entire trip. But think: Who willingly spends a night in Needles?

Unlucky incident No. 4 : Bill and Doris again had generator trouble on Sitgreaves Pass and limped into Kingman, deciding to spend the night there. The rest of us wound up in Needles. The plan was for Les and Jo to go back to Kingman the next morning (Oct. 7)  and drive with Bill and Doris to Rialto, switching batteries from one car to the other as needed to keep going. Once we reached our Thursday night digs,  Les and Bill would change out the generator for an alternator, which we hoped would be picked up by Lucy Clark of Los Angeles, the ultimate T-Bird Road Warrior,  best known for her 62-day, 48-in-08 tour of the nation’s capitals with Doc Dockter, who lives south of the Bay Area. They had already planned to join us for our last night at the Wigwam Motel, and had been busy drumming up Southern California Club members to come out and join us on the final morning, Oct. 8, as we made our triumphal drive to the Santa Monica Pier and the End of the Trail.

Day 13 on Route 66 turned out to be both eventful and frustrating given the car problems we encountered.  Dinner at a Denney’s in Needles didn’t do much to salvage our spirits, but nevertheless we were safe, sound and ready to meet a new day! The day ended with several phone calls between us and Lucy, Lin Somsak (editor of the Early Bird magazine) and others, all trying to make sure we could have an alternator delivered to Bill and Doris in Rialto. Lin's husband, Bill, talked to Les and together they walked through what had to be done to make the conversion possible. This was another of the many examples of the wonderful T-Bird camaraderie we experienced throughout the entire trip.

Historic Wigwam Motel, here we come! Tomorrow will be our last night on Route 66.

Judy and Gordon

PS – Due to a five-day business trip beginning tomorrow, I won’t be able to complete the final two days of the blog until next week. But it's almost done! Please hang in there!