Friday, October 25
Today, we jump to Kingman, AZ, and the Blake Ranch RV Park. As we pass through Flagstaff, we will be at the highest point of our trip, and most of the day was supposed to be downhill, though we did several steep grades uphill. Many trucks were tossing ice from the top of their trailers onto the road even though the temperature along most of the road was in the 50s. They were coming from snowy parts of the country.
We had to drive 3 hours today, so we stopped at a Pilot about an hour into the drive to refill our gas and stretch our legs. Through my research, I also found that this was the cheapest place I could get gas until we reached Kingman. Unfortunately, the on-ramp was closed, so we had to backtrack east about 10 miles to a previous exit to turn around and continue west.
We decided to run through a Blue Beacon and get the truck and trailer washed when we got to Kingman. They never seem to get all the dirt off with their sprayers, but they do well.
Blake Ranch RV Park
Google had sent me to the wrong location for our campground, so after we arrived at the wrong place, I plugged in the address from my reservation, which required us to backtrack for about 20 minutes. A large Love’s truck stop surrounded our campground, and many closed businesses full of graffiti. The campground itself was nice enough. We did not get set up until about 2:30 pm, though, so we got a late start on our tour.
Roadkill Cafe
We decided to head straight to Seligman, about an hour away because it had a lot of Route 66 attractions, and follow Route 66 back.
We decided to eat dinner at the Roadkill Café, known for naming its various entrees with roadkill-themed names. We sat up at the bar and ordered some beers. Lisa had the “Fender Tenders,” which was chicken fingers, and I had “The Chicken That Almost Crossed the Road,” which was fried chicken.
Sno-Cap
We had previously decided to have dessert at a famous local drive-in called the Sno-cap just a couple blocks down the road. It was renowned for being on Route 66 since the beginning, but more notably, for an owner who liked to play practical jokes on his customers. He put doorknobs on both sides of the door but only one worked, it offered you a straw when you asked for a drinking straw, etc. Though this owner is dead, his family carries on the tradition.
Their property was also full of rusted cars and various photo ops. It was all pretty run down, though. We each ordered a shake for $5.50, which was very large and tasty.
Seligman, AZ
We then drove/walked around Seligman, which was full of old buildings, souvenir shops, and photo ops.
Route 66
It was late, but we started down part of the longest remaining intact parts of Route 66 that does not follow I-40. This road was much easier to drive than I-40 because it was relatively flat compared to the steep grades on I-40, even though it was a bit longer. Most towns along the road were ghost towns, so they did not even slow you down. Unfortunately, about halfway home, it got too dark to see much.
Hackberry General Store
We stopped at the Hackberry General Store before it closed, which had a lot of gas pumps, vintage cars, and signs, both inside and outside.
Evening
We got home at about 7 pm and tried to find some TV channels but failed, but we did find a good wireless signal that enabled us to watch some Netflix. I do not believe it was the RV park’s wireless, but I only felt slightly guilty for using it.
Saturday, September 26
Kingman
Today, we headed west and were going to start on Route 66, which went through Kingman, but they had Route 66 blocked off for street car races. We had to take a detour around the races, but before we left town, we stopped at the Powerhouse Route 66 Museum.
The Powerhouse Museum had a small Route 66 Museum on its upper floor. What made this museum a little different is that it had more pictures, quotes, and a big display about the Dust Bowl migration through this area. Most of the quotes were from the movie Grapes of Wrath.
Route 66 National Back Country Byway
Afterward, we headed to the winding roads to Oatman. Since this was going to be a winding mountain road, I drove because of Lisa’s falling phobia. Right before the mountains, we crossed a large wash area and stopped at a rest stop called “Cool Springs Station.” It was a gift shop, but the owner was a hoot. When he saw our camera, he volunteered to take our picture. He then made us stand in a specific spot and do various poses. The Station had the usual old, rusted cars and gas station junk outside and lots of Route 66 souvenirs inside. We did buy a plastic bear of raw desert honey from them.
Oatman, AZ
The road up the mountain to Oatman was curvy, steep, and narrow. We knew when we arrived that we saw cars lining the street trying to park. After we found a place to park, we walked into a recreated old western town with wild burros roaming the street. All the stores had cute names playing off the “ass” theme. We bought a paper bag of donkey food and feed a couple of donkeys. We had to be careful, but they were smart enough to go for the bag if they could.
After walking around some more, we learned that a gunfight show held by a couple of Shriners would start in about 15 minutes, so we tried to find a good spot to watch. We saw some donkeys fighting close to each other, which made me a little nervous. The gunfighters were offering photo opportunities, so I took a picture of Lisa with them. The gunfight was a little silly. There were two gunfighters and a narrator, and they acted out some scenarios that we could not hear as they built up to a fun fight where they fired blanks. Afterward, they collected money for Shriner’s Hospital.
It was lunchtime, so we ate at Olive Oatman Restaurant, where I had my first Navaho Taco, which was good.
Needles, CA
When we left Oatman, we continued west toward Needles, CA, down the other side of the mountain. We crossed the Colorado River with some marsh and palm trees around it, but I expected a much more lush area.
We drove around Needles, CA, and found some Route 66-era buildings before continuing west on more Route 66 roads. We eventually ran into Najah’s Gas Station out in the middle of the desert. This was notorious for being the most expensive place to get gas and supplies because of its remote location.
At this point, we turned around and took the highway home.