Route 66 Day 2 Grand Canyon to Winslow to Albuquerque

 

I finally got up around 5:30 since sunrise was about 5:45 and walked to the point. It was beautiful and I am so glad I did it!!! After the sun was up I walked back to the truck and started breakfast which was hot chocolate because I couldn’t find a Starbucks last night and no truck stop sells just grinds only cups of coffee. O well. Hot chocolate a waffle and a Nutrigrain bar and I was good to go. Met a guy name Jason who was from Oregon, it was his birthday and he was telling me how he bought a caddy took it to Nashville and sold it to a guy he met at a bar, but this year he wanted to tour the grand canyon with his girlfriend. Super cool dude. Talked about cars for a bit while he was drinking his morning birthday beer and then he was off to go explore and I wanted to go to Mather point to take more pictures and spread some of Moms Ashes.

Spent about 45 min there waiting for the gift shop to open at 9 which was fine by me as I got to explore the point more.  Cell phone coverage was pretty spotty but I asked dad and uncle Ed if they wanted anything I sent them some pictures of patches and stickers. First they said no and so then I just bought me the stickers that I wanted the big oval ones and a shirt. Dad changed his mind that he wanted a patch so I went back to get get him one after I had already driven away. The truck is starting perfect. After I left the second time dad called me and said he wanted a pin marker I told him I had already left and wasn’t trying to go back into the park as there was now a line to get in. Luckily for him I thought he would want one and picked one up when I got my shirt and sticker.

Todays goal is to hit Winslow AZ because of the Eagles song and just see how far I can make it. I am going to try and take more pictures along route 66/I40. Along I40 the first road side thing I saw was the meteor city, they had some cool arrows sticking in the ground. The café and gas pumps were filled with graffiti and broken windows. I bet the place looked like a nice stopping ground in its hey day. Today besides that there is a meteor catcher ie dream catcher but bigger. Along with that is a shop that was closed that sold meteor things. The cool thing about the shop was that it was in the shape of meteor/a big dome and then there was a teepee made of cement.

Down the road from there I found Winslow. Winslow is a small town that has the rail road and not much else other than the town center which has gift shops stating on the corner of Winslow because of the Eagles song. I took a few pictures and had to go around a few times because of traffic. After I found a spot kitty corner to the statues I went over and took some pictures a guy with his gf took some pics of me after I took there pictures.  I went to a gift shop and bought a sticker and a t shirt the nice ladies there pointed me to a restaurant down the street which had good tacos with green chili fries. Everybody has been super nice so far.

After lunch it was off to try and make it to the Petrified Forrest because I wanted to see the painted Inn but they wanted 25 bucks for me to drive a gravel road and I would only have about 45 min to see it all before the park closed since they did lock the gates. I said no thanks went to the gift center and got a sticker and talked to the park ranger. She was super informative and said that I would miss some things but compared to the Grand Canyon it wouldn’t be nearly as impressive. On my next trip I will stop by and see it.

Gallup New Mexico was the next stop they were supposed to have some cool stuff but nothing was open. I did take pictures in front of the Navajo Wind Talkers monument for uncle Ray. It was made famous by the movie with Nicholas Cage. I got gas there I got some looks and honks but I kept it running as it seems Gallup isn’t the safest town

After Gallup I made it to the continental divide. There isn’t much there a run down post office, and and Indian trading post that had no cars in front of it. I took some pictures and drove around just to look around, seems that there isn’t much interest on the point where water goes to the Pacific ocean vs the Atlantic ocean. O well. I did get a cool shot of the New Mexico Route 66 sign and the truck with the bags fully deflated.

I ended the night in Albuquerque with a drive of about 415 miles. Dad got me a spot at the Fairfield Inn. I wasn’t very hungry but dad said I had to go to Frontier and have their steak. So I did. It was ok, nothing to write home about but the amount of food was pretty good for the price I paid. Service was decently fast, and they were about a mile and half from the hotel so that was a plus.. I did take out so I could go back to the hotel because I was running on no sleep and still needed to wash my shirts and shorts as it was pretty dusty from the desert.