Great American Road Trip - Day 16 & 17

It's hard to believe that today is our last fun day of this Great American Road Trip!

We are definitely feeling the effects of travelling, and time zone changes, but we're determined to enjoy our final day exploring Chicago.  The hubbs and I have been here before, but it was cold, and that made it difficult to explore on foot! Plus, we were not on Route 66 mode at that time.  

We started our day the way that all Route 66 trips should either start or end: Breakfast at Lou Mitchell's.  The mother road used to start at their door step (before it became a one way street headed in the wrong direction). 

This place was super busy, super efficient and super good! While waiting in line which extended down the street, the hostess walked up and down the line serving guests fresh baked doughnut holes.  Upon being seated, it has always been tradition that the women are given a box of Milk Duds...amazing!

After breakfast we headed down the street to the current official starting point of Route 66 in front of the Chicago Art Centre. 

We said our final farewell to this amazing highway before exploring the rest of the city.  

Our first stop was the Buckingham Fountain. It was beautiful - and I could not stop singing the 'Love & Marriage' song from Married with Children!

From Grant Park we made our way to Millennium Park to check out The Bean, and The Crown Fountain. 

The Crown Fountain was fun, as lots of people were splashing and playing in the water.  It was hot, so it felt good to cool our feet in the water!

Continuing on, we headed to the Magnificent Mile were we stopped for a picture of the infamous Chicago theatre - and of course, enjoyed some Chicago mix popcorn from Garret's across the street. 

We enjoyed looking at all of the stones tucked into the architecture of the Tribune Towers.  Apparently the guy who built it had reporters from WW2 send him pieces from various structures from all over the world.  We had fun trying to figure out how someone cold have brought home a brick from the pyramids of Egypt, and the Great Wall of China (among other notable places).

We had a traditional Chicago Deep Dish pizza for dinner, before heading to Navy Pier.

We were feeling too tired to stick around for the fire works display.  But we had a good ride on the Ferris wheel before calling it a day.

Tomorrow we drive home.  We are all a bit relieved to be heading back to our own beds, but also a bit sad to put this journey behind us.  After months of planning and researching for this adventure, we can now say "been there" and "done that" to some of America's greatest sights and scenery!

There is something about travelling and sharing experiences that brings people closer together.  During this trip we have shared a lot of laughs, made new "inside jokes", and experienced changing landscape, culture and life, daily.  It is somewhat fitting that out last day is also our one year wedding anniversary.  I can't wait to find out what adventures are in store next for this family of ours!

Great American Road Trip - Day 9

Today was an absolute blast!

We left the Wigwam Motel in good time this morning, and headed out on the road.  We made a quick stop at the classic Route 66 landmark: the 'Here it is Jack Rabbit'

The Here it is Jack Rabbit trading post opened in 1949 and is home to the 12 foot tall fibre glass Jack Rabbit.  Although the Rabbit is not original, we definitely had some laughs taking pictures with it.  The bill board on the road is original from 1949.

From here we headed down the highway to Winslow Arizona...  

...where we enjoyed the view of standing on the corner.  (Incase you don't get the refrence - it's the corner referred to in the song 'Take it Easy' by  the Eagles)

Just around the corner we found a Peter Toth totem pole park.  Peter Toth travelled around the country creating totem poles to honor the First Nations people who are local to the area.  

The park also housed an old Santa Fe rail car...this is very similar to the we are staying in tonight.  

We continued out on the open road enjoyng the view of the flat lands with the view of the San Francisco moutntains in the distance.  

We found ourselves at a deserted road side attraction in the middle of no where which claimed to be home to the worlds largest map of Route 66.  The map was slightly delapitated, but it was neat to see none the less.

Continuing on the road we could see some of the land elevated in the distance.  This would eventually become the ridge of the best preserved meteor crater in the world.  We entered the meteor crater park and did a little tour around the rim and learned about NASA's research at this site, and about the rocks in this region.  We learned that this is in a high altitude desert at about 7,000 feet.

After another picnic lunch, we continued on the road still driving towards the Mountains and stumbled upon a little ghost town called Two Guns.  This town was at one time home to a zoo, which proudly displays that they had mountain lions.  It was quite eerie to walk around the abandond buildings and to see the cages which one time were home to animals.

One thing that we concluded on today was that Route 66 is very much like the worlds largest museum of Americana.  We found ourselves down the highway at another abandoned trading post called Twin Arrows.  There was also an abandoned diner - it is so strange to see these places in the middle of no where.

Driving up, and up, we found ourselves in a completely different environment as the trees became more dense, and the road curving and turning.  I actually had no idea that we were going to be driving into the mountains...and then weave ourselves down again on a scenic byway. 

We enjoyed a late afternoon swim at Slide Rock state park.  Unfotunately, all of our pictures from this are on a different camera, which I will load up later! But take my word for it - it is awesome!!  It's basically a mountain river that runs down the mountain, and the rocks of the stream are completely eroded and smooth creating a natural water slide.  The water was super cold...but it was a blast.

We made our way from the park to our hotel, which as mentioned...was an old train car.  The park was cute and so was our room!

We found out that there was a party downtown, and a classic car show, so we headed out for dinner at Twisters Soda Fountain (who happned to be the hosts of the party).  We were exhausted...so we didn't stick around for long before heading back to our hotel for a good nights sleep!

Great American Road Trip - Day 7

Today was really all about enjoying the scenery of New Mexico. 

We enjoyed chatting with the owners of the Blue Swallow briefly this morning over a cup of coffee and a fresh baked muffin before heading out for the day.  

Our first planned stop of the day was the Billy the Kid Museum in Fort Sumner, NM.  However, we were blown away by the change in landscape as we headed south into the desert, and pulled the car over on a deserted stretch of highway just to get out and listen to the sound of nothing. 

 Aside from the odd bird, or lizard, there was really no sign of life.  In fact the only real proof most of the time that people inhabited this land was the odd ranch land marker, and the stretches of road.

After a brief break, we continued on our way.  

Eventually we reached the town of Fort Sumner which proudly displays that it is the home of the final resting place for Billy the Kid.  We followed the signs directing us to the grave site where we stopped to take some pictures.  

We headed into town where we made a stop at the Billy the Kid museum where we learned about the significance of this town in the Wild West.  

From the Billy the Kid museum we continued heading south towards Roswell, NM where we enjoyed some pretty authentic Mexican food for lunch before meeting our tour guide for the day: Denis Balthasar.  Dennis is a  self-employed Roswell expert and has spent many years researching to learn about the "incident" back in 1947.  

We enjoyed his commentary as he showed us around the town and pointed out important facts, landmarks and conspiracies around the mysterious "weather balloon" crash in Roswell back in July  1947.  It was almost bone chilling as we sat in front of the airplane hanger that was used to load the pieces of the "weather balloon" to be taken away from this town.  It was interesting listening to him as he was clearly an expert, and had obviously done a lot of research as he explained to us all of the first hand interviewing he has done.

We were only slightly disappointed that we didn't actually see any aliens - the closest thing we saw was the inside of a McDonald's shaped like a flying saucer as we sipped on cold drinks (and the light posts made to look like alien  heads).

After wrapping up in Roswell, we headed north west towards Albuquerque, NM. We were again blown away by the continuously changing landscape.

Albuquerque looks beautiful, and we are looking forward to exploring it in the morning.  For now, we are sitting poolside in the courtyard of our resort-like hotel, sipping on complementary wine!

Great American Road Trip - Day 6

Do you ever have those days where it feels like what happened in the morning could have happened a week ago??...that was today for me!

We did a lot of travelling today, but of course, not without a few great stops along the way.  We departed from our hotel in Oklahoma City at a good hour, and continued making our way west toward The Cherokee Trading post...

...Where we got to see some real live Buffalo (Oklahoma's state animal).  

There was a little curio shop that we took a peak at, but nothing caught our eyes here...just some great photo ops with the totem poles and tee-pee on the lawn.

From here we headed to the town of Clinton, OK where we toured around the Route 66 museum.  

A number of books and websites identified this one as the best Route 66 museum on the way.  We enjoyed walking through and learning a little bit more about the great sites we have seen already, and got a better idea of what's ahead.  

We enjoyed a picnic lunch and a game of Catch Phrase in a rest area on the grounds of the museum before heading back on the road.  

We were all blown away by the long distance view of the country side as we continued west before crossing into Texas.

Shortly after crossing the border, we stumbled upon a small ghost town called McLean, TX.  This town is home to the devil's rope museum...

...which we did not explore, as well as the old Avalon Theatre, which was very run down and falling apart, but beautiful.

After talking to a shop owner of one of the only open stores and purchasing a soda, we learned that the town is fundraising for their high school's one-act's club.  We have to remember to look up their website when we get home to help donate! (Obviously we want to support acting high school students since we have our own little one-act actor)

Continuing west we drove past the town of Britten and their famous leaning tower, and began seeing changes in the landscape again - the sky just kept getting bigger!

We made a stop for an early dinner in Amarillo, TX at the infamous Big Texan Steak Ranch.  

Since the hubs is a vegetarian, this seemed at first like a funny choice.  But, it's a landmark, and some of  us felt that it was our duty to eat a steak in the steak capitol of the world...and one of us ate a baked sweet potato.  

Just outside of Amarillo is the Cadillac Ranch.  Which is as iconic of an image as any on Route 66.  We arrived, with cans of spray paint in hand ready to make our mark on this attraction.  We all had fun doing graffiti (which is encouraged at this site), and spent a bit of time reading the works of other artists.

Continuing west we saw the sky change and were all amazed at the phenomenon of being able to see storms in all directions around us before reaching them.  

While driving on the freeway, we decided to take another jaunt onto the old Mother Road, and stumbled upon the town of Adrian, TX - which is actually home of the half way point on Route 66.  Here we found the marker that identifies the half-way point between Chicago and Los Angeles on Route 66.  

After some more cheesy photos, we headed back out on the highway and drove into some great thunderstorms.  

Before long,  we knew it, we were in New Mexico.

Once in New Mexico we found ourselves on the other side of the storm, and a large rainbow shawn bright in the sky.  

Then the best thing happened - it became a double rainbow!

Continuing west we reached our destination for the night - the town of Tucumcari, NM.  

This is a super cute town and visiting here is almost like being in a bit of a time warp.  The neon lights of old motels glow down the streets, and we are enjoying the nostalgic features of our room at the Blue Swallow Motel, including a rotary dial phone!  

We headed down the street to a diner where we seemed to be the only people who didn't know each other, and  got ourselves some ice cream!

Tomorrow we are headed for Albuquerque, NM!  (we are going to keep our eyes open for Walter White and Jessie - but will settle for any random camper van in the desert!)