Flagstaff Arizona to Kingman Arizona

I only drove 147 miles across Arizona today but most of it was on old Route 66. We stopped in the historic towns of Williams (bypassed by Interstate 40 in 1984) and Seligman (bypassed in 1978). Being bypassed often resulted in economic hardship. Williams is known as "The Gateway to the Grand Canyon". The historic downtown area covers about six blocks. We enjoyed touring the town, shopping and taking photos. Once an important stop for railroad traffic, Williams seems to be thriving primarily on tourism.

In 1987 the residents of Seligman convinced the state of Arizona to designate Route 66 as a historic highway and to add "City of Seligman" signs on Interstate 40 to draw people to the town and old Route 66 as well. In 2006, Pixar's movie "Cars" based its sleepy town "Radiator Springs" on Seligman. The result of these actions has been economic success for what might have been called a ghost town in years past. We had lunch at the Snow Cap Drive-In built in 1954. While the food was good, the Drive-In itself has so much history about the owners and visitors old and new on the walls, it was really tough to stop reading everything and order our food. The rest of the town was also very compelling.

Tomorrow with over 6,500 miles and 18 states behind us, We will cross back into California, I will drive the final 300+ miles home and this extraordinary road trip will conclude. We've seen a lot of beautiful country and met some interesting people. I have only posted a handful of photos from the thousands I took. I'll post more and better versions in time. I'm glad I decided to take a chance on only using my iPad Pro and the Affinity Photo software to process my photos. It's not a direct replacement for my normal workflow but it has allowed me to process and post photos relatively quickly while on the road. Many were edited in Amtrak trains moving at upwards of 70 mph or in the hotels we stayed in after many hours driving. WiFi has often been spotty to non-existent so I just used my cell service if that was available. I'll apologize now for the misspelled words and poor grammar in the posts from the last couple of weeks. My time to edit and write has been very limited and frankly, I've been tired from all the traveling. It's a good tired though. I'll go back and make some needed corrections as soon as I can.

Some of you reading this may know that my Mom passed away a few months ago. I hadn't taken a real vacation in several years as I had my hands full being a primary caregiver for her. This has been a cathartic experience and while I still think about her everyday, this trip has helped move me along the path of healing.

While I greatly appreciate and welcome the new readers/viewers of this blog, I'd like to acknowledge the long time readers who have come back after my not posting for several years. Yesterday's post had about 1,100 unique views and the number of visitors has been steadily increasing in the past couple of weeks. For those of you who have kindly taken the time to reach out, I have received your messages and I will respond to everyone as soon as I can.

Thanks for joining me (virtually) on this journey. California and the final post of this Route 66 trip tomorrow!

Greg (Big Pixel Pusher)

Santa Fe New Mexico to Flagstaff Arizona

I drove 384 miles today from Santa Fe New Mexico to Flagstaff Arizona. We really enjoyed staying in Santa Fe. While all of the stores were displaying very beautiful but expensive things, very few tourists seemed to be purchasing things. It was clear that the Covid-19 virus has impacted Santa Fe hard. I would say that fully one third of the stores were vacant, another third were closed, and the remaining third that were open, weren't busy. The town was not packed at all and those tourists that were there were not carrying packages. Anyway, we stayed at the historic La Fonda Hotel. I woke up around 4:30 and decided to check out the Orionids meteor shower. While I didn't see any, there were countless stars in the sky above Santa Fe.

We knew we had a long drive to Flagstaff so we got up early, had breakfast at a nice cafe that has been in the same location since 1909 and got on the road. We refueled the minivan and ourselves in Gallup New Mexico. We then decided to stand on a corner in Winslow Arizona (such a fine sight to see).

Our stop here was brief but enjoyable. The road from Windslow to Flagstaff seemed to mainly be climbing and we passed several towering mesas and red rocks were prevalent.

Tomorrow we intend to return to Route 66 to see the Arizona towns of Williams, Seligman, Kingman, and Oatman.

Hidden in Plain Sight - A Historic Atomic Marker in Santa Fe New Mexico

We only drove about 55 miles today. After having breakfast in the arts district in Albuquerque New Mexico, we decided to visit Santa Fe. I have wanted to visit for a while but especially so after reading a fascinating book called 109 East Palace: Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos. 

Today in the courtyard patio of 109 East Palace visitors will find colorful ceramic lizards, chilies, frogs and dragonflies for sale.

Attached to the back wall is a small historic plaque.

With only a small sign that indicates a historical marker can be seen in the patio, the overwhelming majority of tourists miss it.

They pass by unaware that in the 1940's physics luminary's like Edward Teller, Enrico Fermi and Richard Feynman passed through this patio, often bringing their families with them. Each had received secret orders to report to 109 East Palace, Santa Fe New Mexico. They were tired, often having endured long journeys by train to this desolate desert city located high in the mountains at 7,199 feet of elevation.

When they arrived, they were met by Dorothy McKibbin a widow who had originally come to the New Mexico desert hoping to be cured of tuberculosis. After she recovered, she was offered a job by none other than Robert Oppenheimer, a professor from the University of California at Berkeley. Dorothy ran the secret Manhattan Project office in Santa Fe.

She would arrange for temporary lodging (often at the La Fonda Hotel), food, luggage storage and the security passes required for the physicists to travel to Los Alamos, the secret research facility located on top of a mesa where the worlds first atomic weapons were being designed and built. After a good nights rest, the physicists and their families were loaded onto busses for the 35 mile drive up the rutted and unpaved road to the Los Alamos facility. Once they saw their very basic accommodations on top of the mesa, most yearned to return to the luxurious La Fonda in Santa Fe. 

The history of 109 East Palace stretches back to 1939. In that year, Albert Einstein was persuaded to write a letter to then President Franklin Roosevelt, warning him that that in Germany the Nazi's were very close to developing their own atomic weapons. Einstein also understood that the German Air Force, the Luftwaffe was developing a long range bomber to deliver their atomic bomb to the US mainland. He strongly felt that the United States had to develop an atomic weapon first. In 1943 Oppenheimer established the Santa Fe office and the quest to develop the weapons had begun. Although the work was being carried out in the greatest secrecy, the Manhattan Project had several spies working inside the lab. They were dedicated to leaking information to the Soviet Union. Russian agents were meeting with these spies in Santa Fe restaurants, parks and even in the La Fonda Hotel.

Elk City Oklahoma to Albuquerque New Mexico

I drove 432 miles from Elk City Oklahoma to Albuquerque New Mexico today. We did have to stop at Amarillo International Airport to exchange our rental car because of a tire that had a slow leak. The helpful Enterprise agent tried to put us in a compact car after we had paid for a full size SUV but we declined. We're driving a minivan now and it's comfortable and roomy. We mainly stuck to highway 40 but did stop for lunch in at the Big Texan Steak Ranch in Amarillo Texas. It's a very large restaurant but there were very few people there. Rules regarding social distancing and use of face masks were being enforced so that was good. We had fun and the food was good.

We crossed into New Mexico and once we did the clouds and rain were left behind. It was 46 degrees when we left Elk City. When we arrived in New Mexico it was 79.

Kathy made a hotel reservation for us in Albuquerque, but we wanted to drive down old Route 66 for a bit to see the city of Tucumcari New Mexico first. Our first stop was the Blue Swallow Motel which is a historic attraction on Route 66 and has been serving customers since 1939. We met Rob, one of the owners while we were taking some photos of the property. He rightly asks that no one sells images of the hotel without their permission. We of course agreed to this, so no sales of the images taken here for any purpose. Please respect their request as we do and support this important small business enterprise along with the others along Route 66.

Next we visited the TePee Curios shop which I had seen on youtube. We found some great stuff to buy and met the owners who were very helpful.

After that we got back on the highway and saw a spectacular sunset as we arrived in Albuquerque. Tomorrow  we are headed west again although we might backtrack a little and head north to visit Santa Fe or head south to visit Sedona. Either way in the days to come we will pass through Gallup, Winslow, Flagstaff, and who knows where else. Great day today.

Springfield Missouri to Elk City Oklahoma

I drove 441 miles from Springfield Missouri to Elk City Oklahoma today. We did end up cruising for quite a while down Route 66 and saw some cool stuff but didn't stop since it rained nearly all day. We did pass by the famous blue whale east of Catoosa Oklahoma and since the rain had momentarily stopped we turned the car around to check it out. Tomorrow we are heading for Amarillo Texas and possibly Albuquerque New Mexico. Hope we leave the rain behind.

Indianapolis Indiana to Springfield Missouri

I drove 454 miles from Indianapolis Indiana to Springfield Missouri today. Once we left the highway and joined up with Route 66 we found navigating difficult. Surprisingly, modern maps don't always show the route of historic Route 66 clearly. The route is on the map but it is often marked with another name or number. We did stop in a cool Route 66 museum in Litchfield Indiana, but other than stopping to eat, we stuck to the major highway and bypassed Route 66. I can't manually navigate and drive at the same time. My wife gets agitated if she has to navigate so I think the attempt to drive along Route 66 ends here. The goal of this vacation is to relax and explore. I don't want my wife to get stressed out on what is her vacation too so I think we will stick to the major highways and I can better plan the route for a solo trip I'll take at a later date. 

We may still be able to see a few things on Route 66 using a turn-by-turn navigaton app I purchased today. Who knows. Hope so.

National Museum of the United States Air Force - Dayton Ohio

I have always wanted to visit the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton Ohio. The problem has always been that it's a long way to go from California to just see one attraction. My opinion has changed. This museum is so vast, I could easily spend 3 or 4 days just looking around. We were only in the building for about 5 hours and it just wasn't enough time to see everything. This place is high on my list of places I want to return to. We were shocked when my wife asked the security guards at the bag check if they allowed tripods in the museum. The answer was a simple "Sure". My wife entered the museum while my brother-in-law and I trudged back to the car to retrieve the tripods. Wow was it worthwhile. To preserve the artifacts, the lighting level in the museum hangers is kept low. This made using a tripod especially useful. I think I took about 1,000 photos. I have included a few below. After leaving the museum, we drove from Dayton Ohio to Indianapolis Indiana which is only about 120 miles but it was already getting dark and we were tired from the 600 miles we drove the day before. So I'm typing this post on my iPad Pro in a Hilton hotel in downtown. Now that this is done, I'm headed for bed. It's onto St. Louis and Route 66 tomorrow morning.

Long Drive From Washington DC

Kathy and I arrived in Washington DC on the Amtrak Cardinal train from Chicago around 6:30pm Wednesday. We walked to our hotel, dropped off our bags and went back out to find something to eat. We were shocked at how empty Washington's Union Station was. I think Covid 19 has taken a terrible toll on the businesses that once filled the main waiting room and the other retail areas. We found something to eat, took it back to our room, ate, took showers and went to sleep. We had to pickup our rental car at Reagan National Airport at 7:00am this morning. Other than a real lack of customer service at the Alamo car rental counter, getting the car was uneventful. We drove to Maryland to pickup my wife's brother who is riding with us all the way back to California along Route 66. We made it all the way to Dayton Ohio where we will stay tonight and visit the National Museum of the United States Air Force in the morning.

While we didn't have time to take photos in Washington during our short visit, here are a couple from previous visits.

Union Station - Ornate Stairway

This is one of the beautiful stairways leading into Chicago's Union Station's great hall. Amazing!

How I took this shot:

This handheld vertorama was stitched from 4 HDR sequences each containing 3 shots ( -2ev, 0ev, +1ev). I would have used my tripod but one of the security guards was already watching me, I didn't want to give her a pretense to kick me out. It's happened to me more than a few times before.

Union Station - Group Critique Busted!

When I entered the great hall in Chicago's Union Station, I saw about 10 art students sketching the interior. I walked around for 15 or 20 minutes taking photos. When I was leaving, I noticed they had put their sketch pads on the floor and had gathered in a circle. I assume this was a group critique. I thought I could sneak up on them, raise my camera with fisheye lens above my head and get a quick shot. You can see I got busted.