The Gulf Coast - 24th and 25th April 2010

24-04-10

We had a great night’s sleep in the plush motel in Pascagoula, Mississippi and first thing in the morning we crossed the Alabama border on the I10. We passed into Mobile and the bridge across Mobile bay was very impressive.
At a Visitor’s Centre, we saw on the weather radar that Tornado Warnings had been issued for Louisiana and Alabama. It looked further to the north, though, and we were headed east, so we weren’t too concerned.

On the eastern side of the bay we turned to the south on US98 and ALT98, on our continued mission to taste America through its small towns and old roads.
This short southern leg leads through the small towns of Daphne, Montrose, Fairhope and Point Clear. They are postcard towns: Green, lush vegetation, big white homes, and an air of slow gracious decay. It was beautiful.

US98 led us along the coast eastward and soon led us across the border into Florida at the city of Pensacola. We drove south, across the Pensacola Bay Bridge and the $1 toll bridge to the famous Pensacola Beach. Being a grey, windy sort of a day, there weren’t too many people around. There are some very grand and quirky houses along this tiny strip of land. There is everything from old southern mansions to igloos, stilt-houses and UFO look-alikes.

Following the beach along the Florida Panhandle, we stopped in the early afternoon for a look around the town of Seaside. This planned and pretty town is most famous as the location where the movie, The Truman Show, with Jim Carrey was filmed. It is quite a small town and very lovely. The town of Seaside on the Sunshine Coast back home is modelled after this one.

As the afternoon wore on we continued to follow the beach through the towns of Laguna Beach, Panama City, Mexico Beach, Port Saint Joe, Apalachicola and finally, at about 8pm, we stopped for the night at a campground right on the beach at Eastpoint. The weather was miserable, the night was very dark and the wind was very strong.

I had a chat with the father and son camping out there and after a canned dinner warmed on the gas stove, we started to get ready for bed. Then the cell phone rang. It was my mother, Esther, just calling to let us know that a Tornado Warning had been issued for the whole Florida Panhandle, west of Tallahassee. We were on a beach in the middle of the area in question. We assured her that we would keep an eye on the weather and tried to get some sleep. It was about 10:30.

25-04-10

We lay awake in the rocking van trying in vain to fall asleep for a couple of hours. It was probably about 2:30 or 3am before we drifted off. Not long before 4am, we were awakened by very loud thunder and close lightning. Sitting up, we realized that the van was rocking a lot more, too. In the near distance there was a roaring of wind that sounded like a freight train. There was an onshore wind of about 50 knots with gusts that must have reached 80 knots. But it was the freight-train sound that worried us, though. Witnesses always say that tornadoes sound like freight trains, and we knew that the nearest railroad tracks were about 50 miles to the north, running along the I10. Tornadoes that form in the rain (they’re called ‘rain-wrapped’) are invisible until they hit you because the rain hides them, and they sometimes form over water here. We began to become concerned that there may be a rain-wrapped tornado or water-spout nearby.

We made the decision to bug out. We threw all the gear from the front into the back of the van, left some money and a thankyou note for the owner of the park and turned the key. No engine. Just a rapid solenoid clicking. Bugger, Murphy is a vindictive bastard sometimes. After 4000 trouble-free miles since LA, this wasn’t the time or place for a problem. I popped the hood and started the usual sorts of remedies. It was difficult to do by torchlight in the gale-force winds. Battery had charge. Terminals looked clean. Wiring had continuity. Starter motor is in a place you can only get to after a couple hours in a fully-equipped workshop. Bugger. I began to form the opinion than the battery was nearing the end of its life and although it had charge, it wasn’t enough to crank the starter, just enough to confuse the immobilizer and rapid-fire the solenoid. I wanted to try jumping it.

Pia came over and yelled in my ear that that the father and son I had spoken to the night before were trying to pack up and bug out, too. I went over and asked if they had jumper cables. Mike, handed me a battery-jumper and I offered to help him and his son break camp and pack up. They were struggling in the wind with a large tent, a large pergola, a full-size folding kitchen bench, a canoe and much fishing gear. The rain started hitting us sideways. The freight train was still there.

We weren’t packing it up pretty. We were folding it up and stuffing it into their truck, a full-size GMC pickup, and into the canoe, on its trailer. Still it took awhile to get it all stowed. Some of it was damaged.

Then we tried to start the van again. No dice. Even with the battery jumper. We brainstormed and came up dry. Then Mike said “maybe the terminals aren’t getting good enough contact”. I’d already tried rotating them and I’d inspected them and they looked clean. But just to be thorough, I took a knife and scraped the inside surfaces and, what do you know, a bunch of scaling came off. It had been almost invisible, but when I reconnected, it fired right up. Sigh of relief.

We shook hands and bade a grateful farewell. Mike gave us a business card and told us to call him when we were passing by his place in Georgia. We probably will. We hit the road at 5:30am and while Mike ran north, we ran east. We drove pretty fast in the conditions but as time went by, we outran the edge of the storm.

After a couple of hours, we turned off US98 south onto ALT27 and US19, as the sun came up in a sky still grey. We cruised through thickly verdant landscapes, swamp and farmland, and sleepy southern towns. We were tired and wet and grimy from our adventures overnight and we drove quietly.

I whistled Dixie as we drove through Dixie, and we passed through the busy town of Weeki Wachee. The famous Springs there are now the sight of a Water Park. We didn’t stop, though.

The urban build-up for the Tampa / St Petersburg area began at Weeki Wachee. We had no detailed maps of the area, just a nation-wide trucker’s atlas. But nonetheless, we followed the beaches south to the city of Treasure Island, and drove straight to Aunt Edna’s condominium with no wrong turns.

We were very happy to see each other. We hugged and talked awhile. Then Pia and I washed up and we all went out to lunch at a local restaurant on the beach. It was a really nice place and I had a sloppy-joe. Much like Mom used to make.

Later, Pia and I went to the local grocery store and picked up some things. Then Pia made pasta for dinner. She was very happy to have a chance to cook again, and Edna and I were happy to help eat it.

Funny fact: Over the course of the previous afternoon, we saw road signs warning of bears crossing, and a sign by a river in Mexico Beach that read “Please don’t feed the Alligators”. Good advice, that, I reckon.

Pia and Edna

Mark loved this sign, it is really made from old licence plates. Notice the motto underneath.

Mark and Pia in the Town of Seaside, FL

The Town of Seaside, backstreet

UFO House in Pensacola Beach, FL

Road through Daphne, AL

Bourbon to Biloxi

Yesterday afternoon whilst sitting in a café in Bourbon Street, we spoke to Pia’s dad on the cell phone and were alarmed to hear that while we were here, in city that he has visited and loved, he had been rushed to hospital to have his gall bladder and golf ball size stones removed. I guess that rules out golf for him for a while. But, having talked to him since, he is definitely on the mend. Hoping you feel better soon TD.

We awoke in our tiny room in the Empress Hotel, in the French Quarter of New Orleans. We checked out early but the manager was kind enough to allow us to keep our car in their parking lot for the day.

We spent the rest of the day walking around downtown New Orleans. We had a good time but the sky began to threaten rain. Of particular interest we looked around one of the old graveyards. Because of the high water table they bury their dead above ground in Mausoleums here and the old ones are amazing.

In the mid afternoon we drove out of New Orleans on the I10. there are a lot of very long bridges over the bays and bayous and before long we were crossing the Mississippi border. We turned southward to follow the coast on US 90, and saw our first beach in since Santa Monica, 3500 miles ago.

The interstate highways are absolutely excellent and you do get to see the scenery go by, but the old US highways for tourism, because you can drive slower and see more and also they go through a lot of nice little towns (and bigger uglier ones) rather than bypass them.

The skies threat turned into drizzle and bluster as we cruised along the beach for about 70 miles. And the thunder and lightning began to intensify.

Even in the grey weather it is pretty coast and many of the houses that face the beach are huge mansions in the old deep south style. We stopped in a huge bookstore (about the size of a Kmart). You buy magazines from bookstores here, because there are no Newsagents. Such a business doesn’t exist here anymore. I’ve been trying for a while to get a trucking industry magazine, just to check it out, but I haven’t been able to find one anywhere. In this huge bookstore, when I ask their magazine expert, she said that she had never heard of such a thing and didn’t know that any had been published. Bummer.

As we continued east on US 90 the drizzle became a downpour and we gave up any hope of camping tonight, for fear of getting the van bogged.

We had dinner at a Sonic take-away. The sandwiches are very good. This is one of those places where you park next to a speaker box, order from your car and the waitress brings you your food on roller skates. Such a thing could never exist in Australia, because of work place health and safety laws.

We got a great deal on a motel room in the Mississippi town of Pascagoula. We checked in at 5pm and did some laundry, had an adult beverage and a luxurious evening in. It’s a fancy room at a really nice motel and we got it for a really cheap rate.

Funny Fact: Everywhere I look, I find myself surprised to discover evidence that Australia is much more Sue happy than the USA.

St Louis Cemetry No 1

St Louis Cemetry No 1

Court of Appeals, Magazine Street, New Orleans, LA

Mark loved this Kenworth W900 with 130 inch sleeper. The trailer is a 53 foot. The total length around 23 metres. It was a tight fit in the streets of New Orleans.

New Orleans - 22/4/10

This morning was lovely at the Quiet Oaks RV Park. We left in mid-morning and headed north to the small town of Kinder. From there we turned east again on the old US 190. We decided today to stay off the I10 as much as possible, to see some local color. Good decision.

US190 runs eastward through very lovely scenery, both bayou and well tended farmland, in equal portions. All of the small towns along the way are neat and clean, if modest. The locals really seem to take pride in their towns. There is not a blade of grass out of place in some places.

We passed through Baton Rouge at lunch time and it struck us as mainly a commercial town, so we drove straight through.

In the early afternoon we entered New Orleans and went to the RV park near the French Quarter where we were turned away because they were booked out. Then we made the mistake of trying to get to another RV Park four miles away through the back streets using a map, that we picked up for free from a visitors centre.

The map was woeful. It failed to show bridges and intersections and other important landmarks and even showed streets and whole areas that are simply not in existence. We wonder now if the map was printed pre-Katrina.

We got lost for over two hours driving around New Orleans' back suburbs. The flood damage is still very evident out here. There are hundreds of houses literally falling down. Just rubble. And there are entire neighbourhoods washed away. The streets are in the worst condition you could imagine and are far worse than many to be found in third world countries.

But there is a lot of rebuilding going on. There are road works everywhere and there are houses all over freshly rebuilt and repainted. People's love and pride in their city if evident.

Eventually we returned to the French Quarter and found an inexpensive hotel in a backstreet. It was an old European style hotel, very down at the heel, but right in the heart of the action. We discovered that we were very lucky to get a room in New Orleans at all, as the Annual Jazz Festival officially starts tomorrow. And the festivities are really kicking off today.

We set out on foot and spent all afternoon and evening exploring the French Quarter, the waterfront and some of the downtown. The atmosphere on Bourbon Street was electric. At sundown they closed the street to traffic and the party started. There was loud music of every description and neon light mixed with the gas lights. The spectacle is old and stately, loud and boisterous, cheesy, tacky and sleazy. It is wonderful and the senses were totally overloaded.

We had an afternoon drink at a Jazz beer garden and later, a three course dinner at a nice old hotel. We even tried gumbo and liked it.

We were tired but happy when we returned to our room.

Funny Fact: We drove over a couple of low bridges today that took over five minutes to cross at 65mph. That's a long bridge. We passed the road that leads to Marksville. We went into the Bubba-Gump Shrimp Co. restaurant and gift shop. We saw the Moon Over Bourbon Street.

Steamboat Natchez, Mississippi River, French Quarter, New Orleans, LA

Beautiful Buildings, French Quarter, New Orleans, LA

Canal Street at Dusk, New Orleans, LA

Bourbon Street, The Party hadn't started yet

Empty suburb, there is nothing left here except concrete foundations and lamp posts. A whole suburb is gone.

Nuf said!

From Farmland to Bayou - 21/4/10

Slept beautifully on the new mattress. And awoke to a glorious morning in the tiny Texas town of Luling. Had another chat with a fellow we met last night, really nice guy, got along great and was a bit sorry to say goodbye. He clued us in on a club called Passport America, which gets you half price at hundreds of RV parks and campgrounds across North America, very worthwhile.

We hit the road shortly after nine eastbound on the I10. We drove about 140 miles passing clean through Houston before stopping for lunch. Felt a bit bad about not stopping in Houston, but we are both a bit big citied out.

In the early afternoon we crossed a bridge over the top of Galveston Bay, which joins the Gulf of Mexico. It’s our first glimpse of water since turning east at Santa Monica 3000 miles ago. We passed into Louisiana in mid-afternoon and stopped for a few camping supplies, including new pillows and a gas stove, at the Walmart in Lake Charles.

Next, using our new Passport America guide we drove a few miles north of the I10 to a tiny town called Fenton, where we checked into an RV park called Quiet Oaks. It is quiet and surrounded by Oaks. Quite beautiful too. It is warm again now and there is humidity in the air, along with mosquitos. There are wetlands around and creeping vines throughout all the trees.

Funny fact: On the road today we passed a sign for the town of La Grange (famous from the ZZ top song) and also a coast town called Port Arthur (a long way from its Tasmanian cousin). Also, Pia saw an armadillo on the side of the road today (not sure if it was dead or alive, but still some local wildlife).

Welcome to Louisiana. Sign at the rest stop at the border

Pia at Quiet Oaks RV Park, Fenton, LA

Texan Fiesta - 20/4/10

We slept beautifully in our nice hotel and left late to miss the rush hour. We went into downtown Austin and visited the Capitol building. It was very grand. We saw monuments to the fallen Texans from the Civil War and the World Wars.
Next we checked out some funky stores in a cool part of town. Bric a brac, local art and native crafts.

On the southern outskirts of Austin is an area called Buda. We stopped there and had a (very) late breakfast/lunch. We went to a place called the Cracker barrel. I’ve seen a few around and think it’s a chain but it’s definitely my new favourite. It was awesome. The décor is all log-cabiney, decorated with ‘40s and ‘50s Americana kitsch. But the real star was the food. We shared some bacon and eggs and pancakes, and it all tasted home made. It was top quality. I had a root beer with mine and Pia had an apple cider made from real stewed, pureed apples with cinnamon.

Just next door(ish) to the Cracker Barrel, is an outfitter (outdoors store) called Cabela’s. We must thank John and Brenda for this gem. They suggested that it would be worth visiting and boy were they right. Cabela’s is a destination in its own right.
You have to see this place to believe it. It must be a half-square kilometre in size, and mostly one huge room. If it has to do with the outdoors, they have it.
There’s a big aquarium (two tanks about the size of a caravan) with dozens of game fish swimming around in there, and probably more than a hundred stuffed animals around the place. Everything is displayed like it was a museum (but I noticed that the white rhino and the elephant were fibreglass). They sell everything to do with fishing, boating, camping, hunting and everything you could imagine. We had a great time looking around and bought a new mattress for the van. Seems comfortable. Time will tell.

After our Cabela’s adventure, we drove south on the I35 to San Antonio, only 80 miles away. We parked downtown ($10 all day) and struck out on foot.
Our first stop was the Alamo. Not the Alamo Steakhouse or the Alamo Theatre. The actual Alamo. The Catholic Mission turned Texan fort, where 200 brave volunteers, none of them soldiers, fought a desperate losing battle against 2000 soldiers of Santa Ana’s Mexican Army for two weeks. They were killed to the last man, including the famous James Bowie and David Crockett. Texas was still a part of Mexico in those days and Santa Ana was the dictatorial ruler. He was incensed at the American and European colonists that were moving into Texas and wanted to put them in their place. Although the Alamo was lost, it resulted in further battles and eventually Texas became independent. It was briefly an independent nation, later part of the Confederate States of America and now the United States of America. Hopefully it will be part of Australia next.

Once we left the Alamo, we strolled around downtown and noticed a festive atmosphere. We soon learned that they are in the middle of their annual Fiesta at the moment. This is a 10-day celebration, like the New Orleans Mardi Gras, only on water. You see, San Antonio has a man-made river flowing in a big square shape around the downtown. It is flanked on both sides by a paved walkway with restaurants, hotels, cafés and bars. There are also many parks with fountains and sculptures. It is a very pretty place and the vibe was great.
We spent all afternoon there and had dinner at a Tex-Mex place, sitting on the balcony, watching the world go by. We had Texas BBQ-style nachos.

We were a bit sad to leave San Antonio in the early evening. We drove out of town on the I10, headed east and about 50 miles down the road, pulled into a lovely little RV park on a green riverbank.

Funny Fact: When you walk into Cabella’s a sign confronts you that states:

“All customers, please check your firearms and bows at the front counter. Thank you”.

Only in America.

San Antonio Riverwalk - the Venice of America (in the middle of a desert)

Riverwalk Cafes

The Alamo

Capitol Building, Austin

Entrance to Cabela's, Buda, TX

Green Texas

It was another cold, uncomfortable night in the van. The problem, we both agree, is the air mattress. It leeches heat from you and doesn’t provide good support. It has to go. We are officially shopping for a foam mattress.

The bathrooms at the RV park were great. Private rooms with toilet, basin, shower and heater. Nice way to start the day.

Continuing east, it wasn’t long before we were leaving the I10 again to visit the Davey Crockett Monument, in the town of Ozona. The town was an unexpected treat. The main street was lined with old sandstone buildings, graceful homes and the whole road gabled with old oak trees. At the pretty park in the centre of town stood the monument and a man passing by offered to photograph us. We go to talking and he introduced himself as the Principal of the local elementary school. When we told him where we were from, he said that he had been to Australia many years ago and stayed with a friend in Deniliquin. Small world huh.

Our next departure from the I10 was to take the US Highway 290 towards Austin, capital of Texas.

Along the way we passed through the bustling, yet old fashioned and very pretty town of Fredericksburg. We bought gas there for $2.74 a gallon and drove out of town over the bridge over Barons Creek.

The rest of the drive to Austin was through farming communities. They were small and modest, yet pleasing to the eye. One of them was the town of Johnson City, home town of LBJ – Lyndon Baines Johnson, not Lawrie Barton-Johnson.

From our stop in Ozona to the outskirts of Austin, we have really noticed the landscape becoming extremely green and lush. The vegetation is thick and it looks like Tasmania after a wet spring. It is a far cry from the bone dry desert we drove across yesterday.

We arrived in Austin just in time for peak hour but Pia’s awesome planning and navigation skills saved the day again and vowing not to sleep in the van again until we replace the mattress, we got into a really nice hotel in North Austin for $29 plus tax (seriously nice).

We had dinner at the Sports Bar/ Steakhouse next door to the hotel. The New York style steak was beautiful, just what the doctor ordered. We were amused to discover that the place was called Bikinis because that is what the waitresses wore. Shorty shorts, bikini tops and cowboy boots.

Funny Fact: While briefly lost in Austin, we encountered the first speed hump of the trip today. The quality of the highways here is unbelievable. The interstates are as smooth as pool tables for thousands of miles. The old US highway system and the state highway systems are almost as good. It makes our highways back home look terrible by comparison. The rest stops come every few miles and have covered picnic tables, BBQ’s, rest rooms, information kiosks, in some places WI-FI and enough parking for dozens of cars and trucks.

The Nimitz Museum, Fredericksburg

Texas Wildflowers

Davey Crockett Monument, Ozona

Barons Creek, Fredericksburg

From one extreme to the other

The Carlsbad Caverns are amazing. Jocelyn, please thank your parents for us. Let them know we just missed celebrating our anniversary there. But we loved the caverns anyway.

They are just enormous. There are two ways down, there is a path down the natural entrance, which we took, and the walk to the bottom took an hour and fifteen minutes. Or the second way down, is an elevator which stops 750ft beneath the surface. But these caverns would not bother most claustrophobes. They are simply too big and spacious. In many places the ceiling is over 100ft over your head. Walking the whole length of the tour took us three hours. The caves are minimally lit and only in neutral colors, so you see it as it should be. It’s very very beautiful and eerie. It constantly challenges your senses. It feels as though you are walking on another world because it is so fantasy-like.

At lunch time we left the caverns and headed south on the US 180 across the Texas border. We skirted the Guadalupe Mountains National Park and descended from the mountains to the flat plains of the Sierra Diablo Desert.

For the next two hours we drove south on Texas Highway 54 and didn’t see a soul. It is some of the most stark, empty landscape that we have seen yet. The sense of light and space is so great, that it was hard to comprehend after the Carlsbad Caverns. It is majestic country and we were a bit sad to rejoin the I10.

Rejoining the I10 at Van Horn we continued east to the town of Fort Stockton, where we checked into an RV park for the night. Sleeping in the van again felt like the thing to do. Freedom doesn’t feel the same in a motel room.

We parked the van next to the picnic tables and ate a pizza as we watched the sun go down over the desert.

Funny Facts:
1. Highest speed limit observed yet: 80MPH (133KPH) I10 across Texas
2. Miles driven so far: 2700
3. Roundabouts so far on the trip: 1
4. Speed Bumps so far on the trip: 0
5. Pot holes so far on the trip: 1
6. Most bizarre road kill so far on the trip: Black Bear I10 in Texas

Mark and Pia in Texas, the Sierra Diablo is behind us

The view from only about 1/4 of the way down, that opening is about 10m x 20m

The coloured soda straws (the thin staws hanging down)

How big can one cavern be (and this isn't the biggest)

Three huge stalagmites all in a row

They call these formations drapery

A view from the natural entrance

From Miracles to Martians

We had a good night’s sleep in our motel (the Silver Saddle) in Santa Fe, and got up early to go exploring downtown. Lastr night served to whet out appetites. We passed by the O’Keeffe Gallery (too expensive to tour) and just generally strolled around downtown.

There is a local legend here of a church, the Loretto Chapel, which is about 200 years old. Apparently there is a staircase there which is “miraculous”. So we decided to pay a visit. It is a small chapel, and extremely beautiful. The statues and carvings look like they belong in one of the famous European cathedrals. It is one of the loveliest churches. We took many photos. The staircase itself is miraculous for two reasons:
Firstly, when the church was taken over by an order of nuns a hundred-and-something years ago, it was incomplete and the loft was reached by way of a ladder. The nuns needed to use the space up there but had trouble with the ladder (the loft is about 29.5 feet high). They needed a staircase but they had two problems. There wasn’t enough room for a staircase in the chapel and they had no money left for one anyway. So they prayed to St. Joseph, y’know, the carpenter and patron saint of workers and mysteriously, a carpenter arrived soon after and spent 6 months there building a spiral staircase. He worked alone and used only a hammer, saw and square. When he finished he mysteriously disappeared, without seeking any payment. Nice story, eh? Now here’s the clincher: It is a double spiral. It goes up 29.5 feet in a 720-degree spiral. It has no central pillar, no outer supports and no reinforcement of any kind. It simply supports itself with it’s own geometry. Not only is there not another like it in the world but modern engineers are baffled as to how it was accomplished. It is stunning. Sometimes it pays to keep an ear out for local legends.

We spent another hour or so touring the galleries and markets of downtown Santa Fe before heading south on US 285, and bidding a sad farewell, not only to Santa Fe, but also to Route 66.
We passed through a dying, dried up desert town called Encino, which had few cars and one horse in the main street. A real one-horse-town.

Our next stop was Roswell, NM. Famous for the supposed UFO crash and government cover-up there in 1947. It is a thriving town, with a core of old buildings surrounded by modern chain stores. In the heart of the old part of town, there is a UFO museum and research centre. We spent a couple of hours there. It was very informative about the 1947 incident and related matters. It was also very entertaining. All in all, well worth the $5 each.

In the afternoon, we continued south to the town of Carlsbad, near the Texas border. It is very famous for the Carlsbad Caverns National Park. We checked into a cheap motel and had dinner at a great little family-owned restaurant, with down-home cooking, called Danny’s Place.

Roof Line of a hotel in Downtown Santa Fe

The Miraculous Staircase, Loretto Chapel, Santa Fe

PHD outside the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum

One of hundreds of bronze statues seen in Santa Fe

Bugs, Hogs and Eagles

We left Flagstaff fairly early, following the I40 east. And immediately passed a small town, colourfully, named ‘Two Guns’. A little further on we saw a sign for a Meteor Crater. Unfortunately, the admission price was too steep and there was no way to access the crater for free. We were very disappointed as it is the gigantic one from the movie ‘Starman’.

Our next stop was Winslow, Arizona. The town made famous by the Eagles song, ‘Take it Easy’. It is a small dusty town, with many empty shops. And it looks as though it has fallen on hard times. But, it also looks as though the locals are trying to turn things around, with many public works. There is a small park and statue on the famous corner and we (along with a few other tourists) took happy snaps.

The main street through Winslow is also Route 66 and it seemed to us that small, dried up towns all along Route 66 seem to be making an effort to clean up and become tourist attractions again. There seems to be a desire from the general public to have these places restored. There also seemed to be small casinos (about the size of a large RSL or surf club) at regular intervals along the highway. The US Govt allows them to operate on Indian Reservation Land and the proceeds go to the Indian Communities. While this is happening all across the American West, those that lay on Route 66 are benefiting the restoration of the Mother Road as well.

Later in the day we stopped at a small Indian Trading Post on Route 66 in the exact spot of the Continental Divide. It was mainly fireworks, cheap souvenirs and hand made crafts. But we liked it.

We crossed the New Mexico border and the landscape changed. The rolling deserts changed to Buttes and Mesas. It was very beautiful. We saw tumbleweed blowing across the highway and a few dust devils about twenty to thirty feet high. We also saw some freight trains running on the Santa Fe line, alongside the highway. These trains were between 100 and 150 freight cars long, with most freight cars carrying two forty foot containers double stacked. These behemoths were powered by up to four diesel locomotives. We think they were even bigger than anything we have in Australia.

Late in the afternoon, we passed straight through Albuquerque and turned left (as Bugs Bunny always said he should have done) and made our way north towards Santa Fe. Along the way we passed the small town of Madrid (from the movie Wild Hogs).

Santa Fe was a real treat. We immediately loved it, as Mark’s father did in the 1950’s. He had been passing through and ended up staying for two years. We felt as though we could have done the same. It has earthy colors and adobe architecture everywhere. It is extremely pretty and although it is the capital city of New Mexico, it is far smaller than Albuquerque and has a real small town vibe. Everything there is focused on the arts, the outdoors and western mythology. We had a lovely evening strolling around downtown and a nice meal at an underground Bar/ Café called the Sleeping Dog.

Funny Fact: A little about Sacky the Van (she was feeling left out).
She is a 1993 Ford Aerostar Van. She has a 4lt V6, like the one offered in the Mustangs of that year and a 4 speed automatic (column shift!). She is fairly economical and having covered 2000miles since we bought her, she is ticking along nicely. The captain’s chairs are very comfortable, the ride is smooth and quiet and the stereo plays our Ipod nicely. She is named Sacky after Sacagawea, the native American Indian woman who guided Lewis and Clark safely across America.

The windows behind us are all murals, note the reflection of a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowing down to take a look at us.

Pia at the Indian trading Post on Route 66 at the Continental Divide

Street corner in Santa Fe. There are no buildings over 4-storeys around here and they are all this pretty, even the 4-storey car parks.

But the toilet flushes the same way.

Balloons, Snow and the Canyon

Unfortunately, I (Mark) had a terrible night last night. I was violently ill and won’t be able to look at Taco Bell again for awhile. We had wanted a proper restaurant last night in Phoenix, but there was nothing but fast food for blocks and blocks.

This morning, we were surprised to find ourselves roused by the sound of many roosters crowing, near and far. Not what we expected in the city of Phoenix. We left early and drove across town to the highway. Last night, while looking for some dinner, we got a fairly poor impression of Phoenix. It seemed all fast food, industrial lots and all very down-at-the-heel. This morning, however, we drove clean across the downtown and the outer commercial districts and in the cold, hard light of day it seemed a neat, clean and pleasant city. The neighbourhood where we stayed was simply like Glenorchy on a bad day.

We left town on the I 17, northbound (Dale wins the prize), destination: Flagstaff, Arizona. About 50 miles north of Phoenix we pulled over to watch a bunch of hot air balloons take off nearby, then shot straight up to Flagstaff, about 140 miles away.

Flagstaff held 3 attractions for us:
1) It is a historic and very pretty town, that had been recommended to us by some fellow Aussie travellers;
2) It’s main street is part of the famous old Route 66, and;
3) It is about 90 miles south of the Grand Canyon.

We got to Flagstaff in the late morning, having ascended to almost 7000 feet of altitude, and had a bit of a look around at the town. Because night-time temperatures are still getting below freezing, we decided to check into a motel. A couple of walk-ins and we were set. Time for the Canyon.

The drive out to the Grand Canyon was beautiful. It is not desert here, it is aspen country. We drove over 8000 feet. Rolling hills, jagged mountain peaks all around, pine trees everywhere and still a lot of winter snow laying around, even though the day was warm. It was an unexpected pleasure of a drive. At one point, I walked out over a snowy field for Pia to photograph me. The snow was solid and my shoes only sank about a centimetre. When Pia walked out to the same spot, I took her picture and on the way back she stepped on a soft spot and sank to her ankles. She was wearing sandles, of course and the look on her face was priceless. Wish I’d got a picture of that.

The Grand Canyon: You know it’s big, right? You’ve grown up hearing about it. You’ve seen it on TV documentaries. You’ve heard some facts and figures. You understand that it is very, very big. What you can’t imagine, until you see it, is how MASSIVE it is. Firstly, although there is a Ranger station and a Visitor Centre, there are almost no guardrails on the Canyon rim. You can just walk right up to the edge of overhanging rocks and look over. It’s a drop of almost 7000 feet to the bottom, but that’s only part of it’s size. It covers the entire landscape from horizon to horizon in every direction. It is difficult to get your mind around the scale of it. It defies belief. And the rock formations are just beautiful. It is not something you can begin to understand until you see it for yourself, and maybe not even then. We spent a few hours there, and the squirrels played fearlessly among the tourists as the ravens wheeled above and below us.

On the return to Flagstaff, we saw one of those cheap, tacky roadside attractions that thrive in the deserts here. It was an old, Flintstones theme park and Campground. We also stopped to look around in an old Trading Post, now mainly local crafts and souvenirs. Back in Flagstaff, we walked around town for awhile and ended up having a lovely “anniversary” dinner in a cute little Mexican restaurant with good food, a nice wine, a lovely atmosphere and good live music. It was very cool. Then we walked back through town, along Route 66 to our 1950’s era, western-themed motel.

Funny Fact: Some funny names we have found today – Horsethief Basin Rd and Bloody Basin Rd. Some of the desert landscapes look very Australian and some look utterly alien.

Cowboy Wisdom

The Canyon

Snowfield Pasture at 8000ft

Marks feet and 7000ft drop

The 'honeymooners' at the Grand Canyon

Flagstaff, Arizona
Note the street name next to the red light

Across the Desert

We left Santa Maria this morning and drove back down south to Santa Monica where we joined Interstate 10. We used I10 to cross LA and stayed on it across the desert over the Arizona state line and all the way to Phoenix. So from LA to Phoenix it was a total of about 370 miles.

The desert landscape is very beautiful in its own way. Broad flat plains between mountain ranges. Sage brush, Joshua trees and the famous Western Cactus. Along the way we saw some scary turnpikes (Pia still doesn’t like them), beautiful snow capped mountains and just east of Palm Springs we saw miles of Wind Turbines, there must have been thousands, lining hills and valleys.

We arrived in Phoenix late and am afraid that the anniversary dinner was takeout. Will make up for it later.

Wind Farms east of Palm Springs

Scary Turnpike

Snow capped mountains