With the war cry "California or Bust" and the outside temperature of 93 deg. at 8:50 am, we hit the road leaving Kingman AZ and Andy Devine Avenue headed west. The old Route 66 takes a completely different path from Kingman to Needles CA following some very twisting mountain roadway past the Black Mountains. This was very much like the old Fish Creek Canyon road north of Apache Junction AZ complete with a derelict car that had gone over the side of the mountain road. We expected to see the old gold mines along the way, but what was most surprising was to see a modern and very active gold mine in this area with a couple of dozen employee cars! As we passed through Oatman which is an old mining town converted to contemporary tourist zone, we had to avoid the many burros roaming freely down main street! Ultimately, we made our way down to the Colorado River, crossed over into California at Needles and said adios to Arizona. The were some very long and mostly unbroken stretches of "66" all of the way to Kingman. As we made our way there, the temperature steadily rose to 111 deg. as we passed Amboy and the remnants of Roy's Cafe. Between Amboy and Ludlow we passed Amboy (volcanic) Crater and the black lava field that surrounded it for many miles.
We stopped for lunch at the Ludlow Cafe which turned out to be pretty decent food but a little slow in coming. Although Ludlow was our original destination for the day, it was still only mid-afternoon so we pressed on to Victorville. As we came into the town, we stopped at a pretty good "66" Museum and where they had one of the old-style restrooms.
Anticipating traveling to LA tomorrow and knowing that it is strictly forbidden to drive a dirty car in LA we found a car wash that could deal with the accumulation of bugs and grime from Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and now California. Amazingly, there was still a good looking 'Vette after we finished at the car wash. We got lucky with a local recommendation for an "authentic" Mexican restaurant for dinner, it was great! We logged 275 miles today and we are looking forward to completing the final leg of the journey, onto Santa Monica Pier tomorrow.
Pants on the ground, Dave
Twisty roads and great vistas between Cool Springs and Oatman, AZ.
Aggressive driving could get you in trouble here, good thing Mike was driving!
Oatman, AZ. quaint little tourist town/trap?
Burro-lined street, very docile and quite likable burros.
Don't kick or lick the car!
Crossing the Colorado river at Topak, CA.
Dave has the death grip on the Vette wheel.
Amboy, CA very hot and lots of bikers.
Amboy Crater whose lava flow crosses Route 66, strange to see in the middle of the dessert.
On the outskirts of Amboy the Vette read 111F.
We wanted to stay here tonight, but they were booked up.
The old horse has bugs and dirt from eight states, can't wait to get it cleaned.
Lunch time in Ludlow, CA. our book guide said they had good eats!
Great museum in Victorville, decided to stay for the night.
Pants on the ground "Dave" has no shame!!!!!!
Remember these campers? Camping at it's finest.
Clean once again, they did a great job.
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