Get your kicks...

On Route 66… I know, all of my titles are the names of songs. What can I say, I’m unoriginal. Just a brief one for today, as I’m currently parked in a parking lot stealing a local hotel's wireless connection (again, this is becoming a habit of mine). but for most of the 7th, as we travelled from Barstow, California to the Grand Canyon in Arizona, we were on and off the famous cross-country highway most of the time. Beginning our trip early, we saw hundreds of jet streams from planes flying the East-West US route and set off into the desert. As we crossed the Mojave, we took a detour to the Kelso sand dunes where, despite the sun, it was a cool 56 degrees Fahrenheit (turns out deserts, while always dry, aren’t necessarily hot.). We also saw a real life coyote (It is there, look reaaaal close). Next stop was Needles, California, with its historic motels (we have probably a hundred photos of old neon hotel signs so far. And we haven’t even hit Vegas yet).
We continued through the desert into Arizona, then turned off the big I-40 highway to the real route 66, complete with tens of tacky souvenir shops, but also some authentic and old stops on the now largely disused highway, in various states of disrepair.
Eventually reaching the town of Williams in Arizona, we set off on the last stretch towards the Grand Canyon South rim with the setting sun, arriving just after dark.