Not that much to report on today. Left Santa Rosa fairly early and headed toward Albuquerque. We *were* planning on skipping Route 66 in New Mexico's biggest city because of the problem that I described with losing the route easily in big cities, BUT some really awful backed up road construction on the interstate on the east side of Albuquerque had us making an unexpected exit anyway, just to get away from the backlog. This was very fortuitous, as Route 66 is really easy to stay on in this city. There were a lot of mid-century relics along the way on Central Ave throughout. We didn't stop to shoot them (this would've taken forever as there was a lot) but we did pull over to buy Piñon from a roadside vendor. Mmmmm...Piñon. There is something about the kind roasted in the shell found only in New Mexico that is so delicious, but they are high in fat. Oh well, that's pretty much all I ate today. We didn't go to any restaurant at all...just munched stuff in the car. Surprisingly, I didn't stop in Gallup at all, although I thought I would. I really don't need jewelry, what I really need is beads to *make* jewelry*, but I didn't see any stores for that, so maybe I'll try Tucson.

The biggest photo op of the trip is actually a bit embarrassing. It has to do with a certain town in Arizona and a song from the 70s. And I feel like I lost all my indie punk cred for taking such an opportune moment to shoot it (which I probably lost years ago anyway), so maybe this was the nail in the coffin of my cred. I had the worse bad hair day today too...I don't know what I did to it in the shower last night. Maybe it's the dry air straightening it out. All I know was that I was standin' on a corner in Winslow Arid-zona with bad hair, shooting silly statues and street art with Stan, and looking like a total dork.

And thus concludes the Route 66 portion of our travels. Had we stayed on the route, we would've ended up in California. But we have cactus places to see and rock shops to visit in southern Arizona. Pictures to follow, but not yet...I haven't even gotten to Missouri with posting photos! I'm a bit backlogged.

I'm now in Camp Verde, AZ and dealing with a backlog of emails. Hotels were too $$$ in Flagstaff, so we went down the road (literally...steep drop in altitude) a way. Most expensive room I've stayed in (to me, $76 is expensive) but it beats Flagstaff and it beats driving all the way to Phoenix tonight. But it's got two queen size beds...I plan to stretch out a lot. Oh, and the towels are nice...they're an ecru color, not skinny white like most of them.

Labels: Route-66-Part1, Vacation