Saw a chicken lay the same egg twice

Yep, that’s just how windy it was for most of the day.

This morning’s departure from Williams AZ was made under a grey sky with temperatures that fell overnight and then stayed there. I had to bring out the old fleece just to get me down the mountain.

The first alternate alignment of the day was a two-parter. It began just south of Williams with a segment built in 1926 and used through 1932. The second part was put into service in 1932 and used up until 1952. Just imagine the Dust Bowl refugee stories that either section could tell. Another alignment connecting Nelson with Peach Springs AZ, was built pre-1930 and has since been interrupted by a quarry operation. The ride through Peach Springs is one of the finest that the Route has to offer, if you follow the latest alignment. This run coupled with a couple of days in Williams would make a great 4-day weekend for anyone. I rode a 5 mile pre-1940s alignment out of Kingman, knowing that it was a dead end spur but it’s rock formations and twisties made it well worth the doubling back. Finishing off AZ, the ride to Oatman over the Sitegreaves Pass, with a stop at Cool Springs and then Oatman itself (ice-cream & wild burros), never disappoints. There once was a cottage industry consisting of locals that would drive a tourist’s car over the Sitegreaves Pass for those that found it too intimidating.

I crossed the Colorado River just south of the Topock Bay and then stuck my head in at Pirates Cove for some water. Needles CA has a variety of old RT66 alignments and it takes a while to sort through them. There is an abandoned spur from 1926-1947, followed by the 1947-1966 alignment and then a newer alignment that everyone sees in their tour-books. The Goffs Road alignment provides for a nice high-speed desert alternative to the Goffs bypass that uses boring old I40 to a large extent. The last alignment that I ran, took but seconds, as the sun was setting. This is in the town of Ludlow and it used to be a 5 mile spur that dead-ended, but it now has been blocked-off after a few hundred yards to save everyone the trouble of the backtrack (or to deny them the fun of driving one of the original sections of the Route). I guess that it’s just a matter of attitude.

I reached Barstow CA after a 371 mile day and it felt great to see a Californian sunset. Tomorrow will involve a bottle farm in Victorville, blue rock in the Cajon Pass, a ricochet route in and out of San Bernardino and then 3 alignments that terminate/pass-through downtown Los Angeles. There could be a Santa Monica Pier in my very near future.