EKLUND HOTEL, CLAYTON—It would not be true to say that the Rockabilly 4-day party chased me out of Tucumcari. No, I left of my own accord…although every room in the three motels I looked at were rented for the entire weekend. Sponsored by Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer, there was plenty of live music, swing dances, pinup pageants, and vintage car shows. But (darn it) I had already missed the Happy Hour Hootenanny on Thursday. I Read more…
SOUTH 2ND & CENTER ST, TUCUMCARI—The Odeon Theater lights up South 2nd St. in Tucumcari. The rest of the street is pretty dark. This is not on Route 66 that has the world famous neon signs…signs like the Blue Swallow Motel and the TeePee Curio Shop. No, this is old downtown Tucumcari. Route 66 bypassed this part of the city. It runs a few blocks south of here. There are signs of decay, but there Read more…
ROUTE 66, ALBUQUERQUE—About two dozen of us took a tour of one of Albuquerque’s properties last weekend. Purchased in 2010, the Route 66 Open Space, as it is officially known, consists of 66 acres at the eastern edge of town as it enters Tijeras Canyon. Old Route 66 passes right by it to the north. On the south, it encompasses part of the Tijeras Arroyo and abuts the protected biozone there and other publicly owned Read more…
PORTALES, NM—You can’t help but take notice when the movie folks come to town. They were shooting scenes for the movie “Comancheria” last Tuesday in downtown Portales. This made the newspapers as far away as New York City. Actually, the “Comancheria” crew shot scenes in Clovis earlier and were going north to Tucumcari later in the week. This is all entirely appropriate, especially considering that Clovis, Portales and Tucumcari were all in the area criss-crossed Read more…
NOB HILL, ALBUQUERQUE, NM—Some public art is so representative of the spirit of a city it just makes the visitor stop and say, “Let me get a picture of you standing right in front of it!” It is one way we keep track of our lives. Some towns have art pieces that seem to define their existence. For instance, in Reserve, NM the one photo you must have taken is that of yourself in front Read more…
Let’s talk about math. Today on the high plains of eastern New Mexico we rode four hours. Hills: sure. Headwinds: of course. We rode four hours through it all working like two friends who had survived everything weather could throw at us. But again, let’s talk about the math. In four hard hours we rode 20 miles. That doesn’t count breaks…just the time that the wheels were turning. By 2:00 PM, with 20 miles under Read more…
SANTA ROSA, NM—Good weather finally showed its sunny face today…with a tail wind. Add another plus: elevations went from about 6400 feet at Las Vegas to 4700 feet in Santa Rosa. Not that there weren’t hill, steep hills…it’s just that there were good, long downhill runs. In fact, even being on I-40 was made more than tolerable by an 11 mile downhill scamper into the city of Santa Rosa. And I mean we didn’t turn Read more…
LAS VEGAS, NM—It was still raining in Pecos when we awoke at the monastery. The Benedictine brothers had prepared a nice breakfast of some kind of egg and spinach casserole and melon slices. Mike and I ate with a couple of nuns visiting from Texas. Everybody knew the weather was bad. The Abbey’s cook came over to tell us that if we waited to leave we could eat lunch with them. She said it would Read more…
PECOS, NM—It should have been an easy day: only 25 miles and a train ride. It started out fine. Mike and I met near the Alvarado Station in downtown Albuquerque. We made sure our bikes were set up and rode them over to the RailRunner platform. What a deal! Roll on service for bicycles. Frankly, this is not a common service. AmTrak is still trying to decide whether it wants to do it. But here Read more…
NOB HILL—Today was the first day that I woke up and my legs felt tired. I believe it must have been that really difficult morning yesterday with the wind and hills. But all in all, I had expected to feel much worse at this point. We had been on the road for four days and I generally felt great! Mike and I left Grants and headed east on the old Route 66. We hadn’t gone Read more…