Big Red and Rudy are more than a match for John Steinbeck's camper on a pick-up truck bed "Rosenante," although the literary punch is not. Kathy and I set out to find the bits and pieces of Historic Route 66 that have survived being paved over by Interstate 55, Chicago to St. Louis; Interstate 44, St. Louis to Oklahoma City; Interstate 40, Oklahoma City to Los Angelos. More than a year ago, we did I-55, following the Lincoln Trail, Chicago to Springfield Ill. This time we headed straight to Indianapolis to pick up I-70 for St. Louis. The first leg was to be our longest as I wanted to be West of St. Louis by our first night, and so we were. More than 600 miles. I had planned on stopping at the M something State Park our first night, but Kathy did not want to get off the road in the middle of the night to search for a campground that may not even be open. So, our first night, Wednesday night, we spent in Missouri at the Doolittle Rest Stop (you all remember the Doolittle Raid over Tokyo at the beginning of WW II memorialized by the book "30 Seconds over Tokyo", separated somewhat from the dozens and dozens of 18 wheeler rigs, we on the unpaved part of the auto area. The only real hic-up was the need for me to change propane tanks for our furnace that kept us toasty warm. 
Our next leg of our trip was 60 miles West of Oklahoma City in Hinton OK, population 1600, with its one blinking red both ways light, where you park in the middle of the street, and the streets are all paved because of the tax revenue from the 2200 inmate correctional facility just down the road. We camped at the Red Rock Canyon State Park along with two other campers. The Red Rock Canyon served the indigenous tribes as a winter shelter from the blowing prairie winds. The sun was just beginning to shine upon the West wall as we arose, shower and shaved, unplugging the electricity and heading for breakfast snack and coffee. I of course had used the microwave to warm up left over pizza from our forage from the night before. We left Hinton, surviving on the prairie while neighboring towns, wither, their unpaved roads a legacy of when the horse and cattle were king, a now bygone era.
As we traveled West, the time zones changed, but still sunset was at 5 PM and we were searching for campsites in the dark of night. At Red Rock Canyon we campers were three in number, the next night, Villanueva State Park in New Mexico, we campers were 2. North off I-40 into the mountains, elevations of 6000 to 7000 feet, and then plunging down a winding, hair-pin turns narrow road into a valley where a Spanish community had an early success but lost 1800 people when a priest had a vision and lead most of the valley inhabitants South to Mexico leaving behind a remnant subsistence group; first electricity 1949, first community water well, 1952. Littering the valley floor are discarded cars and trucks, broken windshields, hoods up, door open, all with weeds growing around and through the various orifices. The other campers were a group of Spanish speaker men with several small boys, intent upon trout fishing in the Pecos River having intended to go elk hunting this weekend with the two small boys but failing to obtain the necessary licenses through somebody's error, or so we are told. Nevertheless, Kathy and I hiked the valley ridge along the river as our morning excursion. Later on we left for Santa Fe, an artsy community, populated by people who left something behind to get a fresh start in life as we learned at Harry's Roadhouse Cafe. As a winter storm was coming with 5 to 8 inches of snow for the area, by 3 PM we headed South towards Albuquerque and then Westward. The afternoon sun set upon the ribbon of highway as we made our way to Prewitt. We turned South towards the Bluewater State Park. And now we were one, as in one and only in the Park. The wind had been buffeting us all day, 30 mph steady and gusting to 45 mph. As we drove the seven miles to the campground, we took the wind broadside. We had climbed to over 7000 feet elevation in our journey from Albuquerque and again plunged more than a 1000 feet down a narrow winding road to a valley with raging winds and flying dust. In the darkness of night we found a site close to the heated toilets and showers. We also found that we were the only ones there. All night the wind howled, rattling whatever was loose on our camper, rocking us in multiple gusts of wind. We had electricity, propane for our furnace, down coverings for our bed and so we slept, fitfully. In the middle of the night, a pickup truck headlight's danced on our Cabin A and then moved off into the night. Later on, we heard sounds of rain or snow against our metal shelter. It was snow, 8 inches of it, heaped up and swept into drifts. After morning luke warm showers, we unplugged the electricity, fired up Big Red and blazed a trail where the road likely was. Out of the campground and onto the narrow roads, bisecting more evidence of subsistence living with cars scattered about yards in various states of disrepair, we confronted the snow covered narrow steep winding road that we had to climb to get out of this valley and back to I-40. It was this trek up the mountain side that Big Red earned its keep; all 4 wheels churning, clawing upward, pulling Rudy behind. There was a little bit of slippage as we slowed our momentum and turned a particularly sharp curve, but we straightened out soon and regained our course. At the top we were now headed downward and gaining speed. I downshifted and used the engine as a brake and we descended in a more controlled fashion. Our entrance to I-40 was closed and we headed to Historic Route 66 to the next town 25 miles away and another opportunity to get back on the Interstate. I-40 was plowed, although only the right travel lane had pavement showing, the left travel lane was mostly snow packed. Kathy suggested breakfast in Gallup NM another 40 miles hence to let the snowplows and sand trucks finish their work. And so we did.
The roads become progressively clearer as we headed West. We arrived at the Painted Dessert and Petrified Forest National Parks for an afternoon cruise through "Badlands", beautifully colored petrified trees from tropical forest 225 million years ago, when there was but one land mass, and this part of Arizona was near the equator. The petroglyphs you see to the right represent indigenous people from 1250 to 1380 AD who inhabited these enchanted but parchment dry lands eventually, these people blended into the Hopi and Zuni peoples who lived to the North and South of this area. I wonder if a spiritual leader had initially led a group from the Hopis or Zunis sometime in the 13th century much like the priest had led a group from the Villanueva valley to Mexico in the 18th century. The stories in the rocks do not tell of the demise of the community, only the tales of when it prospered. Tonight we stay adjacent to Meteor Crater National Historic monument, clear skies and a full moon. The furnace purrs away.
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