Strength and Beauty, Met Together (Part One)

Happy Birthday, ol’ Route 66! November 11th marks the road’s 99th birthday…one year until the Centennial! I’ve been spending time on the road in recent days and marked this anniversary with my beautiful bride in the City of Roses. When you get down to it, there’s a lot blooming out here in California!

When I crossed the border into California on Saturday, November 8th, I was already pretty exhausted. Our original plan was to fly into Las Vegas, rent a car, and head down to Chambless, CA for a neon sign relighting that the National Trust for Historic Preservation helped make possible. However, due to ongoing air traffic issues, I called a last minute audible, renting a car in Tulsa instead and making a mad dash for the west coast. I definitely do not recommend driving from Tulsa to Gallup in one day, but sometimes you just gotta hit cruise control on the interstate and go as far as you can. As a bonus, Samantha finally got to meet Cindy Jaquez at the Jack Rabbit Trading Post! We picked up a mileage sign for her new shop, Bad Penny, in Tulsa’s Meadow Gold District.

By the time we took the off-ramp from I-40 and headed down to Historic Route 66 and Road Runner’s Retreat, the shadows were already getting long. Road Runner’s dates back to the early 1960s, the tall neon sign and Googie-style filling station standing out in the Mojave Desert as an oasis for westward travelers. “Duke” Dotson and his wife Virginia bought the station a few years after it was built and operated it with great success until shortly after Interstate 40 opened in 1973. Road Runner’s no longer had traffic to serve; the gas station and restaurant had been totally bypassed. The site stood for decades as a silent relic in the arid landscape, further isolated when several bridges on that section of Route 66 washed out in the 20-teens.

But, then, a bit of a miracle happened. On the night that Roy’s in nearby Amboy relit their neon in 2019, Road Runner’s owner Ryan Anderson ran some power to his long-dormant neon sign…and part of it lit up! So began a journey to restore the animated beacon. After years of volunteer work, support from the National Park Service’s Corridor Preservation Program, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Benjamin Moore paint, the California Historic Route 66 Association, and others the project was finally complete. At dusk on Saturday, November 8th, a great cheer went up as the neon came to life.

Once the event wrapped up, Samantha and I headed south to 29 Palms for the night. On the way, we pulled over to a safe spot, turned off the car, and stood in the darkness to see the stars. It was so quiet it was almost painful – like my brain was straining to find any sound at all. But the sky…oh, the sky. The amount of stars is almost overwhelming. You could easily see the Milky Way in the celestial field. Sam and I stood in awe for a time before continuing on to the Harmony Motel. Highly recommended, by the way!

On Sunday, we explored Joshua Tree National Park, which was thankfully still admitting guests during the government shutdown. The park had never been very high on my list, but I was quickly won over by the stunning landscape and easy walkability. The trees and rounded rocks looked like an alien planet! The overlook at Keys View, which provides a stunning panorama of the Coachella Valley, took my breath away.

Our next stop was a surprise for Samantha: the Cabazon Dinosaurs! If you’ve ever watched the movie Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, you know these roadside attractions well. Claude Bell, who sculpted teddy bears as a teenager in the shadow of New Jersey’s famous Lucy the Elephant, moved to California and started building his dinosaurs in 1964 to advertise his nearby restaurant. Dinny the Dinosaur and Mr. Rex have become international icons and the current owners paint them differently depending on season and theme. Mr. Rex is currently painted to look like Santa Claus! We loved wandering the grounds and visiting the gift shop within Dinny’s belly.

There was still a bit of daylight left, so we took a walk through the California Citrus State Historic Park in Riverside. This 250-acre park is filled with fruit trees; it was lovely getting to walk through the rows with the sweet smell of citrus in the air.

Our walk made us a bit hungry, so we wrapped up our day of exploration with dinner at Vince’s Spaghetti in Rancho Cucamonga. We ate at the restaurant when the Road Ahead Partnership had their annual meeting nearby in 2024 and Sam has been dreaming of returning ever since. The family-owned restaurant has been around since 1945 and has a simple menu. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

On this trip, Samantha completed the last leg of Route 66 she has not experienced first-hand. Part of that experience was a night at the Wigwam Motel! It was a quiet, comfortable stay after a lot of time on the road — which was a good segue way to a few days in SoCal. Check out Part II here.