A pilgrimage is what
a drive along Route 66 is today. The fabled road lives in songs and literature
and just won’t fade away. Bev Malzard travelled on America’s Main Street.
In the earliest days of television in Australia, the black and
white screen flickered with many (mostly) American series to entertain the
young minds of the babyboomers: Mickey
Mouse Club (remember Annette Funnicello?); Cheyenne, Sugarfoot and Rawhide (cowboy cool dudes) and family
entertainment – The Nelsons (oh Ricky!);
The Donna Reed Show and Father Knows Best. But for us growing,
restless teenagers of the time this was ‘too square’, no grunt at all. Bandstand was a constant and we got our
rock’n’roll edge with Six O’Clock Rock
but drama to get our motor running? No.
Then in the early 60s along came Route 66, edgy, and supremely cool; two guys in a sleek convertible
Corvette heading from Chicago to LA . . . with incidents and episodes along the
way. Tod and Buzz slicked back their
hair, got moody, threw on their duffle coats and jumped in the car – to drive.
We may not have heard the early song by Nat King Cole –
well, it was a recorded in 1946 but Get Your Kicks on Route 66 is embedded in
everyone’s musical memory. And our generation may not have that restless seed
of youth blossoming as it did in the 60s but the Mother Road waits for the
adventurous!
The romanticised highway represents a transition from dirt
road to super-highway. Route 66 was the shining beacon as to the importance of
the automobile as a new world achievement – and to the American people it
symbolised the new freedom and mobility for every person who owned and drove
their car. Route 66 was born in 1926, pieced together from a network of
existing trails and anonymous roads. It’s the Mother Road that carried life
along the highway from Chicago to Los Angeles. The Interstate Highways System
took it over in the 1950s and much of old Route 66 was decertified and became a
secondary road, a highway of broken dreams and a mythical place that stranded small
towns and businesses with cruel bypasses.
Today it’s the road to a new adventure – a link to the past
with an air of freedom. In the past decade the idea of Route 66 has been reinvigorated
and has made a rock’n’roll kind of comeback – warts and all.
Driving to find the glory days you don’t have to go far out
from Los Angeles and for a couple of hundred miles discover what’s happening
along the way.
Route 66 and beyond can work nicely if you:
Head out of LA and visit Big Bear Lake, Yucca Valley. Set in
the heart of the San Bernadino Mountains, Big Bear Lake and surrounds is startlingly
beautiful country with much to do for fun: off-road adventure in a Pinzgauer
4WD – hot to trot and loads of fun; Big Bear Village has a rustic charm with a
sophisticated edge – the coffee in town is damn good too!
Yucca Valley is reached after a drive that descends through
a layered spread of heavily grassed land to almost paint-by-numbers clarity in
the tapestry effect of the landscape. And in the distance a tiny sliver of snow
is glimpsed on the top of the San Bernadino Mountains.
There’s a hometown atmosphere and this ‘High Desert’ region
is welcoming and eye opening for its nature and cultural heritage. And if you
want to meet the locals – they are the friendliest people around, just drop by
Pappy & Harriet’s Pioneering Palace for mesquite barbecue chow and you’ll
enter an establishment plonked on the
side of the road that looks deserted except for a few utes parked out front.
Walk through the doors and it’s packed, there are waitresses zooming around the
tables and the beer is flowing and the music is about to start – hip and
happening! Step out the backdoor and you are in the old west.
Pioneertown was founded by a group of Hollywood investors in
1946 with dreams of creating a living movie set. The 1870s ‘frontier town’ with
authentic facades never did take off but folk had fun there and several of the
properties are working sets with art and craft people doing their thing.
Hit the highway and drive through the empty, lonely
landscape until you come to the sublime (if you love a desert park) Joshua Tree
National Park.
In the park is the Desert Queen Ranch, a crumbling reminder
of the toughness of this country and the remains here tell the life story of
Bill Keys’ family – the trials, triumphs
and tribulations. Keys lived there from 1910 until his death in 1969.
Bill Keys was a resourceful man who was the Desert Donald
Trump of his day – pursuing mining and ranching and taking every opportunity to
make a killing – which he actually did. He lived on the isolated ranch with his
wife and seven children, three of whom are buried there.
During a property dispute Keys shot and killed a man and was
convicted of murder and spent a few years in the big house educating himself.
(He was paroled in 1950 and was pardoned in 1956 through the efforts of Earle
Stanley Garner, author of the Perry Mason
novels.)
The original homestead is still there plus outbuildings, a
schoolhouse, farm and mining equipment and old truck chassis. The elements are
rusting and corroding the debris from Bill Keys’ empire – to restore it or let
it crumble back to the earth – that’s still being debated.
Even though it’s a remote and strange desert park, Joshua
Tree has drawn some pretty interesting characters – including lots of
alien/spaceship sightings. Oddly, the Andreas Fault Line is visible in parts of
the park and juts out of the earth like a dragon’s spine. Cattle rustlers are legendary
and Keith Richards and Graham Harrison sat out here and took copious amounts of
drugs while waiting to have a close encounter with a UFO . . .
In keeping with the mystical/hippy/left-over60s vibe of the
area much of the interesting stuff of the area has survived and thrived.
The ‘Integratron’ is an acoustically perfect tabernacle dome
and energy machine sited on a powerful geometric vortex in the magical Mojave
Desert. (This was created by George Van Tassle, and is based on the design of
Moses’ Tabernacle drawings and the writings of Nikola Tesla and telepathic
directions of extraterrestrials – that’s the speil anyway.) Whatever floats
your boat out here but climbing up to the platform to lie down while someone
rims ceramic bowls is quite something – a resonating sound bath indeed.
The historic route continues to evolve as states repair and
redirect the road. Entering Amboy, there’s the classic Route 66 stamped on the
road in front of a Roy’s Motel sign – classic 60s and a poor old motel that is
crying in the shadows for someone to bring back its retro coolness. Faded and
atmospheric, the location is not as neglected at is seems. It’s used for
commercials and movies – the no-longer-a- town Amboy, Roy’s Motel and Cafe has
a certain staying power. A buyer paid cash (lots) for the site in 2005 and has
promised to preserve the town and reopen Roy’s.
(The writer cruised into Amboy and was excited to see about
a dozen gleaming, shiny black and silver clad Harley Davidson’s – this is where
it’s happening she thinks. Just the backdrop for the ‘Wild Ones’; as she drew
closer to the bikies – she noticed as they were decked out in denim and
leather, chains, bandanas and snake-hipped girls by their sides – they were all
drinking Coca-Cola. This was a meeting for the Christian Motorcyclists
Association, riding Route 66 to Chicago – it was big, but these boys weren’t
going to be bad!)
Away from the bustling metropolis of ‘town’ we started to
see the beauty and drama of the Mojave National Preserve – sand dunes lead to
volcanic cones, craters became mirage-like salt pans and sand was accumulated
in vast amounts everywhere the eye could see – where does it come from?
We cruise past the Whiting Brothers Gas Station, a relic
that has been preserved and then stop for a milkshake (it had to be a
milkshake) at the Bagdad Cafe (remember the film?). It is still basking in the
glory of movie fame – albeit needing a bit of nip and tuck. The love this cafe
draws is evidenced by notes stuck on the windows – the clientele is universal; all
stopping by to take a peek at the defunct motel from the film and to order a
chocolate malt!
We stop for some big town buzz and Barstow fits the bill. Amazing
outlet malls here and for some real local hospitality we eat at Idle Spurs
Steakhouse – a favourite in the High Desert region of Southern California.
Built around the original house – these folk have been slinging steaks since
1950.
After a lazy sleep-in we keep moving west as we’ve backtracked.
We stop at the extremely charming and colourful Victorville Route 66 Museum –
and we’re greeted by the local lady volunteers – they are the ants pants! There
is so much going on in the museum, take an hour or so to let it seep in - from The Grapes of Wrath to the Mother Road’s
heyday as one of the greatest ways to experience America on driving holidays.
We wrap up our short Route 66 driving trip with a stop at
the original Wigwam Motel. This motel is one of just a couple remaining of a
great chain. The wigwams are neat as pins and there’s the place beside them to
park your car. This is one of two only (the other is in Holbrook, Arizona) Wigwam Motels still in business to offer
hospitality to drivers on Route 66.
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