My compatriot arrived on Saturday afternoon having left Maryland after leaving work an hour early the day prior. He arrived to find that a gathering of my local friends had been planned out and after a long evening of hanging out, playing Cards Against Humanity, watching cheesy movies and eating food off the grill and brought by other guests we hit the proverbial hay. The next morning would find us waking up a good bit later than anticipated and scrambling to make up for lost time.
With our gear loaded and suited up in our riding gear we lit out for the interstate, stopping to top off our tanks before actually breaking out onto I-44 West towards our first stop: Santa Rosa, New Mexico.
Our first leg was indeed a daunting one but necessary if we were to be able to allow ourselves three days to explore the so called Land of Enchantment. The highway would prove relatively quick as we expected, but it was draining as we began to feel the miles a hand full of hours into our 13 hour blast westward.
Our first non-fuel related stop along the route was in the Route 66 town of Afton, Oklahoma. A small, quiet speck of a place that, even though you would miss it if you blink has some pretty fantastic old buildings. Unfortunately many of them have fallen into a sad state of disrepair or abandonment. Afton is yet another perfect example of what happened when the interstate system came through the area, carrying traffic away from these small pockets of population and character. |
On the flip side though, you have little places like Afton Station which was acquired by a woman who has a deep love for history, Americana and of course Route 66. Afton Station was purchased restored and converted from a filling and service station to a Route 66 shop and Packard automobile museum.
One of the neat little things about Afton Station is that in the back room they have permanent markers available for visitors to sign the wall and leave their mark on Route 66. We poked our heads around the museum, left our mark on the wall in the back room and then after chatting with our hostess and host, we were back on our way, picking up the interstate once more and happily motoring our way west.
The next stop on the ride of any significance was a stop in at POPS! in Arcadia, Oklahoma. The filling station/diner/soda pop emporium is marked by a giant neon soda bottle of classic design and it's claim to fame is the mind boggling number of different sodas in stock, ranging from regular colas to coffee flavored sodas, root beers, fruit flavors and even bacon and turkey dinner flavored sodas.
We had a bit of a road buzz going at that point and decided to take an extended stop to enjoy some food, stretch our legs, cool down and browse the sodas that were in stock. We also decided a couple of malteds were in order as well and enjoyed those while we chatted and let our late lunches settle before filling up and heading out on the road once more.
The next miles and hours were spent blazing our trail West towards Santa Rosa hell bent for leather, as it were, stopping only for gas and the occasional snacks and to take on more water as we began to approach the desert and mesa region of our trip.
Our final gas stop before reaching Santa Rosa proved to be a somewhat memorable one. We were stopped on the New Mexico side of Texas and found ourselves trying to outrun a storm front that was rolling in that was reported to be capable of causing severe flash flooding. Matt also found himself trying to outrun a case of the bubble-guts and things got interesting at the first place we checked for gas which only had 90 octane high test and our bikes really should be running on at least 91. He couldn't hold out til the station down the road so he tore off at light-speed towards the restrooms of the station meanwhile I was lazily and probably somewhat confusedly (to them) assaulted by locusts who had a seriously poor sense of direction while jumping around.
And just in case you were wondering, Yes. The answer is Yes, they were big locusts, because they do everything bigger in Texas after all.
Once Matt had mastered his internal organs once again and we had filled up at the next station over which DID have 91 octane, we pushed onward to Santa Rosa.
We entered Santa Rosa well past midnight. The restored Route 66 motel that we were going to try and stay at called the La Mesa was closed when we got there. We had tried making reservations two weeks out but were told that they don't do reservations that far out and to call back the week of or right before heading out that way. Needless to say, after dozens of attempts at getting through to the front office without anyone ever picking up the phone, we had no reservations and we were left searching high and low for a room. Luckily for your dynamic duo, Santa Rosa has well over 20 hotels and we were able to secure a decent room at the Best Western. We unloaded out bikes, secured our equipment and bedded down for the night so that we would be ready for our second day of adventures on the road! Our next stops: the Bandera Caldera and Ice Cave, some very fun roads and Old Santa Fe!!
Until the next post my fellow travelers!
Enjoy the other pictures I am including with this post below!
With our gear loaded and suited up in our riding gear we lit out for the interstate, stopping to top off our tanks before actually breaking out onto I-44 West towards our first stop: Santa Rosa, New Mexico.
Our first leg was indeed a daunting one but necessary if we were to be able to allow ourselves three days to explore the so called Land of Enchantment. The highway would prove relatively quick as we expected, but it was draining as we began to feel the miles a hand full of hours into our 13 hour blast westward.
Our first non-fuel related stop along the route was in the Route 66 town of Afton, Oklahoma. A small, quiet speck of a place that, even though you would miss it if you blink has some pretty fantastic old buildings. Unfortunately many of them have fallen into a sad state of disrepair or abandonment. Afton is yet another perfect example of what happened when the interstate system came through the area, carrying traffic away from these small pockets of population and character. |
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| Your author and Matt at Afton Station |
One of the neat little things about Afton Station is that in the back room they have permanent markers available for visitors to sign the wall and leave their mark on Route 66. We poked our heads around the museum, left our mark on the wall in the back room and then after chatting with our hostess and host, we were back on our way, picking up the interstate once more and happily motoring our way west.
The next stop on the ride of any significance was a stop in at POPS! in Arcadia, Oklahoma. The filling station/diner/soda pop emporium is marked by a giant neon soda bottle of classic design and it's claim to fame is the mind boggling number of different sodas in stock, ranging from regular colas to coffee flavored sodas, root beers, fruit flavors and even bacon and turkey dinner flavored sodas.
We had a bit of a road buzz going at that point and decided to take an extended stop to enjoy some food, stretch our legs, cool down and browse the sodas that were in stock. We also decided a couple of malteds were in order as well and enjoyed those while we chatted and let our late lunches settle before filling up and heading out on the road once more.
 |
| See? Road Buzzed |
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| ...yeah, we're fairly silly people... |
Our final gas stop before reaching Santa Rosa proved to be a somewhat memorable one. We were stopped on the New Mexico side of Texas and found ourselves trying to outrun a storm front that was rolling in that was reported to be capable of causing severe flash flooding. Matt also found himself trying to outrun a case of the bubble-guts and things got interesting at the first place we checked for gas which only had 90 octane high test and our bikes really should be running on at least 91. He couldn't hold out til the station down the road so he tore off at light-speed towards the restrooms of the station meanwhile I was lazily and probably somewhat confusedly (to them) assaulted by locusts who had a seriously poor sense of direction while jumping around.
And just in case you were wondering, Yes. The answer is Yes, they were big locusts, because they do everything bigger in Texas after all.
Once Matt had mastered his internal organs once again and we had filled up at the next station over which DID have 91 octane, we pushed onward to Santa Rosa.
We entered Santa Rosa well past midnight. The restored Route 66 motel that we were going to try and stay at called the La Mesa was closed when we got there. We had tried making reservations two weeks out but were told that they don't do reservations that far out and to call back the week of or right before heading out that way. Needless to say, after dozens of attempts at getting through to the front office without anyone ever picking up the phone, we had no reservations and we were left searching high and low for a room. Luckily for your dynamic duo, Santa Rosa has well over 20 hotels and we were able to secure a decent room at the Best Western. We unloaded out bikes, secured our equipment and bedded down for the night so that we would be ready for our second day of adventures on the road! Our next stops: the Bandera Caldera and Ice Cave, some very fun roads and Old Santa Fe!!
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| Your intrepid author after 13 hours in the saddle |
Until the next post my fellow travelers!
Enjoy the other pictures I am including with this post below!
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