As I’m packing up the bike this morning, my neighbor from the next room comes out to leave. He’s a Londoner, with a classic Cockney accent, who tells me that he makes a trip over here at least every other year.  This time he started in Chicago and drove Rt. 66 to here, and will leave for home from Los Angeles today.  He has a place in Devon, he says, and recommends that the next time I come to England, I visit his area (he didn’t offer me his place, though).  The pull of old 66 extends across the Atlantic.

Not heading for England, but I’m starting out from Barstow, following Rt. 66 into the rising sun. Town doesn’t last long and soon I’m out on old Rt. 66, the Mother Road.  Mom needs some maintaining however, as the pavement is rough and broken in many spots.  It occurs to me that back in the day, this perhaps would have been the direction of defeat, in that folks came west for the opportunities in California and when they were headed back east, it may have meant that things didn’t work out so well.  Like that line from Dionne Warwick’s “Do  You Know the Way to San Jose ?”  ” … and all those stars, that never were, are parking cars and pumping gas.”   No such angst for me, though, I’m on a sidecar rig early in the morning in California and riding on 66.  That’s good enough for me.

The desert continues on, as it always does, and before long Needles California, often the hottest place in the country, appears. Brenda and I stayed here one night back in the 90’s when we were herding a rented Harley Electra-Glide (in blue) around these roads.  On that occasion, we took the old road up to Oatman, Arizona, a tiny town up in the mountains famous for movie star honeymoons (Clark Gable and Carole Lombard, if I recall) and free roaming wild burros.  On our last visit, Gable and Lombard had long left town and the burros had done likewise, leaving only their unmistakable calling cards on the streets.  I decided to go back for another look. The mountains up here are stark and dry, with rocks succumbing to gravity everywhere, decorating the flats and often the pavement.  The town just suddenly

The pass above Oatman, AZ

springs up out of the dust, a collection of buildings arranged along one street, with the old mining apparatus rusting at one end.  This time the burros have kept their appointment with me, standing in large groups in the middle of the road as I come into town, waiting patiently (as burros are wont to do) as I ease forward inches at a time to make my way through.  Some come up to me to see if I have loaded the sidecar with burro snacks, but are disappointed.  This is Easter Sunday and the tourists are out in force on the street, petting and feeding the critters and leaving nowhere to park a rig if I wanted to, so I move slowly on through.   On the upside of town, going into the higher mountain pass, the road is worse than I remembered.  I recall wrestling the HD through these curves on a hot summer day with the melting “tar snakes”  causing the tires to wiggle and slip (something of a concern when two-up on a rented bike far from home !)  Today it is not nearly so hot and there’s no difficulty with trying to avoid the snakes….the pavement  seems to be composed almost entirely of the wriggly black lines, as if the DOT had given up on asphalt and decided to just paint the road like a

Some Oatman Residents

Jackson Pollock with these instead. But, no worries on the rig, with three wheels planted on the road, it could slip all it wanted.  The curves have lots of dirt and gravel in them, usually just around the blind side, which would have been seat-clenching on a two wheeler, but not a problem for the outfit.  I’m going very slowly, due to the road and the altitude of the dropoffs, so I can see for miles around me.  The dry mountains and precipitous valleys just go on and on as far as the end of world, it would seem.  I think about what it might have been like to be a miner and his family up here in the 1800’s.  Nothing but hard work and dry, dusty, rock, and the worry about finding water.

The road down from the mountain top into Kingman is a long, straight decline that might make a good landing strip for a 747, should that be required.  It finally reaches bottom at I-40 and I must make up time now, so onto the slab I go.  All good things come at a cost, and for me the cost of several extra days in California, along the coast, is that I have to burn some miles to get home for the work duty that calls early next week.  The four lane numbs the senses so that the land changes slowly, almost imperceptibly as I near Flagstaff, with the flat desert scrub becoming  now high pine forest, without my ever realizing the difference.  I see signs warning me of elk and then bear crossings.  I will keep my eyes open.  The wind is picking up, dropping in temperature and the light is beginning to fade.

Flagstaff appears, and with no trouble at all I find a Motel 6, which has an AARP connection, giving me a nice clean room with wi-fi for $43. There are some perks to being old.

Earlier today, while lubricating the chain, I noticed that the sprockets and chain, which looked serviceable 1,400 miles ago in Washington are now looking pretty thin.  In my experience, sprockets and chains, like tires and rolls of toilet paper, go much quicker toward the end.  I’ll have to see if the dealer in Albuquerque has replacements.  These might get me on home, but best not to chance it if not necessary.

Route 58

I backtrack to Santa Margarita and pick up Rt. 58 East. Jay Smythe had recommended this road from his time out here, describing it as one of his most memorable. I can see why. On a two wheel motorcycle, these endless sweeping curves and switchbacks up and down the mountains would be heavenly. On the sidecar rig, they are still engaging, but at a much slower speed and with considerably more effort. Still, the scenery is marvelous as the land changes from mountains to low foothills, to those curious mounds that look like a giant child has been playing with those sandbox mold toys that make perfect cones or rounded inverted cups. Later the hills change to a series of wrinkled, eroded waves, covered in a light nap of fawn-hued vegetation. The gentle curves of the hills and their color makes me think of thoroughly rumpled bedclothes, with a thin blanket of the softest tan cashmere thrown over them.

Soon I’m on a flat plain, but I think it’s at a high elevation which lets me look around a bit on the straight road. The ranches out here are self-contained, as they must be, since the nearest services are 30 or 40 miles away. I can’t help but think, as I often do when out here, of what it must have been like in the early days to be wandering these hills and plains on a horse, or on foot. Whatever you could see in front of you looked like all the rest around you and you’d still be seeing it tomorrow at a walking pace.

Now that I’m not so focused on the road, I can think a bit about the machine I’m on. Don’t want to jinx myself, but it seems to be running very well, keeping a steady 60 mph on the straight bits at its “happy place” of 4,000 RPM. I love the single piston thump of the engine when it’s at lower revs and the rapid pulse of it up here at the business end of the tach. The sidecar tracks along quite happily beside the motorcycle, but often wants to go its own way when that third wheel gets in a groove or deviation in the pavement. Perhaps it is a metaphor for other kinds of unions, in which two unlike creatures yoke themselves together for what is usually a happy productive endeavor, but every so often one of them wants to go where the other doesn’t.

I’m learning more about handling the rig, experimenting with weight shifts in the corners as I hang off the side. It seems to work best in the tight stuff if I move back to the rear portion of the seat to hang off and feed throttle in slowly as I exit. Yes, I can hear the experienced sidecar drivers out there saying, in unison, “Well, Duh !” but hey, I’m new at this and experimenting to learn. I think Thomas Edison said something like that about his long series of things he tried for an electric light filament. He said something like, “I haven’t failed, I now know several thousand things that won’t work”. I have also learned that it’s best not to push it too hard. It doesn’t change the overall pace much and it seems to require a lot of the machine. Sort of like the old saying, “you can’t teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and it annoys the pig”.

58 comes down out of the hills eventually, near Bakersfield (home of Chet Adkins, if I recall) and goes back and forth trying to decide if it’s a two lane country road or a four lane interstate. It really isn’t either one and it is unbecoming to its dignity to keep making the attempts.

Between Bakersfield and Barstow is the little town of Tehachapi, (all you Linda Ronstadt fans out there sing together, “from Tehachapi to Tonapah, driven every kind of rig that’s ever been maa-aid !”) where the Tehachapi Loop is found. Apparently there are only two 360 degree train track loops, allowing a train to ascend a very steep grade, in the world, one in Japan and the other here in southern California. A long train coming around the loop will cross over itself. That’s a big deal to train buffs, I’m told. There are several people standing at the marker when I arrive, waiting for

Tehachapi Sign

a train to come by. They’ve brought the kids, who are playing on blankets oblivious to whatever is attracting the attention of the adults. I give it fifteen minutes and go on my way, leaving the faithful behind to wait and watch.

The other attraction of this little town is a German bakery, again recommended by Jay, where I stop and consume more than my share of calories for the day, and take away a strudel for tomorrow morning. The place is mobbed, even at a later afternoon hour, so Jay and I must not be the only ones who appreciate it.

At Mojave, I veer off into the old town to take a gander at the airport graveyard, the old planes parked as far as I can see. I guess the lack of rust and humidity is the attraction for those who leave these here.

I’m staying tonight in Barstow at the “Route 66 Motel” with its flashing neon sign, the old cars arranged around its courtyard parking lot and a mural on the wall showing scenes from the cities along the historic route. It is kitsch, I know, but when I was a kid in Ashland, Ky, in the 50’s and early 60’s, I dreamed of someday

The Route 66 Motel

traveling out here. It was these places, perhaps this very one, that I saw in the Life magazine articles about the west. There are few modern amenities here at this one, even now. The room is very small, and the bathroom hardly a closet. In my grad school days I once lived for 6 weeks in an 18 foot travel trailer and it had a shower stall about the same size as this one. There is a round bed in the room, one of the features the motel advertises, but at my size, I must sleep across its diameter. The walls are either badly done plaster or an attempt at recreating adobe…it’s hard to tell which. But I like it here. It fits.

Dinner is two blocks up the street at Rosita’s, which says it’s been serving Rt. 66 visitors since 1951. I had hoped to eat at Plata’s, a Mexican restaurant Jay had taken us to several years ago, but it serves daytime hours only and is now closed. Rosita’s is a good substitute. A chorizo and egg burrito, rice and beans and I’m set for the night. Off to my round bed.

I got out of the room on foot, just before daylight,  to watch the sun rise over the rim of the bay.  Brenda had told me that when she was here several years ago, there were otters and seals at play in the water as she kayaked among them.  None today, either the wrong time of year or wrong part of the bay. There were, however, young surfers in the water, and I hope they were early risers and hadn’t been out there all night.  I walked a bit around the bay, but couldn’t go far.  The “former me” would have walked for an hour or two.

Sunrise over Monterey bay

Lots of seagulls, of course, and people running, people walking, alone and with dogs.  Very well tended people and well tended dogs all living the good life in this very good place to be.

I packed up and left, taking the shoreline drive again around the end of the point, then drove back into town to find a restaurant open for breakfast.  There on Lighthouse Ave, I found one that offered a waffle special, for the bargain price (here in Monterey Bay) of only $10.99 (plus coffee).  It was good, as it should have been.

I moseyed back through Monterey and

Monterey Bay

got on 1 south, through Carmel-by-the-Sea.  Soon, the built-up areas were behind me and the road hugged the coast going to Big Sur.  That’s one of those place names that everyone recognizes, even if they’ve never been within a thousand miles of it.  As I take the curves that cling to the side of the mountain, with the ocean a straight drop  far below, I know that I’ve seen every movie star I can think of driving or riding in a convertible on these same places.  I can almost hear theme music playing in my head.  Then I recall that in some of those movies, the car tumbles off these cliffs and catches fire in a twisted heap at the bottom, so I go back to paying attention to where I’m going and what I’m supposed to be doing.

At the Big Sur River Inn, I stop for gas and a thirty-ish couple comes up to the rig.  They had been discussing it, as I filled up, and the wife wanted to know how the sidecar worked.  She had assumed that the black  tonneau cover on the sidecar was a seat and she thought the passenger would have to straddle it and somehow hang on.  I unsnapped the cover and showed her the seat and the windshield.  She was greatly relieved.  Her husband had laughed at her assumption, but admitted that he didn’t really know how it worked either.  This tells me that the newer generations have no experience with old British cars, for which a tonneau was almost standard equipment.  As I was leaving another man came up to ask about the rig.  He had tried one before on a Harley, but “couldn’t get the hang of it”.  When he asked where I was going, I was surprised when he replied that he once worked for Bundy Company, which had a plant in Winchester and had visited there often.  There’s that six degrees of separation thing again.

Just past Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, there is a famous bakery and restaurant that Gary Griffin had recommended and I’ve been saving a place in my rapidly expanding belly for some of the delights to be had at this place.  But I had not counted on this being Good Friday, with a lot of Californians being able to have a long weekend.  I have to park the rig in a space that a car cannot fit, because there is no other.  When I walk down to the cafe, there is a line snaking out the door, probably 30 people and that’s only the ones outside.  Every outside table is filled.  I stick my head in the door so see the rest of the line and see that the bakery case is all but  empty.  Sadly disappointed and still hungry, I move on.  There are two more restaurants within the next few miles, both similarly packed.

I find one less mobbed at Lucia, a nice little place that looks on the outside like a country store, but once inside, is a quite nice restaurant with tables looking out over the ocean.  The windows by the tables are open to the sea air and I can hear the waves and the gulls keeping up their eternal rhythms.  I opt for the salad this time, since my wretched excess in eating on

The view from the window at Lucia

this trip must occasionally give way to sense.  But even that choice becomes pleasurable when the salad turns out to be arugula with feta cheese, mission figs, cranberries, walnuts and a subtle vinaigrette dressing. It seems that I can’t be ascetic even when I try.

Finally the fabled highway comes down out of the mountains and runs along the flats so we, the other tourists and I, pick up some speed.  The ocean is closer now, on the same level as the road all the time and not just in the “bites”.  Still, it is that beautiful color, the waves keep crashing the shore and people at every “vista point” just stand there and stare out at the distance.  I’ve seen the Pacific from both sides and everyone does the same thing.

At Morrow Bay, I turn my back on the sea and head up into the hills again.  The temperature goes up dramatically as soon as the shoreline is out of sight and I have to stop to shed a layer or two and change gloves.  The hills here are yellow, with scrub brush and the occasional avocado farm.  Apparently they cut the trees down to stubs and the new growth comes back with fruit.  Seeing acres of what looks like white plaster casts of severely trimmed trees, five feet high is discordant at first, until I realize that what is going on is agriculture and not some kind of modern art installation.  (Well, it is California, after all, so you can’t blame me for considering the possibility.)

My intention is to find Rt. 58, recommended to me by Jay from his big trip last year, but when I reach the turnoff, it’s after 4 and the first town is Santa Margarita.  The town has taken the secular meaning of its name to heart, since there are many bars where one could sample such cocktails, but no motels.  The next town is over 70 miles away and doesn’t look like it’s big enough to have much either, so in deference to a Friday night, I take the safer bet and go back down to San Luis Obispo.  The first motels I check are full, but I locate a Travelodge within walking distance of a restaurant and a bakery, so my needs are fully met.  This is, I think, the old home town of Richard M. Nixon, but I don’t see any mention of that.