Northern Arizona by Suzuki
I had two short-term retirement goals, two long-term goals, and three mid-term goals. My immediate intents were to move to the Southwest and get a female puppy; my stretch goals were to live long and not run out of money; and my medium-range goals were to keep watching movies, continue reading great books, and ride my motorcycles in whatever part of the desert I decided to live. Notice what isn't on the list that is typical for retirees: travel. Why not? Because during my modest thirty-seven-year career I vacationed fifty-seven times out of the country and traveled internationally about half that amount for my last two employers. These numbers more than satisfied one of the goals I had set for myself after I graduated from college, which was to see the world. And see it before I retired because I didn't want to wait until I was old to have wonderful, world experiences. I wanted to have them instead when I was younger, when my brain was more plastic, allowing me to grow with those experiences. So, by design, I traveled and traveled from age twenty-four through age fifty-nine, with no immediate plans for lengthy overseas excursions and dealing with airports, airplanes, rental cars, restaurants, and hotels at the start of my golden years.
Now back to the retirement goals. I said goodbye to corporate life on 24 April 2018; closed on my house in Minnesota six days later on 30 April; and started driving to Arizona after I left the title company's office that afternoon, arriving in Tucson the morning of 3 May.
First goal: complete.
I got Emily, my dog, in October, when she was nine weeks old, waiting until I was settled into my new house and until the heat of the summer had passed.
Second goal: complete.
Those long-term goals? I can't evaluate them yet.
The ones in between? Well, I'm watching more movies than ever, mostly independent films on-line because of the sorry state of mainstream cinema from everywhere; I'm reading books at the same rate I've done my entire adult life; and during fifteen desert months so far I've ridden my motorcycles on half-day trips around southern Arizona. But I have wanted to go on a longer ride, one to northern Arizona, and visit points between Tucson and the Grand Canyon. I didn't want to take such a trip last year because the thought of staying in hotels so soon after retiring made me cringe. Now, a year later, I was ready to ease back into travel, for four days, short by vacation standards but longer than anything I'd done on a motorcycle. Research led me to the route I executed shown on the map below, which was a slight variant of my plan.
Now back to the retirement goals. I said goodbye to corporate life on 24 April 2018; closed on my house in Minnesota six days later on 30 April; and started driving to Arizona after I left the title company's office that afternoon, arriving in Tucson the morning of 3 May.
First goal: complete.
I got Emily, my dog, in October, when she was nine weeks old, waiting until I was settled into my new house and until the heat of the summer had passed.
Second goal: complete.
Those long-term goals? I can't evaluate them yet.
The ones in between? Well, I'm watching more movies than ever, mostly independent films on-line because of the sorry state of mainstream cinema from everywhere; I'm reading books at the same rate I've done my entire adult life; and during fifteen desert months so far I've ridden my motorcycles on half-day trips around southern Arizona. But I have wanted to go on a longer ride, one to northern Arizona, and visit points between Tucson and the Grand Canyon. I didn't want to take such a trip last year because the thought of staying in hotels so soon after retiring made me cringe. Now, a year later, I was ready to ease back into travel, for four days, short by vacation standards but longer than anything I'd done on a motorcycle. Research led me to the route I executed shown on the map below, which was a slight variant of my plan.
I have two motorcycles: a 2012 Yamaha FZ8 and a 2013 Suzuki Boulevard. The Yamaha, a street bike, is chain-driven, has six speeds, is black, has no windshield, and is super-cool. When I'm riding it my knees are bent in such a way that my feet are behind me—streamlined, yes, but uncomfortable for long distances. The Suzuki, a touring bike, is shaft-driven, has five speeds, is white, has a windshield, and is more conservative. When I'm riding it my legs are stretched in front of me—much more comfortable for long distances. The Yamaha, almost a missile, is more fun to ride, by a mile, but the Suzuki, for this trip, was the practical choice—and I knew that all along.
Prescott—Sunday and Monday, 28 and 29 July
Elevation: 5400 feet
I had no reason in particular for choosing Prescott as my first stop on this trip, other than the 210-mile ride being enough time in the saddle for day one. The four-hour ride from home was pleasant, with sunshine the whole way and light, Sunday morning traffic through Phoenix. Prescott was the territorial capital of Arizona in 1864 for three years, and then again for twelve years starting in 1877. It has a distinctive town square, where an outdoor festival was taking place when I arrived and that some of its 40,000 residents were enjoying. The three photos below are from that event. In the 1993 film Tombstone, Sam Elliott's character, Virgil Earp, mentions having a run-in with one of the Cowboys in Prescott.
My hotel of choice here was the Holiday Inn Express on Gurley Street, east of downtown, in a room almost the size of an apartment, with free access to a health club called Fitness for $10 about a hundred yards from the hotel. In the late afternoon I went to see Quentin Tarantino's new film, Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood at a nearby multiplex with the too-cute name of Picture Show. The film was brilliant.
My hotel of choice here was the Holiday Inn Express on Gurley Street, east of downtown, in a room almost the size of an apartment, with free access to a health club called Fitness for $10 about a hundred yards from the hotel. In the late afternoon I went to see Quentin Tarantino's new film, Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood at a nearby multiplex with the too-cute name of Picture Show. The film was brilliant.
Please click on any of the smaller photographs on this page to enlarge them.
Flagstaff—Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday; 29–31 July
Elevation: 6900 feet
The ride from Prescott to Flagstaff was short—ninety-five miles—but my first destination in this high-desert city extended beyond that, fifteen miles north of town, to Sunset Crater Volcano and Wupatki National Monuments. Sunset Crater Volcano was unimpressive—I almost rode right by it, as it looks like a mere hill—but nearby Wupatki, which contains twelfth-century ruins of the Sinagua Indians, ancestors of today's Hopis and Zunis, was worth the visit. At its peak, in the 1100s, one hundred people lived in the pueblos that make up what is now this monument, but thousands more were within a day's walk. Farmers, herders, hunters, and others lived in this thriving community almost nine hundred years ago.
After walking around the pueblos and cooling off at the visitor's center I rode back into Flagstaff-proper. Home to Northern Arizona University, this college town of 70,000 is not without charm, being surrounded by volcanos, sitting next to the largest Ponderosa Pine forest on the continent, and with Route 66 running through its downtown.
Other than being a good base for visiting the Grand Canyon, my main reason for including Flagstaff on my itinerary was to visit the Citizens Cemetery, however morbid that might sound. This past June I read an often-achingly sad book entitled We Are Going In, an exhaustive account of the 30 June 1956 collision between a United passenger plane and a TWA passenger plane over the Grand Canyon, killing all 128 aboard the two aircraft. The author, Mike Nelson, nephew of one of the victims, leaves out not one detail in his 455-page tome, and speculates intelligently as to the exact cause for the mid-air disaster, which to this day hasn't an official explanation. Because of the time I invested in reading the book and because how emotional several parts of it were, I had to see the monuments to those who died in the accident. Flagstaff Citizens Cemetery (no apostrophe in Citizens) has a memorial for the victims on TWA 2, as the few recoverable remains are buried there. The Pioneer Cemetery outside of Grand Canyon Village has an equivalent remembrance for those from United 718. Photographs from both sites are below.
I stayed two nights at a Fairfield Inn & Suites, which shares property with a Hampton Inn & Suites and an Oregano's Pizza Bistro, a popular franchise in Arizona. It was a typical Marriott property: contemporary, reasonably stylish, and clean. I had dinner at a Flagstaff tradition, New Jersey Pizza Company, and had a minority opinion of its fare.
After walking around the pueblos and cooling off at the visitor's center I rode back into Flagstaff-proper. Home to Northern Arizona University, this college town of 70,000 is not without charm, being surrounded by volcanos, sitting next to the largest Ponderosa Pine forest on the continent, and with Route 66 running through its downtown.
Other than being a good base for visiting the Grand Canyon, my main reason for including Flagstaff on my itinerary was to visit the Citizens Cemetery, however morbid that might sound. This past June I read an often-achingly sad book entitled We Are Going In, an exhaustive account of the 30 June 1956 collision between a United passenger plane and a TWA passenger plane over the Grand Canyon, killing all 128 aboard the two aircraft. The author, Mike Nelson, nephew of one of the victims, leaves out not one detail in his 455-page tome, and speculates intelligently as to the exact cause for the mid-air disaster, which to this day hasn't an official explanation. Because of the time I invested in reading the book and because how emotional several parts of it were, I had to see the monuments to those who died in the accident. Flagstaff Citizens Cemetery (no apostrophe in Citizens) has a memorial for the victims on TWA 2, as the few recoverable remains are buried there. The Pioneer Cemetery outside of Grand Canyon Village has an equivalent remembrance for those from United 718. Photographs from both sites are below.
I stayed two nights at a Fairfield Inn & Suites, which shares property with a Hampton Inn & Suites and an Oregano's Pizza Bistro, a popular franchise in Arizona. It was a typical Marriott property: contemporary, reasonably stylish, and clean. I had dinner at a Flagstaff tradition, New Jersey Pizza Company, and had a minority opinion of its fare.
Wupatki National Monument—Monday, 29july
Flagstaff Citizens Cemetery—Monday, 29 July
Grand Canyon—Tuesday, 30 July
Monsoon season in Arizona runs from 15 June through 30 September. The start-date for the rain is usually later than that, though, and the end-date is usually earlier. Meteorologists say the season begins after three consecutive days with an average dew point of 55°F. On the basis of my experience last summer, the rains come in the late afternoon or early evening, when it pours for a few minutes then stops. This pattern is common but not guaranteed.
The northern Arizona weather forecast for today was frustrating but not unexpected: rain and possible thunderstorms moving into the area—Flagstaff and the Grand Canyon—early this afternoon and lasting into tomorrow, though they might be intermittent. I had already paid for a $102 seat on the Grand Canyon Railroad, leaving Williams, a thirty-eight-mile ride west of Flagstaff, at 09:30, returning to Williams at 17:45. Hmmm...sounds like a good chance I'd have to make the almost-forty-mile ride back to Flagstaff on the interstate in the rain. Undesirable. Think, think, think. Ponder, ponder, ponder. Worry, worry, worry. Start to rationalize. The train takes two hours and fifteen minutes to travel sixty miles, for an average speed of 27 mph. Pretty slow; pretty boring. The train doesn't pull into the depot in Grand Canyon Village until 11:45, a few minutes before the rain, if the forecast held true, meaning I'd walk around the Canyon grounds in inclement weather. Not so fun.
Or, I said to myself, I could eat the money I spent on the ticket, hop on my bike at 07:00 and take the sloppy hypotenuse of an even sloppier triangle to state road 64, making the northwesterly trip a snappy seventy-eight miles, and arrive at the Canyon before 09:00. Bum around the Canyon for a couple of hours, then head back to Flagstaff, getting to the hotel between 12:00 and 13:00—and maybe be dry. That's the new plan, and most of it worked well. More on that in a few minutes.
I pulled up to the entry gate of the park at 08:40 and explained to the ranger that I didn't take the train as planned because of the weather, and she was nice enough to waive the $15 visitor fee because it had been included in the price of the railway ticket. Excellent. (Actually, a $20 fee was included in the train ticket; motorcycles get into the park at a $5 discount.) Either way, I was in, and though the skies looked threatening no rain fell.
I walked along the south rim of the Grand Canyon, speechless. What can you say about the Grand Canyon that hasn't already been said? What photo can you take that hasn't already been taken? A negative answer to both. The Grand Canyon is so overwhelming that you can't describe it in any medium. I don't know that you can even understand it. And it doesn't matter if you spend ten minutes there or ten years, it diminishes every other physical entity to nothingness and you'll be changed forever by seeing it. If you try to describe it in words, as many have, you will fail because sooner or later—probably sooner—you'll use a simile or metaphor, but that won't work, can't work, because nothing on planet Earth compares to it, not even to a minuscule fraction of it. Looking at the six pictures below I'm thinking, who am I kidding...this ain't it. It might be similar to the way agnostics consider what religious people call "God," or the way mathematicians think about infinity, or the way astronomers think about the universe. Because of its enormousness, its beauty, we can't grasp it, no matter how much we stare at it or contemplate it. In her 2005 book Before the Fallout: From Marie Curie to Hiroshima, which I started reading just last night, author Diana Preston quotes physicist Richard Feynman, who I believe is referring to the subatomic world but his sentiment aligns with my thinking of the Grand Canyon:
Our imagination is stretched to the utmost, not, as in fiction, to imagine things which are
really there, but just to comprehend those that are there.
This was my second time here—the first being forty-two years ago—and if you haven't made the trek, as a woman who worked at the hotel in Prescott and who had lived in not-so-far-away Prescott all her life hadn't, then you must or your life will forever be incomplete.
After strolling along the rim for some length of time and having a nice conversation with a Korean family, I went to the visitor's center and bookstore. Then I got back on my bike and followed the main road in the park to the Pioneer Cemetery to pay my respects at the memorial for the United victims of the plane crash I mentioned earlier on this page.
The northern Arizona weather forecast for today was frustrating but not unexpected: rain and possible thunderstorms moving into the area—Flagstaff and the Grand Canyon—early this afternoon and lasting into tomorrow, though they might be intermittent. I had already paid for a $102 seat on the Grand Canyon Railroad, leaving Williams, a thirty-eight-mile ride west of Flagstaff, at 09:30, returning to Williams at 17:45. Hmmm...sounds like a good chance I'd have to make the almost-forty-mile ride back to Flagstaff on the interstate in the rain. Undesirable. Think, think, think. Ponder, ponder, ponder. Worry, worry, worry. Start to rationalize. The train takes two hours and fifteen minutes to travel sixty miles, for an average speed of 27 mph. Pretty slow; pretty boring. The train doesn't pull into the depot in Grand Canyon Village until 11:45, a few minutes before the rain, if the forecast held true, meaning I'd walk around the Canyon grounds in inclement weather. Not so fun.
Or, I said to myself, I could eat the money I spent on the ticket, hop on my bike at 07:00 and take the sloppy hypotenuse of an even sloppier triangle to state road 64, making the northwesterly trip a snappy seventy-eight miles, and arrive at the Canyon before 09:00. Bum around the Canyon for a couple of hours, then head back to Flagstaff, getting to the hotel between 12:00 and 13:00—and maybe be dry. That's the new plan, and most of it worked well. More on that in a few minutes.
I pulled up to the entry gate of the park at 08:40 and explained to the ranger that I didn't take the train as planned because of the weather, and she was nice enough to waive the $15 visitor fee because it had been included in the price of the railway ticket. Excellent. (Actually, a $20 fee was included in the train ticket; motorcycles get into the park at a $5 discount.) Either way, I was in, and though the skies looked threatening no rain fell.
I walked along the south rim of the Grand Canyon, speechless. What can you say about the Grand Canyon that hasn't already been said? What photo can you take that hasn't already been taken? A negative answer to both. The Grand Canyon is so overwhelming that you can't describe it in any medium. I don't know that you can even understand it. And it doesn't matter if you spend ten minutes there or ten years, it diminishes every other physical entity to nothingness and you'll be changed forever by seeing it. If you try to describe it in words, as many have, you will fail because sooner or later—probably sooner—you'll use a simile or metaphor, but that won't work, can't work, because nothing on planet Earth compares to it, not even to a minuscule fraction of it. Looking at the six pictures below I'm thinking, who am I kidding...this ain't it. It might be similar to the way agnostics consider what religious people call "God," or the way mathematicians think about infinity, or the way astronomers think about the universe. Because of its enormousness, its beauty, we can't grasp it, no matter how much we stare at it or contemplate it. In her 2005 book Before the Fallout: From Marie Curie to Hiroshima, which I started reading just last night, author Diana Preston quotes physicist Richard Feynman, who I believe is referring to the subatomic world but his sentiment aligns with my thinking of the Grand Canyon:
Our imagination is stretched to the utmost, not, as in fiction, to imagine things which are
really there, but just to comprehend those that are there.
This was my second time here—the first being forty-two years ago—and if you haven't made the trek, as a woman who worked at the hotel in Prescott and who had lived in not-so-far-away Prescott all her life hadn't, then you must or your life will forever be incomplete.
After strolling along the rim for some length of time and having a nice conversation with a Korean family, I went to the visitor's center and bookstore. Then I got back on my bike and followed the main road in the park to the Pioneer Cemetery to pay my respects at the memorial for the United victims of the plane crash I mentioned earlier on this page.
Grand Canyon Pioneer Cemetery
The first forty-five miles of the ride back to Flagstaff were dry, with clouds that looked threatening but nothing more. Me and my big mouth. It started pouring and kept raining for about twenty of the last thirty-odd miles. And I had nowhere to run to and nowhere to hide. So I got wet. Soaking wet. Oh well.
A post-script about to take the train or to not take the train. Though I couldn't see the tracks from state road 64, they couldn't have been too far from the highway, as 64 from Williams is a straight shot to the Grand Canyon. And it was not a scenic one. Not that I needed to have my no-railway decision validated, this did reinforce my choice to ride the high-speed motorcycle rather than take the puttering train today.
A post-script about to take the train or to not take the train. Though I couldn't see the tracks from state road 64, they couldn't have been too far from the highway, as 64 from Williams is a straight shot to the Grand Canyon. And it was not a scenic one. Not that I needed to have my no-railway decision validated, this did reinforce my choice to ride the high-speed motorcycle rather than take the puttering train today.
Walnut Canyon National Monument—Tuesday, 30 July
By the time I got into Flagstaff's city limits the precipitation had stopped and I started to dry. Given that it was early afternoon and that the unsettled weather might continue for who knew how long, I decided to see my next Flagstaff destination now rather than tomorrow, so off I motored to Walnut Canyon, twelve miles east of the city. And, of course, it started raining again on the short ride there, for part of the time I was at the canyon, and on the ride back to the hotel. As there was nothing I could do about it, I ignored it.
If you look carefully while on site, then you can see cliff dwellings in Walnut Canyon, ancient home to some of the same folks who inhabited Sunset Crater. I must confess I couldn't see the dwellings and wasn't looking for them. The canyon itself was spectacular, though the pictures below don't show its depth and contours. Walnut Canyon is not well known, at least in my circles—heck, I hadn't heard of it until I started preparing for this trip—but it is incredible, something you shouldn't miss.
It was still afternoon when I left Walnut Canyon and rode back to the Fairfield in the rain, which would not let up for the rest of the day and night. Not wanting to sit in my hotel room all afternoon and evening nor wanting to ride my bike around rainy Flagstaff, I decided to see Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood a second time. It was playing at the Harkins theater at Flagstaff Mall, a little more than a mile from the hotel. Yes, I got wet riding the few minutes to and from the theater, but it was worth it to see this great film again.
If you look carefully while on site, then you can see cliff dwellings in Walnut Canyon, ancient home to some of the same folks who inhabited Sunset Crater. I must confess I couldn't see the dwellings and wasn't looking for them. The canyon itself was spectacular, though the pictures below don't show its depth and contours. Walnut Canyon is not well known, at least in my circles—heck, I hadn't heard of it until I started preparing for this trip—but it is incredible, something you shouldn't miss.
It was still afternoon when I left Walnut Canyon and rode back to the Fairfield in the rain, which would not let up for the rest of the day and night. Not wanting to sit in my hotel room all afternoon and evening nor wanting to ride my bike around rainy Flagstaff, I decided to see Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood a second time. It was playing at the Harkins theater at Flagstaff Mall, a little more than a mile from the hotel. Yes, I got wet riding the few minutes to and from the theater, but it was worth it to see this great film again.
Meteor Crater—Wednesday, 31 July
Aye carumba. It was still raining when I woke up this morning early and continued to do so while I exercised in the hotel's better-than-average fitness center and then again through breakfast. The forecast for the remainder of the day was discouraging. Well, sticking with my "ignore it" philosophy I got on my motorcycle, which I was able to park under cover in front of the hotel's entrance, and rode forty miles to my next stop, Meteor Crater. Although I was already soaked by then, the rain stopped just a few miles east of the hotel and it didn't start again until I was about a hundred yards from the visitor's center at Meteor Crater, six miles off Interstate 40.
Some 50,000 years ago a 150-foot diameter meteor, traveling 26,000 mph, slammed into the desert here and left an impression 550 feet deep and 3900 feet across, displacing 175 million tons of rock in the process. The impact was the equivalent of 20 million tons of TNT exploding. These numbers, I think you'll agree, are impressive. Scientists consider Meteor Crater to be the best preserved meteorite impact on Earth, a fact I have no reason to doubt. The official name of it is the Barringer Crater, named for Daniel Barringer, the mining engineer who in 1903 suggested to the world that this depression was created by a large metallic meteorite. (It wasn't until 1960 that astronomer and planetary scientist Eugene Shoemaker confirmed this.) Because of its lunar appearance, surreal to me, Apollo astronauts trained in the crater in the 1960s and 70s. Odd as it may seem, the crater is on private property, still owned by the Barringer family, and is not a national monument. The Barringer Crater Company (seriously) has constructed an outstanding visitor's center that complements the site perfectly.
Some 50,000 years ago a 150-foot diameter meteor, traveling 26,000 mph, slammed into the desert here and left an impression 550 feet deep and 3900 feet across, displacing 175 million tons of rock in the process. The impact was the equivalent of 20 million tons of TNT exploding. These numbers, I think you'll agree, are impressive. Scientists consider Meteor Crater to be the best preserved meteorite impact on Earth, a fact I have no reason to doubt. The official name of it is the Barringer Crater, named for Daniel Barringer, the mining engineer who in 1903 suggested to the world that this depression was created by a large metallic meteorite. (It wasn't until 1960 that astronomer and planetary scientist Eugene Shoemaker confirmed this.) Because of its lunar appearance, surreal to me, Apollo astronauts trained in the crater in the 1960s and 70s. Odd as it may seem, the crater is on private property, still owned by the Barringer family, and is not a national monument. The Barringer Crater Company (seriously) has constructed an outstanding visitor's center that complements the site perfectly.
Winslow—Wednesday, 31 July
Elevation: 4850 feet
Although Meteor Crater is closer to Winslow, I erroneously considered it part of my Flagstaff experience. Mere semantics and who cares, right? Anyway, twenty-six miles east as the Suzuki flies was Winslow, next on my itinerary. The rain had stopped about ten miles into the short jaunt and the sun peeked out for a few minutes before hiding again behind some gray clouds. Visitors come to Winslow for two big reasons: to see the Standin' on the Corner Park, which the locals built as a result of an unnamed corner in town being sung about by the rock group Eagles in their 1972 song "Take it Easy," and to visit or stay at La Posada Hotel.
The first four photos below show the corner in its overcast glory. It's a good-natured piece of Americana that alone makes visiting Winslow worthwhile. Shops selling memorablilia on opposite corners of Kinsley Avenue and Route 66 add to the fun.
A few blocks down the road, and that I almost forgot, is La Posada Hotel, the last of the once-famed Fred Harvey hotels. Fred Harvey was an English-born American who in 1876 became partners with Santa Fe in building and operating quality restaurants and hotels along mostly Santa Fe rail lines west of the Mississippi. He brought in chefs from Europe to do the cooking and hired young woman of good character, intelligence, and attractiveness, aged eighteen to thirty, to serve as waitresses. Setting a new standard for the hospitality industry, the company lasted until 1968.
The hotel, which is adjacent to an Amtrak train station, was designed by Mary Jane Colter, an architect of some renown, made even more so being a woman in a profession then dominated by men, which I suspect is still true though not to the same degree. Construction was completed in 1930, at a cost of two million Depression dollars. It closed in 1957, but Santa Fe Railway converted it to its Albuquerque Division offices, saving it from being demolished. Then in 1997 a man named Allan Affeldt, his artist-wife Tina Mion, and their business partner Daniel Lutzick, also an artist, bought the structure and transformed it into a premier hotel. It now has fifty-seven rooms, each named for a well-known person—mostly actors—and renting for $137 or $177 a night, plus tax. Those in-the-know say the hotel's restaurant is the best in the Four Corners area of the Southwest. I walked through the hotel and enjoyed my self-guided tour, puzzled by but still admiring Ms. Mion's unusual paintings. The gift shop had a good cross-section of books on the region; I bought three to add to my pile at home.
The first four photos below show the corner in its overcast glory. It's a good-natured piece of Americana that alone makes visiting Winslow worthwhile. Shops selling memorablilia on opposite corners of Kinsley Avenue and Route 66 add to the fun.
A few blocks down the road, and that I almost forgot, is La Posada Hotel, the last of the once-famed Fred Harvey hotels. Fred Harvey was an English-born American who in 1876 became partners with Santa Fe in building and operating quality restaurants and hotels along mostly Santa Fe rail lines west of the Mississippi. He brought in chefs from Europe to do the cooking and hired young woman of good character, intelligence, and attractiveness, aged eighteen to thirty, to serve as waitresses. Setting a new standard for the hospitality industry, the company lasted until 1968.
The hotel, which is adjacent to an Amtrak train station, was designed by Mary Jane Colter, an architect of some renown, made even more so being a woman in a profession then dominated by men, which I suspect is still true though not to the same degree. Construction was completed in 1930, at a cost of two million Depression dollars. It closed in 1957, but Santa Fe Railway converted it to its Albuquerque Division offices, saving it from being demolished. Then in 1997 a man named Allan Affeldt, his artist-wife Tina Mion, and their business partner Daniel Lutzick, also an artist, bought the structure and transformed it into a premier hotel. It now has fifty-seven rooms, each named for a well-known person—mostly actors—and renting for $137 or $177 a night, plus tax. Those in-the-know say the hotel's restaurant is the best in the Four Corners area of the Southwest. I walked through the hotel and enjoyed my self-guided tour, puzzled by but still admiring Ms. Mion's unusual paintings. The gift shop had a good cross-section of books on the region; I bought three to add to my pile at home.
Holbrook
Elevation: 5080 feet
Shortly before entering Holbrook I stopped at a Shell station to refuel the motorcycle. While doing so I had an interesting conversation with another cyclist, a slight, shaggy fellow, articulate, dressed in black leather, who, on a five-week roundtrip to the West Coast, was returning home to north of New York City. Having avoided the rain until today, he said he liked the Pacific Coast Highway the best.
Holbrook wasn't in my original plans but it was on the way and had a famous Route 66 connection, so I took the exit and drove down the Mother Road to see the Wigwam Motel. Formerly a franchise that started in the 1930s, Wigwam Motels number only three now, down from a peak of seven in the late 1940s. Besides the one in Holbrook, shown in the photo below, there's another on Route 66 at the border of Rialto and San Bernardino, California, and in Cave City, Kentucky.
Being twenty miles from the entrance to Petrified Forest, I did consider changing my route a second time today, but after stopping at a "museum" of petrified wood and then talking with the gate agent at the Route 180 entry to the National Park, I decided to skip it and continue riding to Show Low.
Holbrook wasn't in my original plans but it was on the way and had a famous Route 66 connection, so I took the exit and drove down the Mother Road to see the Wigwam Motel. Formerly a franchise that started in the 1930s, Wigwam Motels number only three now, down from a peak of seven in the late 1940s. Besides the one in Holbrook, shown in the photo below, there's another on Route 66 at the border of Rialto and San Bernardino, California, and in Cave City, Kentucky.
Being twenty miles from the entrance to Petrified Forest, I did consider changing my route a second time today, but after stopping at a "museum" of petrified wood and then talking with the gate agent at the Route 180 entry to the National Park, I decided to skip it and continue riding to Show Low.
SHOW LOW
ELEVATION: 6340 FEET
As with Prescott, I had no compelling reason to spend the night in Show Low, other than from a time-spent-on-the-bike perspective it was a convenient place to rest. Yes, I could have ridden the last 187 miles and got home by about five o'clock, but I'd have been too tired during the ride to have enjoyed it.
There was little to see in Show Low—nothing, frankly. My hotel was a Days Inn, which is a Wyndham property. But it's not a Wyndham. Though it was clean, the hotel was over seventy years old, long before there was a Days Inn or a Wyndham. The room smelled musty and the whole place needed updating. They offered a free made-to-order breakfast in the morning, but it was so skimpy it was barely worth eating. And the hotel had no fitness center or access to one of the five in town. I did, however, have enough reward points to stay for free, which is why I chose this hotel instead of the Holiday Inn Express up the road.
The sun was shining between the clouds when I got to Show Low, but by early evening it rained and rained, until at least nine o'clock, when I fell asleep.
There was little to see in Show Low—nothing, frankly. My hotel was a Days Inn, which is a Wyndham property. But it's not a Wyndham. Though it was clean, the hotel was over seventy years old, long before there was a Days Inn or a Wyndham. The room smelled musty and the whole place needed updating. They offered a free made-to-order breakfast in the morning, but it was so skimpy it was barely worth eating. And the hotel had no fitness center or access to one of the five in town. I did, however, have enough reward points to stay for free, which is why I chose this hotel instead of the Holiday Inn Express up the road.
The sun was shining between the clouds when I got to Show Low, but by early evening it rained and rained, until at least nine o'clock, when I fell asleep.
us 60 towards Tucson—Thursday, 1 August
After a breakfast of one slice of French toast, two strips of bacon, and a tiny glass of apple juice, I checked out of the hotel and was on the road by six-thirty, heading south on US 60. The weather was glorious the entire ride home, with brilliant blue skies all over the place. And how about US 60? I hope the six photos below capture it to some extent, but if there's a more dramatic stretch of highway anywhere in the U.S.—anywhere in the world—then I don't know about it. That it was a week-day morning meant I had little traffic to compete with. Look at the pictures, Reader, it was beautiful beyond words.
Home—10:15
Elevation: 3100 feet
After filling the Suzuki one last time, I sprinted south from Globe on state road 77 to home. At quarter past ten on the north end of Tucson it was already hot when I pulled in front of my house. This particular journey was complete. I had ridden just short of a thousand miles in a little more than four days and visited parts of the state new to me. Most of the financial particulars are below.
See you soon, maybe in Yuma, probably in Sedona.
See you soon, maybe in Yuma, probably in Sedona.
