Day Thirteen - Flagstaff to Kingman

This morning was bitter-sweet. The sweet part was going back into Flagstaff. What a beautiful place! The bitter part was that I had to say goodbye to my travel companion, Kathleen. She was so much fun to travel with!

She was taking the airport shuttle to Phoenix - so smart! - so I dropped her at the train station. It was beautifully refurbished and I did actually go inside, so that was a lot of work for me!

The Hotel Monte Vista looked beautiful, but I didn't go in because I was already so exhausted from getting out of the car at the train station. 

Yes, I am populating this blog with pictures of things I didn't even bother to slow down for. 

Phoning it in? 

Nearly!

 But here is a video of me leaving town that is quite lovely!

I stopped in Williams and FINALLY got a picture of a bordello for Lady Chardonnay. I didn't go in because, well, I'm not that kind of girl. But I did get out of the car to take a picture. 

Baby steps!

I don't know if you can see the mannequin jutting out of the second floor window. 

Shameless...

Next up was Seligman. Eileen and Kathleen recommended it and they weren't wrong. I went to the Snow Cap, an ice cream stand that specializes in wacky jokesterism. There are double door knobs, one that says push, one that says pull. If you order chicken, they toss a rubber chicken at you. (I have heard, I did not order chicken...) When I said to the counter girl, "Can I get a cup of coffee?" She replied, deadpan, "How about I get it for you." Not the sparkliest of repartee, but I laughed. 

This was the potty. I thought it was a joke. But it was not.

I was still charmed enough at this point to take a picture of this beat up old pickup. I have seen a lot of beat up pickups since then and while they do look kind of cool, there are a lot of them. I am kind of picturing a factory where they produce these terribly weathered old pick-ups. 

So here is a video of the Route between Seligman and Kingman. There were several sets of Burma Shave signs. The drive was so bleak that I really did look forward to them. I would giggle and read them out loud. Because I am a goober. 

The drive was wonderful. I love the time travel aspect of driving on the route. Whatever song came on influenced what I was thinking. I was listening to the songs on my phone alphabetically (don't judge me!) and Billie Holiday came on singing Billie's Blues and I imagined I was a dust bowl woman in the 1930s headed to California. (With an anachronistically wonderful sound system in her...rusted old pickup)

Then Red Garland's Billie's Bounce (because of alphabetic-ness) came on and I was a 1950's mom driving with her family across the desert on vacation.

Then Billy Don't Be a Hero (Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods, if you must know) came on and I was immediately 9 years old again. (But, you know, traveling Route 66).

And finally Bird Song, but the Grateful Dead came on and I was a hippie driving across the dessert in the 70s. Maybe passing a family listening to Billy Don't Be a Hero.

And then it got confusing and I stopped.

But it was awesome while it lasted.

Kingman was pretty dull, I stayed at one of those hotels where the rooms open on to a porch that wraps around the whole building. And those kind of freak me out. Plus it was Saturday night, so there were a lot of people hanging around being loud. But I did see my first In-and-Out Burger of the trip, so that was a plus!

Stay tuned for tomorrow's harrowing episode where I drive through the bleakest landscape I have ever seen. (Spoiler – I lived through it!)