Route 66 Musings

Thursday, June 10, 2021

Not sure if I want to continue this as a blog, but I think I want to at least keep a journal of what we doing and thinking about doing for a “planned” Route 66 jaunt in our Corvette.

First question is, Do we really want to do this in our Corvette or do we want to use the Jeep? Interestingly, Nancy Jones (from our cruise to Australia a few years back) has a friend, also named Pam (Rectenwald), who just completed Route 66 with her husband in our vintage Corvette, a C7. Although the Corvette is—no kidding!—a bit difficult to get in and out of, and the Jeep would allow us to go places that the Corvette won’t, there is just something truly special about doing the Route 66 in a convertible—a RED convertible!—Corvette!

The planning started with getting two much-too-large-tshirts (well, it seems they actually AREN’T too large) and two books and one set of maps—all of that specific to Route 66. I got the Here It Is set of maps, one for each state on Route 66, and EZ66 Guide for Travelers and Route 66 Adventure Handbook.

Friday, June 11, 2021

Adrian, TX, is the midpoint on Route 66. Have to figure out how to remember these random thoughts as they seem to occur at very odd moments.

Have been introduced to Pam Rectenwald by the above mentioned Nancy Jones. I’m anxious to hear back from Pam about their trip! I have spoken to her and she said she didn’t want to do the trip but had a wonderful time and is very glad she went. I presume it goes without saying that her husband liked it too, since it was his idea! She did tell me about two items: an app (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.route66navigation&hl=en_US&gl=US) that offers turn-by-turn navigation and a Route 66 “Passport” that offers info and a few free things (they didn’t know about it until they were already on their trip).

Excited to be planning something, ANYTHING, in the way of travel. Not sure we’ll go back to cruising in the next year (2022), maybe the year after. If Australia eases it’s restrictions, we’d love to take the “kids” (Kathy & Ken, Greg, & Yolanda) on a “swag” trip—well, a bit more luxurious than than—to the Top End of Australia, one of the few places we haven’t yet been in Australia.

Back to the current plans, I also need to decide if I want to do another full-blown travel blog, or just post to facebook or just email to the kids and any friends who might be interested in our peregrinations.

Saturday, June 12, 2021

New irrigation system is mostly in, Chase Kaplan will be by this morning before we leave for the cabin to walk us through the irrigation system. Update: He never came to the door because he “thought you had left”! Never even knocked!

Monday, June 14, 2021

Up at our cabin because it will be no cooler than 111 in Tucson this week. It’s a bit warm here, too, mid-80s during the day, but tolerable. So would Tucson be with air conditioning but we’re doing our part to not overload the grid. Sure, that’s the reason we’re up in the mountains.

Can’t find the first few days I wrote about, no idea where I saved it and can’t remember any unique words to search for. Update: found it by searching for “route 66,” it was saved in my Recipes folder! Randy is happy, not because I found it, but because I file things in weird places, too.

I really have to get back to thinking about the Route 66 trip!

Tuesday, June 15, 2021

Spent some time yesterday reading one of my Route 66 books, Route 66 Adventure Handbook, and am having a great time thinking about actually DOING it! So much stuff to see that I know if we tried to see everything the author suggests, we’ll be overwhelmed. Perhaps skimming the book and planning, when actually on the trip, to read in depth the section of the highway that we will be traveling the next day will be the best alternative.

Another book, EZ66 Guide for Travelers, has detailed maps of all tiny, contiguous sections of the road. It is pretty much unreadable, I think, unless we are actually traveling that section of the route.

There are so many places in the US that I don’t know why we want to travel anywhere else! I was reading just this morning about 10 Haunted Towns in the U.S. Yet another trip?

Tuesday, June 22, 2021

Well, here it is a week later and I haven’t written anything for a week. I could blame it on the weather (Tucson has broken records for the past seven days for hottest temps each day and most days in a row over 110°F) but I won’t; I’m just lazy. We spent most of the week at our cabin thinking it would be cool at 8,000ft. It was cooler but definitely not cool (90°+ during the day and only cooled down to the mid-70°s overnight).

I have started up my blog again ( www.pamelaryan.blogspot.com ) and I will try to keep it up. I’ll start by posting this. I’ve also started a ring binder with “stuff” about the trip. So much “stuff” to think about: checklists, books, maps, calendars, clothing (see “checklists”), apps (Roadtripper and seemingly a gazillion others), getting the Corvette ready, making sure the kindles are stocked with books.

{Aside: I’ve ordered a new kindle for Randy and had a hard time finding a cover to fit that will prop it up in a vertical position!}

Speaking of the Corvette, we did have another discussion about whether to take the Jeep or the Corvette. We pretty quickly decided that we absolutely can’t do Route 66 in any car other than a Corvette! We may not have the awesome Corvette that Buz (George Maharis) and Tod (Martin Milner) had, but a Corvette is a Corvette is a Corvette! And Route 66 wouldn’t be the same in a Jeep.

Checklists.

I am in love with checklists. I have checklists of my checklists. I have cruise checklists and clothing checklists and electronics checklists and photography checklists and…you get the point. It’s all because I married a pilot and anybody who has ever known a pilot knows they also love checklists. And inflict them on anybody and everybody around them. There is, however, a problem with our checklists: we have made them so long and detailed that we don’t use them. I really need to pare them down to more generalities (write ¨ Computer equipment, NOT ¨ Computer, ¨ Computer power cord, ¨ USB type C, ¨ USB type B, ¨ Mouse, ¨ Extra batteries for the mouse, ¨ and so on!)

I have lost my brand new, prescription, bifocal, sunglasses. Randy and I have proverbially torn the house apart with no luck. Perhaps I took them to the cabin?