Meteor Crater to Williams

Cruising down Route 66, Oscar and I were talking about the Native American Eagle-Dance in Gallup, NM when all of a sudden, we heard WHUMP! WHUMP! We looked around and saw two large arrows stuck into the ground alongside the traveling Eggs.
Cautiously circling back, Oscar and I eased up to the giant arrows, always looking skyward in case there were more arrows inbound.

To our relief, we saw they had not recently landed, but rather, were part of the fun landscape of giant things to be found along Route 66. Oscar decided the noises came from the 18-wheeler passing us at the time. We were relieved to learn the Little Plastic Trailers crossing all these Indian reservations didn't spark a war. Whew!


Taking the pre-1947 routing near Winona, we found an original portion of Route 66 pavement spanning an old iron bridge. Looking through the bridge, we saw snow capped mountains in the distance.

Today was a short travel day, positioning ourselves in Williams Arizona, on the edge of the high country where it is still cool. We'll hang out here a bit 'til the heatwave west of us eases. Williams is a nice town to visit. It's filled with great shops. But lookout . . . in the evenings you may find yourself smack in the middle of an old fashioned western gunfight!

Oscar was looking somewhat scruffy from all his traveling. He had become a light gray dog with dark gray markings. Tynia, from Canyon Pets, said she could take care of that and proceeded to lavish Oscar with all the TLC he deserved. As you can see, he liked the results a lot!

After his grooming we were driving through Williams and Oscar said "Hey Pete! You should get a job over there! It not only has your name on it but being the museum piece you are, you'd fit right in!" (Everybody loves a comedian)

To be continued . . .

Meteor Crater

50,000 years ago, an iron-nickel meteorite collided with earth and morphed an otherwise flat landscape into a deep bowl 700 feet deep and 4000 feet across. In 1902, a Philadelphia mining engineer, Daniel Barringer, purchased the two acres encompassing the crater and began a 27 year search for the iron laden meteor he believed to be buried beneath the floor of this impact site. These ruins are from his on-site headquarters for the exploration.


The Barringer family still owns crater property and since 1941 has developed what they feel is a public trust where geologists and even the Apollo astronauts have trained and studied. Tours are given daily which include a walk along the rim of this well preserved impact site.

Our fearless leader, Lane, and his grandson, Mathew are seen here taking in the view.

Some of those Little Plastic Trailer People posed below the rim.

Here are those same brave tourists perched precariously on the edge of certain doom if they take one misstep. (Bravo, Little Plastic Trailer People, Bravo!)

Before leaving this educational side trip, in an attempt to let the force be with them, they laid hands on the Barringer Meteorite, an 800 pound piece of the giant meteor which was recovered from 2 1/2 miles away. (Oscar smiled and said we looked like a bunch of space cadets.)

Gallup, NM to Meteor Crater, AZ

Gallup to Meteor Crater is a passage across a barren beauty that's hard to describe to city folk. Big blue sky, visibility that goes to the curvature of the earth, unexpected color from a flower tenaciously making a foothold . . . we had it easy compared to earlier travelers with less reliable cars, no A/C, no satellite radio or iPods with thousands of songs played over the nice sound system . . . you get the picture.

Here are some pictures of some happy Little Plastic Trailer People making the passage.



Red hued rocks against a blue sky was a nice place to pull over and take in the sights.

Some of those sights were placed high on the rocks to capture passing the tourists. I guess it worked!

Colorful cliffs are one thing, but having the entire desert painted in front of you is truly something else. We cruised slowly through the painted desert savoring the eye candy along the way.


We stopped to look at symmetrical hills called the Teepees on our way to the Petrified Forest.

Once upon a time, a very long time ago, all the earth's continents were in a single supercontinent called Pangea. During the Late Triassic Period (around 200 million years ago) the land we know as Arizona was near the equator and covered with lush forest vegetation. Some of the trees of this forest fell and were deposited under deep layers of silt. Mineral laden groundwater seeped down through the silt and infused the dead wood with minerals. Silica crystals grew inside the cells and bit by bit the wood turned to stone.

Formerly wood, now rock, a wonder in the petrified forest . . .

These weren't even the biggest!

Just think . . . this 30 foot section of rock used to be part of a large tree in a prehistoric forest near the equator. (Sorta makes us a blip on a very looooooong timeline, doesn't it.)

Oscar thought that was interesting and was amused to see a family of dinosaurs menacing traffic along Route 66.

As if travelers along The Mother Road need to be reminded this used to be the wild west. You can still take a room at the Wigwam Motel, in Holbrook, AZ. The kokopellis on front of our trailer felt right at home.

So did the rest of the Eggs.

Further west, Oscar got all excited when he thought he'd get a chance to chase a giant jackrabbit.

Some of Oscar's new traveling buddies thought the bodacious bunny would whoop up on the little smiley dog so they thought they'd tame the wild rabbit themselves in his defense.

Sam & Gloria - - - "Rabbit Tamers"

Chris & Dianne - - - "Bronking Bunny Busters"

After hours on the road and all that rabbit wrangling, it was nice to stop and stand on the corner in Winslow Arizona and hang out with a member of The Eagles. Oscar wasn't into it much, that is until he saw a girl in a flatbed Ford slowing down to take a look at him.

Another fine day . . . more miles behind us and a western sunset in front of us as we take it easy along The Mother Road.


To be continued . . .

Albuquerque to Gallup

Rolling down Route 66 through the southwest, the vistas are spectacular. Visibility goes on forever, and ever, and ever . . . here's group of us taking in the views.

At Villa Cubero, Hemingway wrote part of "Old Man in the Sea" in the cafe attached to these wayside motel rooms. (Not much sea to be seen around these parts)


While not specifically associated with Route 66, we couldn't resist a side trip to Acoma Pueblo. Built atop a mesa rising over 350 feet above the floor of the valley, it is one of the longest continuously inhabited cities in the country. This location was settled in the 11th century to protect against invading nomadic tribes. The people of Sky City have a fabulous story to tell. Don't miss it if you are in the area.


From this stop, one can see shapes of buildings on the mesa far off in the distance.


San Esteban Del Rey Mission dates back to 1629 and is active today. Thirteen families currently inhabit the pueblo. The rest of the tribal community resides below, in the surrounding area.

The Acoma people's religious practices combine Catholic traditions with their original religious beliefs. This is a ladder ascends to the top of an Acoma prayer house which can only be entered from the top.

The earthen oven is still used during community events. They say it makes roasted corn that is unrivaled by other means.

Some more scenes in the pueblo . . .




"Little Plastic Trailer People" in the pueblo . . . L-R, Judy, Sam,Gloria, Pete, Chris, Dianne, Carol, Rich, Maureen.

That was a great stop, now it was time to get back on the road.

Oscar didn't believe me when I told him about rainwater flowing towards either to the Pacific or the Atlantic ocean, depending on which side of the continental divide it lands. He hopped down from my arm and proceeded to "water" a couple of rocks to test this theory . . . when he was done, he looked at his test samples, looked up at me, snickered, and told me he thought I was nuts.

After another day on the Mother Road, some of us settled into the Quaking Aspen campground in the Cibola national Forest.

Here are Oscar's new best camping friends.

The air was cool and the fire warm as we planned our next day's adventure.


To be continued . . .