Catch up on the earlier Chapters: 1, 2, 3

(click to enlarge images)

Day 5

The next morning I discovered the last indignity from the motel. There was no hot water. Not even a drop. I had to settle for washing my pits and crotch and using clean clothes to face decent society.

Having seen the results of the dinner buffet, I wasn’t expecting much for the breakfast buffet and my pessimism was correct. Same bored guy behind the counter took my breakfast order. I took the opportunity to re-check the board for the cavern tours and was pleased to discover that I had mis-read it; the $50 tour was for another area and the standard tour was only $20, and I even got a discount for AAA when I bought the ticket. The cavern tour made up for all of the hassles that I had endured with the motel and restaurant. It was simply magnificent.

I was almost solo with my attractive tour guide but at the last minute a family from somewhere in Eastern Europe joined us. I can usually pick out a language (even though I cannot speak it) from its sounds and a few vocabulary words that I can recognize. I never knew for sure but they sounded Slavic to me.

Like Carlsbad Caverns the entrance to the cave was not the original entrance. An elevator took us down (and back up), followed by a walk of a mile or so. It is a “dry” cave (unlike Carlsbad) and therefore has a different sort of cave formations. The walk also took us by the old Civil Defense fallout shelter and a hotel room located 250 feet below the surface. Our guide said that she had spent her honeymoon there and the total darkness and total silence was actually too much to take! They had to turn on a nightlight in order to remain the night!

I finished the tour around mid-morning and resumed my trip on US-66. Someone, I’m guessing the Tourist Bureau from the Seligman area, has sponsored a series of signs along the road, similar to the Burma Shave signs of the past. I thought that this was a clever way to promote the historic road. There is a lot of interest nowadays for the promotion of US-66 of bygone days, as my trip was discovering. I think that Americans are missing a lot of their heritage by blasting by on the limited-access Interstate Highway. A forgotten America still exists on the back roads that is not part of the Interstate Exit conglomeration of chain motels and fast food restaurants.

At Seligman I climbed back on the freeway to deal with the truck traffic.

I took the exit to drive through Ash Fork, as the road had diverted in the past. I had not remembered the Ash Fork was famous for its stone quarries, particularly shale and flagstone. Most of the houses in town were made of stone and many of them looked to be quite old.

I wanted to see the statue that Winslow had erected of the guy “standing on a corner in Winslow Arizona” and missed it on the westbound trip so I exited the freeway and drove through the town in the other direction
I recall hearing the refrain, “Spend the night in a wigwam!” ever since I was a child. One of the few remaining authentic Wigwam Motel ™ franchises was located in Holbrook Arizona and, since I was committed to doing the “tourist thing,” I reserved a wigwam. I am so glad that I did.

The original design was from the 1930’s and the park in Holbrook is one of three remaining in the country. The layout is quite clever with a surprisingly large bedroom and a bathroom with shower at the rear. The park has numerous old cars parked at nearly every room, adding to the nostalgic flavor of the place.

As I sat in the lengthening shadows of my last night on the road I used my cell phone to call my buddies who were gathered for our weekly poker game. A bit later I was finally got to visit with some neighbors who were having a little party in the parking lot. We chatted for a few minutes, then they moved on to a party downtown and I moved on to my bed in the wigwam.

Day 6

I had breakfast where the locals eat, Joe & Aggie’s Place. All that one could ask for, large helpings of terrific food and a bottomless pot of coffee.

In the parking lot there was a family of foreign tourists apparently taken by my motorcycle. When I walked up in my leather chaps and vest they were enthralled. The husband asked if I would pose with their children and I suggested putting the son on my bike for the photo. It looked like the daughter wanted her picture taken, too, (and I would have been glad to oblige) but I think that the parents felt that they were putting me out by the photo op. Hell, I didn’t care, it was fun being thought of as “an American biker.” I got an extra internal kick from knowing that my Harley-riding friends would be in distress by the foreigners being impressed with a biker on a Japanese bike.

After my encounter with Stogie I looked for other motorcyclists to ride with. On the way back I caught up with a fellow on a Honda 350. I held with him for a few miles, but he was traveling much slower than I wanted to so I said, “See ya” and went on. At Continental Divide I stopped at the Stuckeys for fuel and, upon leaving, encountered my friend on the Honda. We stopped for a few minutes to chat and then I went on.

To avoid the truck traffic on I-40 and to bypass Albuquerque I planned my trip across the reservation from Gallup through Crownpoint to Cuba. Again, wonderful scenery on a two-lane blacktop with no traffic. The road meanders from small town to town as it winds toward Cuba.

I was only a few miles away and had the lunch from El Bruno’s on my mind as I followed the Rio Puerco into town. Suddenly my reverie was interrupted by the impact of an insect on my exposed neck and the instant application of pain. I had run into the business end of a bee and the sting was rapidly swelling. I’m pretty sure that I’m not allergic to bee stings but I was still worried that the swelling might cause my windpipe to close. Fortunately the pain and swelling subsided in a bit and I was able to enjoy my lunch.

After spending the night again with Bruce I headed east toward home. The trip back was uneventful until I arrived back on my home turf in Albuquerque. I hit the freeway at the peak of rush hour. I had heard horror stories about the horrible traffic jams in Los Angeles, yet the worst traffic that I encountered was right in my home town!

I pulled into home right at dinner time. The family came out to greet me and hugs were liberally spread around. As I had been riding the hard saddle of the dirtbike almost non-stop my first words upon arrival were, “My butt hurts!”

I was home.

The last leg of the trip was in sight. A while back my uncle sent me a copy of a column from a motorcycle magazine where the author gave tips about road trips. One of the tips was a reminder that the last day of the trip is still part of the trip and one should not hurry the finish. A suggestion was to stop at the local bar on the way home and savor the trip just before it is over. I stopped at Los Ojos for a beer and found some folks to listen to my tales before heading up the hill for the last 20 miles.

I was home.