Today has been a day of extremes. We woke up this morning to about 6 inches of snow in beautiful Sante Fe. Luckily this time the car was in an underground garage! First thing, we took Dottie for a long walk along the river in the snow- no point in leaving while the snow ploughs were still clearing the roads. This was the first time Dottie had ever seen real snow and seemed to love it! Thank goodness... We took her orange ball with us and she had a great time trying to find it in the snow. It was great fun to watch her playing in it.
We took a slow drive out of Sante Fe- partly along the Old Sante Fe trail and headed back towards I40. This section of route 66 is considered the pre-1937 route as the route was realigned after that. It started snowing and hailing - it was a bit like driving through a thick fog.
Once back on I40 we headed towards Tucumcari-another old route 66 town. Like all the towns we have already seen, there were lots of abandoned motels and signs for other services that would have been used along the road for cars. So sad.
We stopped at the Kix on 66 cafe for brunch.
Just after crossing into Texas, (and into another time zone) we reached what is technically the Midpoint of Route 66- a town called Adrian, which sits 1139 miles west of Chicago and 1139 miles east of LA. At this point, we've had driven 1532 miles - not quite halfway for us yet! We think it will be about 3500 miles in total. We should reach halfway sometime tomorrow.
The landscape changed drastically, along with the weather. It became partly cloudy and we saw the sun for the first time in a while considering it rained the whole week before we left California! The mountains disappeared, and we went from an elevation of 7200 ft in Sante Fe to 2700 in the Texas panhandle. It was very flat and windy, hence the enormous wind farms- bigger than the ones we see in California but it is Texas after all!
After a pit stop in Amarillo, and a drive through the city, we drove through 7.2 miles of what is considered the best preserved and untouched sections on Route 66 in Texas. Nothing but a road running through prairie land. We also found the VW Slug Bug Ranch- five graffiti coated VW's buried nose in- in a tribute to the Cadillac Ranch which we had missed earlier in the day.
It was a long day of sitting in the car, and we finally made it to Shamrock, Texas. A typical old Texan town, but with some route 66 surprises- this lovely old restored Conoco garage- and now a visitor center.
There are also some fun murals:
Finally, in a liquor store, a Texan Pinto Noir!
PS We deserved the wine as we are currently homeless! Our house sale went through today... :-)
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