Route 66 Road Trip
Hitting the Open Road: Our Route 66 Adventure
There’s something undeniably magical about the open road—and no journey captures that spirit quite like Route 66. Known as the Mother Road, this iconic highway stretches over 2,400 miles from Chicago to Santa Monica, weaving through eight states and a time capsule of American culture, history, and nostalgia. A Route 66 road trip isn’t just about getting from point A to B—it’s about the diners with neon signs, vintage motels, quirky roadside attractions, and the ever-changing landscapes that tell the story of America itself.
Route 66 offers an unforgettable blend of small-town charm, big sky views, and retro Americana that will leave you with stories to tell and memories to last a lifetime.
Below you will find blog posts relating to the planning of our road trip across the USA, links to websites we found useful and the unfolding story of our trip. They are full of my musings on the places we visited, images of route 66 and stories of the people we met along the way. I hope you find them enjoyable.
The following posts are presented in ascending order. If you have any questions don’t hesitate to get in touch
The following is a list of the towns and cities we are visiting along with the hotels and motels we are staying in. Each location will receive its own page as we travel along the route on our adventure but this will give you an idea to start with
It's now less than two weeks till the big off and whilst my wife is organising and double checking holiday insurance, passports, tickets and ESTA's I'm panicking about the more important matters such as
We left Derby at 4am and by mid afternoon we were sampling the delights Chicago had to offer as we started our Route 66 adventure
The day started with a traditional American breakfast at at the unofficial start to Route 66 in Chicago, Lou Mitchell's. It's exactly the kind of place a Brit would imagine if they were told to describe an all American diner.
Our first day on the route 66 in Illinois was an eventful one. Firstly the taxi driver taking us back to O'Hare airport to pick up the hire car spoke very little English and didn't have much of a clue where he was going.
After a heavy night on the beer with an American couple last night and a short walk to see Abraham Lincoln's childhood house and other period houses we finally left the strange town of Springfield Illinois to head to St Louis.
Getting out of St Louis was slightly easier than getting in. We still managed to make several wrong turns before finding route 66 towards Cuba and heading for our first stop of the day
The sky was still gloomy when we left The Wagon Wheel but the worlds biggest rocking chair in Fanning Missouri was waiting and we weren't going to let a few grey clouds spoil that !
The day began with breakfast in the local pancake hut which was occupied by a couple of camouflage wearing hicks who were obviously on there way out hunting
I can now answer Tony Christies question, YES, i do know the way to Amarillo. Now thats out of the way i can get on with the journey from Oklahoma City to Amarillo, Texas
Artist Lowell Davis grew up in the "real” Red Oak, about 18 miles northwest of the "new” Red Oak II. The original Red Oak, like many other rural agricultural towns across the USA, started to
We left the Big Texan early and headed just out of Amarillo to the Cadillac Ranch. For those who don't know what the ranch is, its essentially a bunch of Old cadillac's buried nose down in the desert in 1974
When i was first researching where we were going to go on route 66 i came across the following video about a ghost town called Cuervo. It sounded so "American Detective" or "Twin Peaks" i just had to make a pull in off the I40 to check it out.
We had a lie in this morning as we didn't have to drive anywhere - BLISS !! It wasnt much of a lie in but was nice not getting up and having to repack the bags and head to the car.
Today's drive to Monument Valley was a long one. We started the day with a drive up a windy mountain road to visit Los Alamos, a town that once held a very dark secret
Another day and another iconic scene and one of the seven wonders of the world - The Grand Canyon in Arizona. After breakfast overlooking Monument Valley we
We headed out of the Grand Canyon Village relatively early still slightly disappointed at the village ( but not the canyon i must add) and headed towards to Winslow
Seligman has really embraced its route 66 history and is packed full of antique and souvenir shops, diners and motels. its also home to the Guardian Angel of Route 66, Angel Delgadillo
The road took in lots of rocky desert, small towns and rail road depots before aligning itself with the Colorado river and heading into Needles California.
A refreshing nights sleep and a nice, but expensive, breakfast in the hotel left us raring to go exploring what delights Las Vegas had to offer.
Its taken a few months but i have finally started to upload the many hours of video we took and the thousands of photographs
Ive finally got round to editing a few more videos from the hours and hours of footage i took whilst driving Route 66 last summer.
We travelled Route 66 in August 2015 and these are some of the tips i would give to anybody who wanted to travel the Mother Road
Today i ticked off a couple of items from my bucket list, firstly to drive an American classic muscle car and secondly to go up in a helicopter. Fortunately in Las Vegas you can do both very easily.
After a busy few days in Vegas its time to head back to Route 66 and into California to the wigwam motel
The following video was taken as we drove through Missouri on Route 66
