This was our first full day on PCH and we decided to have a ‘rest’ day … with 9km walking around San Francisco including Pier 39 and Alcatraz.
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After a comfy limo dash in the morning we were soon enjoying champagne and plant-based curries before our flight in the British Airways B gate lounge at Heathrow Terminal 5.
Cheers!
A short while later, we were on the plane and just as I’d got everything in its place (and a place for everything), Alison demanded we swop seats. Citizen’s Divorce already enacted. And I wondered where all my demons should go…
Demons!
Cheers (again)!
Once we landed at San Francisco it was off to collect our pre-booked car from Hertz. An absolute nightmare it was too with Hertz, who didn’t have our car when we arrived. After an hour’s arguing with them, they palmed a Florida-registered 5.0L V8 Mustang convertible off on us instead of the Camaro SS Convertible we’d ordered and indeed emailed about earlier that week.
Once we eventually got to the Riu Plaza Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco, it was time for a gin and kebab as it was 5am UK time.
Gin and Kebab
British Airways were being a nightmare before we were due to fly: despite booking our Business Class flights many months earlier, a month before flying, BA emailed us to tell us they’d cancelled our flights from London Heathrow to San Francisco.
When we’d been trying to fly out to Corralejo to move into our place out there in 2020 and 2021, the UK and Spanish governments had been opening up and locking down and easyJet were cancelling flights, so I’d become adept at moving flights and amending travel arrangements, so I was straight back online to look at alternatives, finding that BA had flights later the same day. Not ideal, but beggars can’t be choosers. I changed the car reservation with Hertz, the limousine booking with Addison Lee and sat back to make sure our COVID-19 PCR test bookings would also still work.
Later the same day, British Airways then cancelled our return flights from San Diego to London. This was more of an issue, because it meant I had to extend the car hire and the hotel. The first would not work, and the hotel? Not so much as it was fully booked, so we decided to leave the car hire as it was and book ourselves into a hotel near the airport for the extra night to suit our flights home a day later. Thankfully BA ended up paying for the hotel as compensation for the flight delay.
Well 10 years after doing my Route 66 trip on a Harley in August 2012 to celebrate being 50, I’m back with another plan for my 60th birthday (and to celebrate still being alive after my little incident in 2019): Pacific Coast Highway, North to South during summer 2022.
We fly out business class to San Francisco, collect a Chevrolet Camaro SS Convertible and then drive off to the Fisherman’s Wharf area of San Fran for a couple of nights (and a trip to Alcatraz), before we head off down California SR 1 with stays along the way in some of the coolest hotels we could find.
We stop off en route for a few days in Downtown LA during which time we’ll be popping in to the Members’ area in the Bike Shed Motorcycle Club’s LA clubhouse for drinks and food.
We end up with a couple of nights in San Diego before we fly back in Club World again back to the UK.
It’s all booked, so watch this space!
So then. I’m back and it’s a fortnight since the trip ended.
It took over a week for me to stop waking up in the early hours of the morning, not knowing where I was and thinking I needed to get up and hit the road.
The Big Trip wasn’t so much mind-blowing as mind-expanding. They say travel broadens the mind and mine’s been broadened to breaking point. I was awe-struck by the wide open plains of Middle America; Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, New Mexico and California. I could quite happily have stayed forever in Venice Beach: my sort of place and my sort of people. That’s the same sort of thing I was thinking when I was first in the States, back in 1979.
I encountered nothing but positivity and friendliness from Americans – in contrast perhaps with their perception in the rest of the world – and yes, having an RP accent is apparently a very attractive trait…
America, despite bringing us coffee shops chains, doesn’t really do decent coffee as far as I could see. It was plentiful with free top-ups, but not what I would call decent coffee! It does like super-sized portions though.
I’ve never been so photographed or videoed either: no doubt this was simply down to us being a bunch of 11 Harley Davidsons leaving rest and fuel stops at the same time.
I found members of the public wearing holstered handguns disconcerting when we were in Arizona at an ice-cream parlour: when I am out and about, it’s “keys, phone, wallet … good to go” rather than “keys, wallet, phone, .44 … good to go”. Does carrying a weapon clipped to your shorts mean better customer service at the café?
I had many hours in the saddle with my music and my companions for company but ample time to simply think and reflect on life in general and my own in particular and what is important to me. I thought about friends and enemies. I thought about forgiveness and thankfulness. I thought about families past and present. I thought.
I liked riding past signs for “Spunkey Creek” in Oklahoma, billboards saying simply “JESUS”, villages and small towns with more churches than houses and churches with massive car parks deep in the bible belt.
I loved riding through landscapes where you couldn’t tell where the land stopped and the sky started. I loved the big skies. I loved riding alongside massive freight trains blasting their horns to acknowledge us. I loved cowboy country – on a steel horse I ride – and those wide open spaces.
I made friends, good friends I look forward to seeing again. Different languages but a common bond.
As expected, I encountered decay and disuse. Route 66 was built for a purpose and when something ‘better’ came along, it was phased out and forgotten and the communities that had been built up along the way were allowed to decay and close down. My photos from the trip tell only part of the story. But the memories will last forever.
I didn’t go looking for America … but it found me anyway.
More tearful farewells from the new friends I’d made throughout the morning as the group dispersed, and a small group of us headed off to Venice Beach (and Muscle Beach) for a wander around and to take a few photos.
Walking back, we got a little lost so we saw more of Marina Del Rey than we’d expected.
Then off to LAX to board my flight back to London, arriving in the early afternoon of the Saturday.
I’ll try to sum up my overall thoughts later…
Journey’s End!
It was with a degree of sadness that we set out for our last day in the saddle leaving Barstow and heading for Santa Monica.
On one section of Route 66 which, as was often the case, rang alongside a railway, we came upon one of those massive freight trains with 2 or 3 tractor units pulling many, many containers. There was a wonderful childlike joy when things like this happened as we’d wave at the train driver who’d wave back and give a long pull on the train’s horn. Boy’s Own Paper stuff!
We came into Los Angeles and went via Beverley Hills and roads with names from folklore and popular culture like the Santa Monica Boulevard and Vine, etc. We stopped briefly at the junction of Olympic Boulevard and Lincoln Boulevard which was the endpoint of Route 66 to take photos before heading to the Harley dealership to drop the bikes off. They kindly drove us to our hotel in Marina Del Rey where we showered and changed before heading out for a lovely shrimp dinner and some final parting words on Santa Monica Pier and photos at the tourist marker for the end of Route 66.
Our plans changed again in the morning: we decided that as both the more direct roads to Barstow and the Route 66 route would be equally hot, especially in the Mojave Desert, we would go the ‘proper’ way.
First stop was at Las Vegas Harley Davidson for more shopping. They have a bunch of amusing dummies dressed in Harley gear in the showroom which was fun. Then it was a case of wrapping up in long sleeves and SWAT-style face covering before heading off.
Our next stop was at a roadside café in Fenner, California which thoughtfully provided a sprinkler hose outside the entrance which meant a cooling shower; very refreshing as it was baking hot.
Then on into the Mojave stopping at Roy’s Motel and Café in Amboy, California for more photos. There was a weather station monitor there showing the temperature as 115.5°F/46.4°C.
As the sun began to set, we approached Barstow, stopping for Dinner at the Bagdad Café in Newberry Springs. Having closed for the night shortly before we arrived, they reopened especially for us and we enjoyed Buffalo Burgers and beers before heading off to our hotel on the outskirts of Barstow.
After a light breakfast {cough} at Mr D’z Route 66 Diner in Kingman, Arizona we set off towards Las Vegas.
Due to the heat, I’d earlier developed heat rashes on my arms and chest and found it better when it was really hot to wear long sleeved T-shirts and to pull the buff up to cover my face – very SWAT-ish! More of this tomorrow…
First stop was Oatman, where Clark Gable and Carole Lombard honeymooned. Wild mules, “burros”, roam the streets asking to be fed by visitors and the whole town has a real Wild West feel to it. Then on to Las Vegas, stopping for lunch in “the middle of F-ing nowhere” as my check-in on Facebook suggested; also known as Searchlight, Nevada.
Reaching Las Vegas, we headed to our stop for the night, the New York, New York which, included its own rollercoaster. Not just a hotel, but a resort with shops and themed restaurants throughout the main reception area.
American Excess.
Las Vegas I found to be incredibly tacky – like Blackpool but without the charm – and I can see why it’s popular for stag weekends and themed weddings. What was very sad was the number of people still playing the slot machines at 1am…
Dinner was at the impressive Harley Davidson Café: you really have to admire the branding/lifestyle efforts at Harley Davidson – you don’t just buy a motorbike, you buy a lifestyle.
Off to bed and the promise of a lie-in due to the expected heat of the Mojave Desert and a suggestion we might simply hit the Interstate to Barstow.
The day started off with a second visit to the Grand Canyon and a different viewpoint. The fact that you could – as I did – scramble down to the edge of the Canyon itself and look over the edge of a precariously balanced boulder added to the sense of wonder at the whole shebang. Photos followed!
Off we went towards Kingman, stopping off for a leisurely lunch in Williams before hitting the road via Hackberry and Seligman where I was introduced to Angel Delgadillo, the “Angel of Route 66″ at his barber’s shop. Angel is a famous character and one of the leading lights in trying to have Route 66 recognised as a national historic byway and tourist attraction to try to reinvigorate local businesses that effectively died when the twons en route were bypassed.
Then on to Kingman and a fab little bar and restaurant where we were served by a really friendly waitress who looked like Sandra Bullock!
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