Getting My Kicks on Route 66 - part 2 of 3

continued from part one :-

We left our hotel in Springfield Missouri to head to Kansas which only accomodates a few miles of the route. Before leaving had noticed the sign that Elvis had stayed at the place and following a bit of investigation found out it wasn't my room but the one next door, still never saw the ghost.

Remember stopping of at some dead end town in Kansas where 4 women ran a souvenier shop which we visited, they where real charactors (sisters i think) and told a tale or two. Also provided free coffee and biscuits which was nice. Lots of little towns like this, there is plenty of poverty about but decent people (take note Mr Obama).
Before leaving another bloke took us to a bridge (on the 66) to show us his trick which was to turn is feet the wrong way (facing backwards) must have had double jointed ankles, was definately a strange thing to see.

Moving on we arrived in another run down town but it had a fantastic theatre (The Coleman), can't rememer the history as we were getting overload by this point but the guided tour was real good. If I remember (please correct me if wrong) it was run by volunteers.

 It wasn't long before we crossed another State line and were in Oklahoma where we first visited Tulsa before moving on to the capitol for a 2 night stay.

Well in the words of the Song Oklahoma City is pretty and it sure is would like to visit again one day.

We had a good city tour included and visited the State Capitol Building which is like every other State Capitol I've visited.

Other highlights were a Cowboy museum which had a massive section about Western movies which I loved, right up my street and of course they had plenty of things about the Duke.

Can't remember if it was before or after we went to a massive statue which was a tribute to the early pioneers, very impressive.

Another thing the City has done well is the tribute to those who lost their lives in the Oklahoma bombings which includes a timeline pond and a lawned area with a chair for each of those murdered. Was a little dissapointed that people were allowed to sit on these chairs for photos, didn't seem right to me.

We also visited the stockyards and a big western clothing store where many of our group stocked up on their Levi Jeans and cowboy hats.

Another beautiful part of Oklahoma was the riverwalk (think they are trying to copy San Antonio), also looked a good area for nightlife with interesting bars, restaurants and clubs.

Had lunch there at a nice place but would have liked to have gone back on the night. However our hotel was too far away and couldn't raise a possee for a taxi.

To be fair first night the hotel bar was fine, quite lively with a karaoke going but 2nd night (sunday) it was closed but a few of us managed to find a sports bar, bit of a nothing evening though as it was quite desserted.

We left Oklahoma to head Texas but not before stopping at one of the interesting route 66 museums, there are loads of them wish we could have done them all.#

Another small poor town and we stopped to meet a couple of real charactors of route 66, the self proclaimed redneck king & queen Harley & Annabell. They invited us into their home which was filled with route 66 memorbillia and then put a show n for us singing redneck songs. Was certainly different but great fun.




Finally we got to Texas but now was the problem of finding Amarillo with nobody to show us the way.

Only a one night stopover but went out to a ranch where we got on some trailers to be taken through the desert while real cowboys chased some cows about.
They afterwards put on a horse racing show before we had a typical cowboy meal, was authentic when the beef and beans came out but lost it with the salad bar, lol.
On return to the hotel bar which had some very nice beer prices (very cheap) a few of us had a game of cards, was actually good fun and we had many laughs.


On leaving Amarillo we had time to call at Cadillac Ranch for a photo shoot before moving on to the mid-point of the mother road, yes still another 1,139 miles to go.

One thing had become apparent by now was that Richard our tour manager only had a very small CD collection, one that played the Route 66 song in 20 different versions and Lou Reeds greatest hits, luckily I had my MP3 player and headphones, lol.

Reckon this is a good place to stop part two (more to follow).




Just thought I'd give a bit of publicity to a local York group playing the route 66 song, this version wasn't on Richards CD.