Wednesday, May 12th - Needles CA to Victorville CA
Today we plan to meet Corvette pal Janet Curran in Amboy which is about halfway to Victorville. We plan to meet her (and whomever she can entice to join her) at Roy's Cafe in Amboy at 11:00a. It's only about 35 miles so we left the hotel at 8am (planning three hours to cover thirty-odd miles; about normal for us)
What we didn't know is that there is a dearth of attractions at which to stop between Needles and Amboy:
(Well, there was this one abandoned thing..)
Desperate for something to photograph, I lay me down on the highway..
(The once-thriving RoadRunner's Retreat Restaurant is no more..)
(Maybe one of you geologists out there can tell me what that white area in those mountains is? It ain't snow -- borax?)
In fact, there was a great deal of nuthin' between those two places -- except that, apparently hungry for something to do, the locals used a berm running alongside the highway to arrange small rocks and pebbles to spell out their names, those of their loved ones and other random words:
There were hundreds of these alongside the road.
With nothing much to do but drive, we arrived in Amboy more than an hour early. The Amboy Crater was on our list so we thought we'd visit that, kill the hour and meet Janet right on time.
By the time we got to Amboy we discovered two things. One, Roy's is closed and has been for some time:
In fact, the whole town of Amboy is closed and for sale; you can get the whole place, land, buildings and improvements for $1.5M. Write for details...
The second thing is that a restroom visit was needed and, without Roy's, there's no place of business open in Amboy -- except the United States Post Office right across the highway:
Knowing that they had to have a restroom, we politely inquired as to the use of said facility.
We were told that they cannot permit "the public" to use their restroom. When we pointed out that "the public" pays their salary we received polite but rather blank stares. They told us that all was not lost; there were "public" facilities at the Crater.
I discarded the image of what we might be expected to do at a crater regarding bodily functions -- and we mounted up for the two mile journey West to the Amboy Crater.
The Crater is there all right:
.. and is a National Natural Landmark. It seems the thing blew its top many millenia ago and spewed baseball-size lumps of lava in all directions for a considerable distance. BUT -- the Government DID erect a restroom facility near the parking area and, thank goodness, it was unlocked:
This is apparently an un-manned site; there was no one about but us. I'm guessing that a Department of Interior posting to the Amboy Crater would be like being fired -- but not quite.
Interestingly, the toilet tissue was in a padlocked container labeled "Tissue Vault" with a single sheet visible. Thankfully it worked, giving up the requisite amount of this very valuable commodity.
The "tour" of the crater involved a three hour hike; three of the four of us were in sandals and that, along with our commitment to meet Janet, forced us to abandon touring the Amboy Crater (though Buzz and Jackie gave it a shot):
If you ever do this, I'd love to know what we missed.
We headed back East to meet Janet at (closed) Roy's when we saw a C5 Corvette coming from the opposite direction. Janet's C5 is Silver and this one was Navy Blue so I knew it wasn't her. We stopped anyhow and Janet was in the passenger seat of Chris Law's C5. Seems they'd left Janet's Corvette at (closed) Roy's and were looking for restroom facilities as well. They, too, had visited the Post Office and received the same "help" as had we.
All's well that ends well and we gathered successfully (and post restroom-ly) at (closed) Roy's. Now we have a four-car caravan (doubling our previous size) headed West toward Victorville.
(Left to Right are (windblown): Jackie, Buzz, Janet, Gael, Chaz and Chris)
Off we went to visit the Bagdad Cafe. Curiously, the Bagdad Cafe isn't in Bagdad (through which we passed handily). Rather, it's in Newberry Springs, CA:
The Bagdad Cafe may have been decent in some time in the past, but not so decent now (not recommended) though we did have Cokes:
(That's Chris in the mirror..)
(Gael and Janet)
Here's our dash plaque on the wall at the Bagdad Cafe:
We all rolled into Barstow to visit the Mother Road Route 66 Museum:
Debra and all were glad to receive their dashplaque:
(Here's Debra Hodkin, Ralph Martin and Lonnie Swartz)
(Here's "jcbob", J.C. Clark from the Corvette Forum)
When we left the museum we added yet another mural to our collection:
Our final stop of the day was at the Route 66 Museum in Victorville. The museum wasn't normally open but we lucked out; they were waiting for Route 66 icon Bob Waldmire to come by. We spent most of an hour there (we wanted to meet Bob as well) but finally had to go:
(Here's Museum President Chick Kirk with her dash plaque)
Then off to the Comfort Suites Hotel, dinner and to bed. Tomorrow is the last day of our adventure; honestly, it seems like we only started the trip seventeen days ago. No, wait. We DID start it seventeen days ago..:)
If you find typos or other errors on these pages, please click to
. I can't always respond to the emails promptly (being on the road all day) but I do receive, read and act on them.
Another great day -- and much, much more to come...
Watch for more tomorrow, Day #17 on the Mother Road!
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