Getting Our Kicks on Route 66

After our extended 2.5 mile coffee walk in the snow this morning, we decided the snow and muck here in Peach Springs, Arizona wouldn't permit much other than a drive somewhere nearby.  We decided to drive 25 miles to lunch in Seligman, Arizona.

Since our campground is located on Historic Route 66, our little drive to lunch also became a Route 66 experience.

 

Those of you old enough to remember the old "Burma Shave" highway signs will be pleased to know that they are strung out all along U.S. 66 between Peach Springs and Seligman.  As soon as Kathy spotted the first sign, we knew what was coming:

 

Burma-Shave sign series first appeared on U.S. Highway 65 near Lakeville, Minnesota, in 1926, and remained a major advertising component until 1963 in most of the contiguous United States. As the Interstate system expanded in the late 1950s and vehicle speeds increased, it became more difficult to attract motorists' attention with small signs. When the company was acquired by Philip Morris, the signs were discontinued. The Burma Shave signs we saw are re-creations and were not installed by Burma-Shave during its original campaigns.  

According to Wikipedia:

"A number of films and television shows set between the 1920s and 1950s have used the Burma-Shave roadside billboards to help set the scene. Examples include Bonnie and Clyde, A River Runs Through It, The World's Fastest Indian, Stand By Me, Tom and Jerry, M*A*S*H and the pilot episode ("Genesis") of Quantum Leap. The long-running series Hee Haw borrowed the style for program bumpers, transitioning from one show segment to the next or to commercials.

"The final episode of the popular television series M*A*S*H featured a series of road signs in Korea "Hawk was gone, now he's here. Dance til dawn, give a cheer. Burma-Shave" in the style of Burma-Shave adverts in US roads in the 1950s.

"Roger Miller's song "Burma Shave" (the B-side to his 1961 single "Fair Swiss Maiden") has the singer musing that he's "seen a million rows of them little red poetic signs up and down the line", while reciting rhymes in the manner of the ads. Tom Waits' song "Burma-Shave" (from his 1977 album Foreign Affairs) uses the signs as an allegory for an unknown destination. ("I guess I'm headed that-a-way, Just as long as it's paved, I guess you'd say I'm on my way to Burma-Shave") Chuck Suchy's song "Burma Shave Boogie" (from his 2008 album Unraveling Heart) incorporates several of the Burma Shave rhymes into its lyrics."

We passed eight sets of Burma Shave signs (four sets on each side of the highway) before reaching Seligman and the best diner in town:

 

We ate hearty!  Kathy chose an elk burger and David picked homemade chili with homemade bread.  Yum!

After stuffing ourselves, we took a look around town, which is mighty small.  Next to the Roadkill Cafe and its adjoining OK Saloon is an historic 1860 Arizona Territorial Jail:

 

The sign out front of the jail reports that it held a number of outlaws -- including four Indians who escaped by TUNNELING the 100 feet or so from the jail into the OK Saloon.  It seems their efforts were in vain, because they were killed several days later in a gunfight.

Between Kingman and Williams, an old railroad line cut the path followed later by old Route 66.  The freight traffic on this line is heavy, with a train chugging by almost every 15 minutes.  On our drive back to our campground, we paced this freight train -- obviously not a long one because it only had two engines:

 

It's hard to call this region a desert because the wide, flat valleys are occupied mainly by juniper and prairie grass.  Ranching is big here.  To our north, a long ridge loomed between us and the Grand Canyon, some 60 miles away:

 

We so enjoyed the Burma Shave signs along the highway, that we thought you might like another signpost jingle to lighten your day, spotted on our return trip:

 

 

 

But that's not all!  

After we returned to the campground, we stopped down for dinner in the Caverns Grotto.  You can order off the restaurant menu and dine in comfort deep in the Caverns.  Our hostess obliged us by taking our photo before dinner, with the Caverns' interior behind us --

 

-- and then hoisted our dinner up to our underground dining deck from the cavern floor, where it was delivered from the restaurant up at the surface:

We spent a pleasant dinner chatting with our hostess about the area, and learning about the adventures of another couple of women, cousins from Phoenix and Vancouver, BC who had spent the last several days hiking and camping at Havasu Falls in the Grand Canyon.

The food was delicious, the wine warming, the company companionable, and we had a wonderful evening before retiring to our RV to fall asleep for the adventures that await tomorrow.