Saw a little more of 66 yesterday. It looks like most of what's around L.A. is similar to the first corner that we saw... just a busy street running through the city, with no real indication of the fact that it's part of Route 66. This was true from the very Western end - at the corner of Santa Monica Blvd. and Ocean - inland until Pasadena. There, where Colorado Blvd leaves the east end of Pasadena to parallel the 210 through a "towny" (Shekar's word) portion of the city, we saw the first "Historic Route 66" signs along the side of the road. We later realized (on the way back home) that there are many more signs informing travelers coming from the east (although still none west of Pasadena). I guess Route 66 really is an East to West road... should be interesting doing it the other way.

Yesterday, we also learned the importance of choosing wisely which parts of history you want to preserve. Our probably most realistic look at what Route 66 was like in its heyday came when we were in Santa Monica... no indication of historic value, just bumper-to-bumper traffic for two hours. But that must have been what being on 66 was really like. As some people have told us, 66 was just a way for them to get places, and now it means more because it is part of their past, and because the highways that replaced it seem to lack the character that it had. So, if what we experienced was Route 66 before people treasured it... let's just say that I think I can understand why they built the interstates, and if anyone wants to bring back THAT part of Route 66, I'd call them crazy. But the other parts of 66 - the crazy attractions, the local flavor, the friendly people - I'm looking forward to seeing some of that... things should be a lot more interesting once we leave L.A. (I saw "try" to find these things because yesterday we also found out that our maps aren't so good - they instructed us to take the Sunset exit off of the 110, which doesn't exist). For me, being the driver, I guess the big appeal of leaving L.A. is the hope that we'll escape the traffic so I can watch the side of the road a little more, not just the cars in front of me.

Today we drove up to Lompoc to interview Bert and Deane Langdon, who traveled the road for vacations, to move to L.A., and for business - from 1948 to 1990. Was very interesting hearing them tell about how their appreciation for 66 has grown... and they were really nice - even fed us lunch. I'm excited about the interviews we'll be doing more than anything else on this trip... if they all go as well as the first two, we'll have something good, even if all of our pictures, videos, everything else sucks. It won't matter.

A truck selling fresh seafood at the side of California's Highway 99, a road much like Route 66 that runs up and down the CA coast.

We kind of did a little "parallel universe" of 66 versus the interstate today on 101 and 1 between L.A. and Lompoc. We woke up late for our interview, so we took 101 up... it's your typical highway, the trees at its edges zooming by at 80 mph, with not much else visible. And it got us there quickly - only ten or fifteen minutes late. But on the way back, we took our time and drove Pacific Coast Highway (Hwy 1), a much more interesting road. At times, you can't really go over 35 on it, and there are plenty of stoplights to deal with, especially in Oxnard. But when 101 cuts back inland, 1 sticks to the coast, with plenty of views of small state beaches, the roadside lined with RVs, and places to pull off and look out at the ocean. We found one guy who was selling fresh seafood along the road, and as he picked our 3 lbs of prawns for us, he noticed the Hopkins logo on my shirt and told us about his father, who was a general practitioner and worked in the time of housecalls. Drove by Leo Carillo State Beach after that - told Shekar about the 26-mile bike rides we used to take to there. But traffic started picking up on PCH and we'd had our fun with the ocean and wanted to get back to cook the shrimp, so it was time to make use of the interstates... took the 10 to the 405 to the 105 to the 110 and back home, and 50 minutes later we were eating barbequed and grilled shrimp, mushrooms and onions with rice and avocado.