Another early start and we had a big drive ahead of us. We had planned to get into Texas today but that just didn’t happen. With bad weather and some random Google Maps directions we had eaten up too much time.
Breakfast was another healthly serving of waffles and eggs at PJ’s, the motels complimentary breakfast. Everything in Flagstaff seems to be Route 66 themed which is cool.
Then it was East bound and down ( an Archer and Smokey and the Bandit reference ). The car was looking more suited for this drive than ever.
First stop for the day was the Arizona Meteor Crater. 50,000 years ago a Meteor hit the earth in the middle of knowhere and left this hole in the ground. Like the Grand Canyon, this thing was massive. It’s cool to think that the Canyon was formed by just water and this crater was formed by just a rock ( a really big one though ).
There was a bunch of telescopes to look at certain parts of the crater. On the far side is a drilling tunnel and in the centre of the crater is a cardboard cut out of 6ft astronaut, both just look like specks to the naked eye.
From the Meteor Crater it was another b-line down to New Mexico. We got caught in a massive lightning storm most of the way, it is easy to see how these places flash flood so easy, the water started pooling on the roads with only 30mins of rain.
We got a little window of sunshine just in time to get some photos as we crossed the state line into New Mexico.
After seeing an episode of Dirt Every Day and watching Fred stop in at a place called ‘Pie-O-Neer’ in Pietown, New Mexico and then realising it was pretty much on our way, it was added to our list.
The pies were all sweet pies and there was a wide selection, my favourite being the classic apple pie. Also served with icecream and tea/coffee to top it off.
The pies here were amazing and the owners were easily the nicest people we had met all trip. Kathy even gave us free pie in return for a photo with them, which we were more than happy to do ( we were going to ask for a photo with them anyway! ).
My pie choices were apple pie and sweet potato / pecan pie. We also got a lot of advise from them on places to see, places to eat at, sleep at and everything in between.
Next stop on the way to Austin ( which changed later ) was the VLA or Very Large Array. It is run by SETI / Search for extraterrestial intelligence. They went for miles, literally and we just happen to be there when all of them changed direction, which was pretty impressive to watch them all move as one.
We attempted to go see the Trinity site which was just down the road, but that turned into trying to go down a road built for offroad trucks and ATV’s. Paul did take some GoPro footage of us in a stand off with some free range cattle and admitting defeat and turning around once the road of too rough.
Luckily Paul spotted another gate at down the road that we could at least get a photo by. We were informed at the Pie-O-Neer that the site is only open two times a year but we were hoping to at least get a photo at the gate next to the entrance, this gate was our best effort.
The same thing kind of happened when we turned by to White Oaks Ghost Town, in ‘Billy the Kid’ country. Except this time is wasn’t so much a ghost town as it was a bunch of people living in run down old houses in the middle of knowhere. We were expecting an old “western frontier” style abandoned town. There was a couple of old cool looking places but not what we thought it was going to be.
The let down of White Oaks was soon forgotten when we managed to grab a photo of one of the best sunsets on our trip. The Chrysler taking centre stage and looking bad ass as usual.
Once we realised that we weren’t going to get anywhere near our destination we jumped on booking.com and found a cheap motel in Roswell, New Mexico for the night and grabbed the greasiest burgers, hot dogs and fries you could think of for dinner.
Next stop, Austin Texas.
Trip Total = 532 miles / 856km
Miles on car = 16,202
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