Oklahoma

At some point we had to cross the country. The South-East has been awesome, but we still had tons of destinations in the West. The problem with the part inbetween is that it's mostly boring...or so we thought.
We chose Route 66 to get from Oklahoma City to Amarillo, Texas, where we would leave Route 66 again and drive further south.
Oklahoma is the state, where the longest parts of the historic Road 66 are still more or less intact and drivable. Many other states got rid of the old road after the "new" interstate system had been established sometime after World War II. For a while the road could still be used, but as the years passed, maintenance became too much of an issue and many states just cut the the expenses and closed the road. The road really wasn't what we expected. At times it was horrible to drive on, but we weren't in a hurry and drove slowly from one point of interest to the next. Birte had found a homepage with lots of sights along the way, so time passed quickly and we even had to skip some stuff.
Close to Erick, Oklahoma, we turned on the radio to listen to local news and music. After only 2 minutes the music was interupted by a regional thunderstorm warning. People were advised to leave open areas and stop driving as heavy wind gusts, rain and lightning were expected for the next hour. The storm was currently on its way to Erick. Well...shit. We still had a few miles ahead of us and weren't planning on stopping in Erick, but figured that we should probably take the advise seriously, since thunderstorms in the US, especially in the Great Plains, can be severe. The homepage listed a small "Curiosity Shop" for Erick, close to Route 66. This should become our shelter.
Inside the shop sat a bearded old man. Everything was packed with things, be it instruments, memorabilia, signs, lamps and whatever else. We talked to the guy about his shop and about music. Then he suddenly grabbed his guitar and gave us a 15 minute private concert. It was amazing. What a wonderful coincidence that the storm lead us to his place!

The overall experience of driving down Route 66 was great. The road was mostly empty, because everyone uses the Interstate 40 to get from A to B, so we could stop whenever and wherever we wanted. Many villages along the way were deserted, which created a spooky horror movie atmosphere, but every once in a while you found a nice little gas station that was left from a different time.

I have a video of our private guitar concert in Erick, but Findpenguins won't upload it for some reason...if anyone wants to watch it, tell me, then I'll send it via WhatsApp.もっと詳しく