The personal authentic travels of a world-wide drifter, you'll always see pics of me at the locations being described (if the other blogs you're reading don't do that, odds are they were NEVER there, just saying…)
Located on Historic Route 66 adjacent to I-55 in Willowbrook, IL, Dell Rhea’s Chicken Basket opened in the late 1920’s as a lunch counter in gas station.
As the story goes, in 1938 two women who ran a chicken farm overheard the owner, Ervin ‘Irv’ Kolarik, complaining about how much he hated running the gas station part of business and wished he could just run the food counter. They promised to share their secret chicken recipe with him on condition he bought his chicken from them. The chicken was so popular that by the mid 40’s it was clear he needed a bigger place and in 1946 he opened a restaurant adjacent to the gas station.
One of the cute things that happened was it was the birthday of one of the customers and the whole staff came out to sing her happy birthday, only they clucked the words … as in made chicken noises instead of singing the words
This is one of those places that has been a chicago are institution but I have never been because this is not a part of town I’d normally go to. As such, the odds of me being here again were equally low, so I had to try their specialty, the fried chicken. That said… The chicken was very good… but I’ve had better … the fried chicken at Disneyland’s Plaza Inn was in fact MUCH better. So I’m not in fact sure it was worth the damage to my diet (and in fact when I got back to Chicago I failed my blood test… my liver numbers had jumped again).
My waitress was an obese middle-aged woman with the smile planted firmly on her face who was scurrying around the place checking on everyone regularly, Really friendly and asking all the right questions without being overly in your face about it…all while limping really badly with a sort of waddling walk. At the end of the meal I asked her what was wrong with her leg and she said it wasn’t her leg it was her back and by the end of the day she was in a lot of back pain. To which I exclaimed, “And you waitress?!!!” That woman deserves a reward… I gave her a $20 tip on my $18 bill.
Lou Mitchell’s Restaurant & Bakery located just outside of the loop in Chicago Illinois, is probably the only historic Route 66 eatery to be in the Michelin guide (here’s the link)
In spite of this being a Chicago institution, I think this is probably my very first time eating at Lou Mitchell’s. This is ironic, considering that I was born and raised in the northern suburbs and got my undergraduate degree from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, which is about a 10 minute walk away.
The most likely reason for this is that Lou Mitchell’s only does breakfast and lunch and my family usually came downtown in the evenings, and I ate my lunches during college either in the school cafeteria or at any of the restaurants within a block or two of school.
I got the apple and cheddar omelette because I’ve never had one before… which was served with Greek toast (toast made using greek style bread with sesame seeds on it). The omelette is ridiculously fluffy… it’s good.. but would have been better with a much sharper cheddar, and maybe folding the apples INTO the omelette rather than topping it… and I think raw crispy apples that were tart would have been better than cooked
That said there was clear Route 66 theme to the restaurant, with all the 66 branded stuff being specific to the restaurant rather than any of that hopeless generic stuff.
A lot of my friends boycott this chain, due to their stand on LGBT rights… because the owners donate VAST sums to lobbying groups that try to keep same-sex marriage illegal and members of the LGBT community oppressed… as someone who rejects single issue politics, I tend to be a bit ‘flexible’ in how I look at this business. That said, I can’t discuss this chain without addressing the problem.
Let’s be clear…I strongly disagree with Chick-fil-A’s politics regarding LGBT issues, but at the same time I do respect them for their general lack of hypocrisy with regards to their interpretation of what it means to be a good Christian. What a lot of people don’t realize is that Americans eat more chicken on Sundays then they do any other day of the week. That said, Chick-fil-A, whose main product is chicken, is closed on Sundays… ALL of them without exception. Even if they are located in malls. The company in effect is choosing to lose $1.019 billion+ per year rather than go against their religious beliefs — and that amount is only the cost of being closed one day out of the week, it does not take into account the BUMP that comes from most Americans consuming more chicken on Sundays. Ergo, for a food chain whose main product is chicken to choose to be closed on a Sunday because that’s God‘s day –a day when they believe their workers should be at home with their families or at church, THAT is really putting your money where your mouth is …. although, that said… others have argued that being closed one day a week is part of WHY the chain is so profitable.
And their adherence does not end there…. for instance, just a few weeks ago, I went in to one in Strongsville, Ohio in order to get a cup of coffee (I REALLY needed some caffeine, the only coffee at the adjacent Costco was full of carbs I didn’t need… and I couldn’t spot a McDonald’s). When I walked in the door this store had hired a girl with a serious case of downs syndrome to open doors for customers (clearly they made work for her so she could have the self-respect that comes from making your own money and having a purpose). Then, when the manager discovered that I was only there for a cup of coffee he gave it to me for free. This is NOT in any way unusual to my experience for Chick-fil-A outlets, in fact its more likely than not.
Truett Cathy, the company founder (memorialized in the sculpture above), and his brother opened a diner at this location, in 1946 and called it The Dwarf Grill because of the little red door in the picture above. The Diner was later renamed the dwarf house, but of course this was back before it was highly politically incorrect to call little people Dwarfs because of their Dwarfism.
Apparently he then had the idea to open a smaller version of the diner (apparently without his brother) that just sold his popular chicken sandwich at a mall (this was well before food courts existed in malls, and the idea was therefore radical) … and thus the chain began
The interior of this location is a Diner, unlike the rest of the chain which is fast food
The Cozy Dog in Springfield, Illinois, is one of the iconic locations on Route 66, and is the first restaurant owned by the inventor of the Corn Dog.
As this place closes fairly late (by rural America standards), when I arrived in town first I went to the hotel and checked in, and then I came by here to check it out
From the sign its clear that this place USED to be a Drive-in, it’s not any more. At best, it has a small drive through window along the side but I didn’t see many people using it.
Since all the reviews I had read where going on and on about how this was the best corn dog they’d ever had, I had to try it. Based on the sheer speed it was handed to me, it was NOT made to order, although it was still warm and very crispy on the outside
Was it a good corn dog, sure… was it so much better than any other corn dog that I’ve ever had that I absolutely had to try it … no, not really.
There’s a library in the shop, but based on the discouragements, it’s just for show
The next day, since I was going to be staying in Springfield for a few nights, I went back to get daytime shots. There must have been some sort of antique car club meeting there because the cars were so pretty
The Cozy dog was the first place I’ve seen so far to have TWO of these Illinois route 66 maps, The tall one, which is two sided — back is the bottom right image, was adjacent to the road, while the small one (upper right) was standing just by restaurant’s front door
The weather had gone from overcast and rainy the night before to clear blue skies and a windstorm… 20 mile per hour winds with 40 mile per hour gusts… and those gusts of were making it very difficult for me to set up my iPhone, walk away, and then use my apple watch’s camera app to trigger the shots before a gust blew the camera over.
According to the guy who owns and runs this place, who I got to talk to, this is the restaurant that invented the idea of the drive-through window. It is in what was originally the caboose of a train where they took the wheels off.
The caboose was built in 1881, The building has been here since 1919 and it had a gas station in the front originally. It was registered as a business in 1924 which is when the tax system came into tax businesses. They’ve been selling loose meat sandwiches since 1919, and from the beginning the layout was as it is now, with sandwiches either being sold direct from the kitchen through the side window, or to customers at the bar. (Later, they expanded sideways and added more indoor seating.) Remember how on the Rosanne TV show, how her shop sold a loose meat sandwich… the Conners live in the mythical town of Lanford IL, which is supposed to be somewhere around here. This is the first place I have ever been to that had it. So of course I had to try it, it is not a sloppy Joe it’s different, they call it a sloppy Joe with no sauce. It was homemade pie, their maid-rite sandwich (loose meat), and homemade root beer which they still make.
Now that I’m not in the building anymore it was not very tasty. The root beer was VERY good, but the loose meat…. the primary flavor was salt with a second flavor underneath it that I could not quite identify… it was some sort of spice. The guy as a hint said the woman who invented it was originally from Hungary, and that no it was not paprika, but the taste was really familiar I just couldn’t put my finger on it. I timed it right because they were closing up just as I was getting ready to leave
Clanton’s cafe on Route 66 in Vinita was one of the places I had marked as MUST try their foods… and I even planned my day to arrive there around dinner time… only to find it was closed!
Clanton’s was one of the restaurants along the trek I was really looking forward to trying. This place has no shortage of accolades from TV and magazines, not to mention getting almost 5 stars on TripAdvisor and 4 on yelp. AND they’re supposed to have the best Chicken Fried Steak on Route 66, which is one of my favorite dishes
But MY good luck, between me planning my trip and arriving there, they’d posted NEW hours which include being closed on Sundays. So
Per the suggestion of a friend, and one of those “places you need to check out on Route 66 lists” I stopped for a meal at the Rock Cafe in Stroud, Oklahoma. Not only is the Cafe original to the 66 experience (the place has been there since 1939, and used to be a Grey Hound Bus stop), but when the Pixar folks were doing their Route 66 road trip as research for the animated movie Cars, they came here, and so fell in love with the place’s owner, Dawn Welch, a Route 66 restoration activist who had moved to Stroud and bought the restaurant in large part to help resurrect the town… that they based one of the main characters for the movie on her; namely, the animated character Sally Carrera (shown as a blue, 2002 Porsche 911) the owner of the Cozy Cone Motel, who serves both as the love interest of/and protagonist against Lightning McQueen, was based almost entirely on .
I found YouTube video by her, where you a taste of what the Pixar folks saw
That said, she wasn’t there the day I visited, and odds are you won’t meet her either… so lets talk about the restaurant she owns.
I found the menu of the Rock Cafe to be far more upmarket/chef driven than I would have expected based on most of the other historic eateries in town (and more than a few of the dishes made me wonder about the German Heritage of Stroud)
Of course anyone know knows me well knows which of the items on this menu I went for (although I admit the Jagersnitzel & Spaetzle with cheese were calling to me)…. but I opted for food more in line with my dietary restrictions (low fat)
One Buffalo Burger with mustard
The Buffalo burger was ok. The meat patty was thin and crunchy rather than thick and juicy, and the amount of mustard they put on completely overwhelmed the flavor of the meat (which should have been the star of the dish). But it had a good bun…
After eating I checked out the gift shop and IF they had offered this T-shirt on a more feminine cut shirt (a V neck or a scoop neck) I would have purchased it…. but they didn’t.
It’s the Sally Carrera character that’s based on the Rock Cafe’s owner, in front of the cafe and a route 66 sign. (I’ve emailed the owner and she’s agreed she needs some women’s versions, hopefully she’ll get back to me when she has one and I’ll buy it on-line).
It’s the Grand Canyon, South Rim… it’s a classic! Rather than drive here, however, I took the train ride from Williams, AZ (on Route 66) where I was spending the night.
To be honest, the three hours the Train service allowed me was ENOUGH, in large part because my pinky toe on my right foot was seriously unhappy with me (I had sprained it and rather than let it rest and keeping it elevated, I had been driving cross-country and doing a load of walking.) As such, rather than walk I first took the shuttle bus for invalids (organized by the train company) from the train to
I LOVE the fact that an old-fashioned station wagon drove up just then, haven’t seen one of those since the 1970’s
El Tovar.. in order to get some lunch, and to see it because … HARVEY HOUSE!!!
On the train I had asked the girl to suggest which of the restaurants had the best food, and she said the main restaurant at the El Tovar for sure… but I had done so much snacking on the way over that, while looking over their lunch menu, I found I wasn’t actually all that hungry, so I opted for the Onion Soup
It was VERY good (definitely a cut above the average), and every person I spoke to at the surrounding tables was also extremely happy with their food. Let’s face it, you don’t expect food at restaurants like this actually be good, especially when the food prices are relatively reasonable. (You’re paying for the location, ambiance and view).
That said, the room is also quite spectacular…. both its interior and decorations,
And of course if you’re very lucky (I wasn’t) you’ll be placed next to a widow with an amazing view.
The bottom right image was from my table… I was WAY in the back but that said, ….Heh, my table was RIGHT next to the electric plug and my iPhone’s battery was down to 20% after the train ride.
A bar, that also has a wonderful view
I wandered around the building a bit afterwards, cause it was gorgeous (and a Hardy House that had been kept authentic over time)… ‘
Directly adjacent to the El Tovar is Hopi House, which is also a historic landmark, that is used as store for mostly high-end Native American goods. It was designed by Mary Colter, the same woman who designed almost all of the Harvey Houses. After checking it out, I went to look at the rim…. pictures don’t do it justice, there’s something unreal about it.That said, I was in AWE of how clear the view was. I kept saying to people, “do you realize that a few years ago you wouldn’t have seen this? That there was a horrible haze mucking it up? That its only because of the Clean air act, and the recent closing of some near by coal-burning power stations that you can see this so clearly” Apparently nobody did… Not only that but some Trump supporters actually started yelling at me (I’m shitting you not.)
My weather karma is continuing— like I said it was supposed to be raining today…
At the other end of the part of the southern rim that I had walked along, is the Bright Angel Lodge which was also designed by Mary Colter, and this one has a very famous fireplace (that the one behind me in the images below)…. which again has amazing views at its restaurant… only the girl on the train told me the food isn’t quite as good.
Adjacent to it is an ice-cream place that also serves sandwiches, and pretzels and snacks (all the food you’d eat while standing outside)… although while I was there mostly all people were buying was the ice cream.
As they warned us on the train, there’s a HUGE fine, like $500 if they catch you feeding a squirrel… and that they will try to steal your food if you don’t watch out… what they neglected to mention is the little buggers bite, and will infect you with the plague!!!!
After this I took an un-scenic shortcut back to the train station, because it was about time to go back to Williams, and if you miss the train you’re kind of screwed.
After having stayed a few nights in each, I decided that the town of Williams, Arizona is so upscale compared to Kingman, AZ, that it’s almost like a different world. Where everyone in Kingman seemed to hate their jobs and took it out on the customers, here in Williams I received nothing but decent customer service, i.e., at least they were trying to be nice to you while screwing up their jobs. Where in Kingman you’d be hard pressed to find a decent meal, Williams has more than a few chef driven restaurants. Both cities serve the SAME tourism group (both are on 66, both are gateways to different parts of the Grand Canyon, and Kingman is also an access point to Hoover dam) but each has completely different attention to details and attitudes towards their customers. Therefore, for a restful vacation, choose Williams.
I have a theory as to why this is so …Kingman is down in the desert where its hot and dry and that makes people cranky… while Williams sits at a higher elevation and they’re surrounded by trees. While williams, like a lot of the Route 66 cities, puts a great deal of effort into celebrating its history in that regard, unlike Kingman and some of the other cities in Arizona, there’s something a lot more classy about how they opt to go about it…
This historic gas-station, rather than demolished has been converted into gift shop, and the contents of the shop weren’t just the usual low-cost mugs and magnets (although some of that was there too) but rather it also had goods aimed at much more affluent clientele; some of it even appeared to be from local artists, and it included things like potted cactuses in cute western style pots. After a quick investigation of the store, I headed to my hotel.
I stayed two night here, spending the full day on a train ride to and from the Grand Canyon (totally worth the extra expense, see the post, and allows you to spend about 3 hours exploring the Canyon, which is enough to see the sites and have a meal).
Rather than stay at the train station’s hotel that was built in replacement for the town’s Harvey House (there’s really nothing in this new building of the old grandeur; the original building is still there, but now it’s their gift shop & offices), I opted instead to stay at the Howard Johnson that is only one block away from there (and two blocks from Williams’ downtown area). I was really happy to discover that the WiFi at the hotel was quite reasonable… 4 Mbps download and about 1 upload… which almost made me wish I’d booked for an extra day to spend blogging about my day at the grand Canyon before heading on. That said, it was fast enough that I was able to upload video to YouTube at a decent rate… and rather than picking up WiFi that’s coming through walls from somewhere else in the building, like at most big chain hotels, this place had a server in each room! At this hotel your wifi is your wifi, that speed isn’t shared. That said, all was not perfect. The chain that should have been on the interior of the door in order to lock hotel staff out while I was in, was broken … AND there was no card of the sort you hang on the door to tell the staff not to clean the room in your absence.
The night I arrived I walked around the downtown a little (my right pinky toe had been sprained when I fell off a bed back in Los Angeles, and I’d not gone to a clinic to have it seen to, so walking was a bit painful). For dinner I opted for the Red Raven Restaurant which had VERY good reviews on Yelp, and was suggested for the best option if what you did NOT want was a steak dinner. NONE of the steak places in this town served Bison (the low fat & tastier option) along with Beef, so I was very sad. For dinner I had Salmon Cilantro (Char broiled salmon fillet topped with a cilantro pesto. Served on a bed of Southwest mashed potatoes with grilled asparagus, and for my soup I opted for the Tomato Gazpacho (cold) $22. Both of these were as good as they looked. I forget exactly what the desert was, but it was deeply chocolate and a little bit of heaven in my mouth
After I walked around the downtown some more. The place is LOADED with really high-end shops selling Native American Jewelry, art, clothes, etc. NOTHING in this town is cheap, but the quality is all very high end.
After dinner I headed back to my hotel to rest up for the next day. The Train I was going to be taking required I be at the station at 8:30 am, while I normally wake up at around 10. (For dinner of the day after the train ride, I opted for McD’s all day breakfast menu, and an Egg McMuffin — I love those things). The day AFTER the train ride, I checked out the town a little bit more while heading east to my next stay.
A 2nd renovated historic gas station. The museum was closed when I arrived.
Got a love it, instead of having wooden Indians (which are offensive) they have wooden white people and bears… which the woman working inside told me represented the animal spirits of the tribespeople… like I said, classy
I admit, I didn’t come here to eat while I was in town because they didn’t have a single thing on the menu that I could eat and keep my diet … Everything was either beef or something fried… that said, EVERYONE of my friends who has been to Williams told me that if you do want a steak this is the place to go… one friend even said it was the best steak she’d ever had in her entire life.
66 as it runs through downtown Williams is a one way street, so if you can see their sign from the vantage the lower picture, you are in fact driving the wrong way. (Got to love their sense of humor)
Falling into my “big things” category, but not for the usual reasons…. This restaurant is sort of famous in the US (really, how many restaurants that aren’t major chains warrant a Wikipedia page?), not because the food is so amazing — it’s good, but I wasn’t deeply impressed (and even sent back the first dish)… but more for being an impressive tourist trap. In the vein of “everything is bigger in Texas” this place challenges the consumer to snarf down a HUGE 72 oz steak, a bread roll with butter, a side salad, and a fried shrimp appetizer in under an hour.
IF the customer can, then the meal is free, if they can’t, it costs $72 (the other large steaks cost slightly over $1 an oz, so still a discount); and the challenge comes with a very specific set of rules.
This is what a 72oz slab of steak looks like
As this was the question asked most by my Facebook friends…. According to the Wikipedia page: The challenge began in 1960 and “as of February 2018, over 9,500 people out of about 62,000 have accomplished this feat”… so in about 58 years, about 1,070 people try a year…
That’s me, eating the steak
According to the manager I spoke with, HE said they average about 35 challenges a week — which sort of jives with my math (20 people a week) if you figure it took some time for the word to spread and with the number of people stepping forth to try it escalating over time.
Note the date: this article is from 2007, so if true, 1,500 have done it in the last 10+ years
That said the restaurant has evolved over the years from just being a restaurant to being a “road side attraction”… aka tourist trap
Not only is the main building kind of huge (this is a picture of it from the front and side)
It property comes complete with its own Motel (and sufficient parking for Trucks and RV’s)
I arrived on a Saturday night and the poor girl who meets you at the front door essentially has the job of standing there and saying “It’ll be a 15 to 20 minute wait” while handing out buzzers… almost once every 30 seconds….
for folks who show up single there’s a bar in the waiting area which gets very little traffic, where you can sit almost immediately (I didn’t take a picture of it, but it’s fairly long and there at least 10 spots held for solo eaters that I could have sat at, had I wanted to). This is because waiting sections of the place are HUGE and diverting. There’s a massive gift that is as big as if that were their sole business…. and stuffed to the brims
I was tempted by this … but where would I put it? (This sign is particularly funny in Amarillo as they’ve NOT marked where 66 is… they sort of designated one area of town to 66 but it doesn’t seem to link to the rest of the road in any meaningful way, and almost feels arbitrary and resurrected for the tourists, unlike in say LA or Albuquerque, where the are actually roads that link to form a whole)
AND there’s a gaming area with a shooting gallery for the kids/families AND gaming machines (see right side of image) for the adults
Behind THAT there’s a section with tables for people who just want to sit with a drink and talk while waiting, but on a Saturday night it was pretty empty
And behind that is the hallway to the bathrooms, which was lined with those moving pictures that change based on where you’re standing… all of which were historic portraits that changed into horrific images…. these sorts of things…. which kept me and a few other people entertained for a good 10 minutes as we decided which were the worst (and which could be purchased at the gift-shop). I.e., the “customer holding pen” is designed to separate you from your money, is almost as big as the eating room (which is two stories), and I’d bet is probably more profitable.
Only then do you enter the main eating area…
Note the desert table at the bottom left
It is two stories high (happily I didn’t have to climb stairs), and is (I believe) set up so that anyone taking the challenge is sat in the central area and becomes part of the attraction; they are not only observable by most of the other customers.
One of the things I noticed was how WHITE the room was…
But there’s a clock located below the massive cow-head, that can accommodate up to six competitors at once. But, no one was competing when I was there, which is why I think they have these guys walking around entertaining the guests (sort of a country western Tex/Mex nod to the Hispanic tradition)
I arrived at the restaurant having not eaten all day… other than a cup of coffee. So I was pretty hungry. I consulted with the various guests around me, and one of them … who was eating Chicken fried steak convinced me to order that. It is very much NOT on my allowed diet (both steak and fried) but its one of my very favorite things. I ordered it with the vegetable soup and baked sweet potato (sweet potatoes are MUCH MUCH MUCH healthier than normal ones, and are even diabetic acceptable). I was also drawn to try the baby-back-ribs, which this place sells in a sampler menu of three as an appetizer.
The ribs were tasty … although, as I explained to the people next to me when they asked, “I’m Jewish”… they went quite for a second and then broke into laughter… “so really, I think they’re tasty but in 50 odd years it’s only like my 3rd time eating them.” The guy next to me asked if the meat was falling off the bone, which it was… and was it tasty, which it was… so he declared that meant they were good.
The soup was a bit thin… it was watery sort of soup with mushrooms and potatoes and other veggies in it, with a little bit of a kick (spice). But it was good, and since it had been a cold rainy day and my nose was running a bit, it was satisfying.
Then the “star” of the meal, my Chicken fried steak with white sauce, which is how they do it in Texas. (It was very pretty, but I didn’t take a picture of it, sorry.) I had my first bite and…. BLECH!!!! Firstly, it was neither cubed steak nor an actual fillet (which is how I prefer it), it was hamburger … and FATTY hamburger at that… and pretty much ALL I could taste in my mouth was a mouthful of fat. BLECH! I pushed it to the side and continued to eat my soup, with an intention of then starting on my sweet potato.
After a while a waiter finally came by (wasn’t impressed with the wait staff’s attentiveness) with an obligatory “how’s everything” which wasn’t genuine and I could tell he assumed would be “ok” only to be shocked when I pointed to the now cold plate of chicken fried steak… that was pushed to the far side of the table… which he REALLY should have noticed if he were any good at his job… and said, “I don’t like that.”
He went, and got the manager, who asked why I hadn’t like it… so I described my diet and how Chicken fried Steak is really one of my favorite foods, but that this one wasn’t good enough to justify breaking the diet… so he then suggest I order the grilled Salmon instead, which I did. And, unlike the day before when I had ordered salmon and got served trout… today it was actually salmon, and a fairly large slab of it.
It was well cooked (by US standards), but firm but not dry… and sort of heavily spiced with spices I’d normally reserve for steak. But, by the time it had arrived I’d had 3 ribs, a cup of soup, a piece of Texas toast and 3 bread rolls… so I ended up packing up it and the sweet potato to have for lunch the next day (I had booked in a rest day from my travels, which a forecast of really lousy weather ensured I’d take…)
That said…If you’re hungry but not THAT hungry, they also offer 12, 18, 24 and 36 oz steaks (see menu), which is what the owner originally was selling and referred to as his “Texas sized steaks”, before coming up with the challenge. Oh and if that weren’t enough…
Then, as you’re leaving you are forced to walk past this gauntlet, A a gelato, fresh fudge and pastries stand…
….even though this is technically in the front area right by the entrance to the restaurant area, I noticed most people bought from it just as they were leaving the store… to take home for later (so that your full stomach shouldn’t be the master of your eyes… which is kind of brilliant if you think about it from a marketing perspective)
Directly adjacent to the El Tovar is Hopi House, which is also a historic landmark, that is used as store for mostly high-end Native American goods. It was designed by Mary Colter, the same woman who designed almost all of the Harvey Houses. 
After checking it out, I went to look at the rim…. pictures don’t do it justice, there’s something unreal about it.
That said, I was in AWE of how clear the view was. I kept saying to people, “do you realize that a few years ago you wouldn’t have seen this? That 
My weather karma is continuing— like I said it was supposed to be raining today…
At the other end of the part of the southern rim that I had walked along, is the Bright Angel Lodge which was also designed by Mary Colter, and this one has a very famous fireplace (that the one behind me in the images below)…. which again has amazing views at its restaurant… only the girl on the train told me the food isn’t quite as good.
As they warned us on the train, there’s a HUGE fine, like $500 if they catch you feeding a squirrel… and that they will try to steal your food if you don’t watch out… what they neglected to mention is the little buggers bite, and will infect you with the plague!!!!
66 as it runs through downtown Williams is a one way street, so if you can see their sign from the vantage the lower picture, you are in fact driving the wrong way. (Got to love their sense of humor)
Not only is the main building kind of huge (this is a picture of it from the front and side)
I was tempted by this … but where would I put it? (This sign is particularly funny in Amarillo as they’ve NOT marked where 66 is… they sort of designated one area of town to 66 but it doesn’t seem to link to the rest of the road in any meaningful way, and almost feels arbitrary and resurrected for the tourists, unlike in say LA or Albuquerque, where the are actually roads that link to form a whole)
Rebecca Radnor's Personal Blog: Consider yourselves warned! 