WEEK IN REVIEW

WEEK IN REVIEW

Years of drought and a few brush fires have transformed the rugged hills above the historic district of Kingman, Arizona along Route 66 into an almost lunar landscape.


The Cerbat Mountains along the old Beale Wagon Road present a stunning skyline of buttes and mesas.

Barney the wonder truck on the road into the rugged Cerbat Mountains. One of many adventures for the Adventurer as the Ghost Towns of the Southwest project gets under way.

The road from the now forgotten town of Stockon Hill to the rail head in Kingman passed through these canyons more than a century ago.

Here is the intrepid author at the wheel of the stalwart Adventurer, aka Barney the wonder truck.

These pictures are but a small part of the past week. As with a large percentage of the population I worked away the week with visions of adventure away from the office dancing in my head.
I started last week battling a hard winter storm on the way to Peach Springs on old Route 66. As always the family truckster (my 1988 Ford Crown Victoria LX Country Squire station wagon) got us to point A and back again. This time through driving rain, blowing snow and hard winds.
My son, his wife, and their daughter moved into their first home this week. I must confess it is nice that my wife and I, and a couple of moth eaten old cats, have the house to ourselves again but there is a certain emptiness to the place.
I finished a feature article for Old cars Weekly on the early history of front wheel drive cars. The center piece were the cars built by J. Walter Christie.
I also wrote my monthly column, The Independent Thinker, for Cars & Parts. The personality profiled in this piece was J. Walter Christie.
There has been no response from the editors at Hemmings in regards to a submitted proposal. In light of having supplied features for almost twenty years it is difficult not to feel the failure to respond is a snub.
The evenings have been spent sending letters, studying for the CDL license test, reading, and making myself familiar with the new camera. As I have been assigned the task of covering this years Route 66 Fun Run for Cars & Parts it is imperative I have intimate knowledge of its workings and quirks by May.
I have established an account with Flickr to further promote this blog as well as my writing. I must admit all of the new technology fascinates me but it is also rather confusing. It seems to change so quickly it is numbing.
The game plan for the next week is to adjust the breaks on Barney, finish the book reviews for Cars & Parts, and dig in to the ghost town project. If the weather holds I hope to get to photos of the old towns of Cerbat, Mineral Park and Chloride.