One with the Road

Starting from Simi Valley we made our way out over the mountains and back down to the ocean at Malibu, CA. From there, we followed US-1 along the coast into Santa Monica where after 4820 total miles over the road, we made our second major left turn and started heading back east on Route 66.

Corvette on Route 66

Well if you ever plan to motor west, travel my way and take the highway that’s the best so you can get your kicks on Route 66. Won’t you get hip to this timely tip, and take that California trip to get your kicks on Route 66.

The following photo shows the head stone of Route 66 in a little park where Santa Monica Blvd dead ends into Ocean Avenue.

This is the end of Route 66 – or the beginning depending on your perspective. After spending a few minutes here, we quickly tried to make our way out of the Los Angeles area via I-10 going east to try and shake as much traffic as possible because driving the surface streets was painfully slow in the city.

Our plan for the rest of the morning was to pick up some key landmarks of Route 66 along the highway while leaving town including the Colorado Boulevard Arch Bridge in Pasadena, CA and then the original historic McDonald’s location in San Bernardino, CA. However, our plans would become thwarted…

Today we ran into our first “problem” driving the Corvette today. The weather along the ocean was humid and also very sunny and we noticed that the cabin of the car was periodically getting warmer than the set temperature. After a little while it got worse and even though the A/C compressor and circulating fans were operating, virtually no air was coming out of the vents. We pulled over to check the cabin air filter to see if anything obvious was going on. Nothing seemed out of place so we started up the car again and to our amazement everything seemed to be operating normally again, so we pressed on. Unfortunately the problem returned in a similar manner within 10 or 15 miles of driving. Pressing on to follow Route 66 (or even I-15 at this point) with a wonky climate control system did not seem prudent.

You see, this section of Route 66 here is in the middle of the freakin’ Mojave Desert and there is nothing but you the tumble weeds out there.

And when we say desert, we mean Africa hot.

Yes -110 Degrees!

Time to try out that blue OnStar button! We asked them to tell us where the closest Chevrolet dealer was. Damn handy system. The agent directed us to Rotolo Chevrolet in Fontana, CA about 5 miles away down I-210. The dealership turned out to be a pretty large truck dealership, but had Corvette experience and even had 4 Corvettes in stock (including two Z06’s) and once we explained to them our predicament, was actually quite helpful. In fact, the car was in the shop and being diagnosed within 30 minutes of our arrival. Of course at this point, the A/C was working perfectly again and there were no fault codes being reported in the computer. Best they could tell everything was operating perfectly; so now what right!? – The shop foreman worked with Jeff and took him and the Corvette for a test drive to see if it would happen again within 30 miles of driving. It did not.

Given the exact description of the symptoms, their theory was that the A/C heat exchanger had frosted up and was obstructing the air flow….hence fixing itself when the car was turned off for a little while in the parking lot. They suggested trying two things if it happened again. First, force the A/C off and see if it starts working again within 10 minutes of driving with warm air being circulated. Second, if A/C off clears the problem, force recirculation mode and see if that prevents it from happening again. The theory was by using the recirculation mode, the amount of hot moist air passing through the heat exchanger would be minimized. The problem did eventually return about a half-hour later and both tips did completely resolve the problem. Got to love it – Thank you Jim and John at Rotolo Chevrolet!

Unfortunately, the A/C episode cost us about 3 hours of total lost time between fussing around checking things out ourselves and the time at the dealer. To be clear, we’re not complaining. It worked well in the end, but we did have to skip a couple of planned stops to make it to the planned stopping point of Laughlin, NV (on the Colorado River) pretty much at the intersection of NV, CA, and AZ.

The California stretch of Route 66 itself turned out to be somewhat disappointing. First, the spans of Route 66 across the Mojave are in fact completely desolate. We’re not talking small towns. We’re talking no towns. Once I-40 was completed through the 70’s and early 80’s these sections of Route 66 became pointless because nobody actually lives out there. Second, the road surface quality is pretty bad for many stretches. Unlike Nebraska’s US-20 where you could do 100 mph without any problem, here you do not want to go much faster than 60 mph in lots of areas and sometimes even slower.

We did see some cool things including the “Sneaker Tree”

"Kicks" on Route 66

This tree was followed a few miles later by an “Underwear Tree” and then later a “Bra Tree”….but we’ll spare you the pictures of them. There was also the famous Roy’s Motel and Café

Roys Hotel Cafe

but that is completely abandoned now….and the few trains we had to wait for also crossing the desert.

Route 66 Railroad Crossing

To be clear, the California section of Route 66 was still cool to drive, but there is not all that much to show you and I’m not sure I would recommend it unless you really want to drive it – just because – like we did.

Tomorrow – The Grand Canyon!