Out West 2017! Get your kicks on route 66

One of my favorite Depeche Mode songs is their remake of the song Route 66.

Route 66 always symbolized an idyllic road trip. The song lists all these towns that you will see along the way. For my road trip out west, I had a chance to take route 66 along some of my route. I didn’t get to hit many towns listed in the song, and we left too late to really enjoy lots of daylight hours on the road, but it was still and interesting trip.

First there is a stop at the Lake Mead Recreational area to get a good look,

Then we stopped at an old time-y gas station. It had closed just before we arrived since it was already getting late. I snapped a couple pictures and got back on the road.

The rest of the drive to Flagstaff was dark and isolating. It reminded me a little of the latest season of Twin Peaks, kind of creepy. But we made it to Flagstaff safely for the night. We had a little time for local craft brews and pizza before calling it a night. We are heading to Grand Canyon the next day.

Out West 2017! Extraterrestrial Highway

During my road trip out west I had a couple days to hang with my aunt in Nevada. We had no set plans but somehow we ending up talking ourselves into taking a drive to go to see Area 51.
I drove and we really didn’t know where we were going so we sort of followed directions going north.

The scenery was other worldly. I felt like I was on another planet. It was a long drive but we finally see a sign so we know we are on the right track.

At this point our phones are useless. It is just miles and miles of roads. We look for Area 51 but all we see are dirt roads to “nowhere”. When we arrived back to my aunt’s house that night we discovered that one of those dirt roads was probably the way to Area 51. There is no signage.

We stop at a little alien town along the way, it could be creepy at night.

It was fall and the sun was starting to set early. Those roads were scary during the day so we decided to turn back to get to civilization before dark. It proved to be a very healing trip. My cousin (my aunt’s niece) passed away earlier in the year. One of her favorite recent trips was down this highway. We were able to think fondly of her as we passed the signs.

St Pete Breweries Day 2

We started off our second day of St. Pete with brunch at Peg’s Cantina. It was a good time on the patio enjoying food beer and friends.

I thoroughly enjoyed this cheese appetizer. It didn’t last long.

Blueberry goat cheese pancakes

The bill comes in this fun box.

Soon after Peg’s we headed over to 3 Daughters for our first beer tasting of the day.

The 3 Daughters tasting room was attractively decorated there. We spent quite a bit of time sipping our samples there. I soon realized that they had an outdoors activity area. You can play games with a view of the brewing facilities.

Our next stop was Cycling Brewing. Their cream & sugar, please was all the rage. We had fun hanging at their tasting room but soon it was time to head back home.

Not quite done yet. We decided to stop at Rapp Brewing Company heading out of Tampa. It proved to be the best stop of the day. You can tell they love what they do, you can taste it in their beers.

So the trip comes to an end. I will return someday. However next on the list is all the great breweries in Dunedin. See you soon!