When I was a young teen, I remember hearing about a loony American millionaire who had bought the London Bridge, and had it shipped to Arizona, brick by brick. We just put it down to eccentricity – one of those “Only in America” stories. Then, this week, Shirley and I drove across that bridge,…
It’s been called The Mother Road, the Road to Opportunity, America’s Main Street .. its been celebrated in movies, and songs .. and it exists, in its traditional form, in a mere handful of places. It’s Route 66, the legendary highway from Los Angeles to Chicago. One of America’s first national highways, the road connected…
So – The Painted Desert – I wonder why they call it that? Well, Duh! There have been people crossing the Painted Desert (which stretches from the Grand Canyon down to the Petrified Forest in Arizona) for millennia – but the name The Painted Desert was given to the region a bit under 500 years ago.…
If I ever had any doubt about the impact that popular music can have on the tourism industry, that was dispelled on Sunday, when Shirley and I rocked up to Winslow, Arizona. If the name doesn’t mean anything to you, you are either too young, or live in a country that never played The Eagles…
As an Australian – for whom patriotism is a quiet, abiding, but largely personal thing – the ‘in-your-face flag waving of Americans is a bit surprising at times. On our first visit to the US, we went to Hawaii – and one of the first things I noticed (and photographed) was the number of…
If you will excuse the indulgence, today’s #Travelpic is, in many ways, a bit like the relationship between me and my lovely wife, Shirley. I have always loved sandstone, and the way that single grains of sand can bind together under pressure – to create something sold and strong, and yet malleable and shaped by…
As a child I idolised the US Cavalry in movies and TV shows – I wanted to be Rusty from Rin Tin Tin, ably assisting the heroic Lt Rip Masters … or even one of F-Troop – who were bumbling, but always good-hearted. Of course, as I grew older, I recognised that the “heroes” in…
I got to climb into the mouth of the ancestral enemy yesterday .. at least in a manner of speaking. As part of our road-trip across America’s western states, on Tuesday, we got to peer back into history – and beyond, to the lands of the people now known as the Ancestral Pueblo people. Until…
On Tuesday, as part of our road-trip across America’s western states, we had cause to stop at a quintessentially American establishment – a hamburger stand. This particular one was in Buena Vista, Colorado – and has been there since 1955. The burger I had was good, the fish-and-chips Shirley had was also not bad –…
For the next six weeks or so, we’re on the road again – with a trip to the US. I mentioned, the other day, that we had taken the California Zephyr train from San Francisco California, to Denver Colorado – and thoroughly enjoyed it. But I also mentioned that there were some traps for young…
Cairns Communications 