We drove from LA to Las Vegas then to a small town called Williams in Arizona. The date we arrived at Williams was also the date that the annual Great Race pass through the same town. The race started in San Antonio, TX and ended in Anaheim, CA.
William is quite close (well, about 50 miles or 80km) to the Grand Canyon National Park's south rim. This is my 3rd visit to this town in the past 10 years. Everything seems the same, except for the famous Route 66. In my first visit in Spring 1992, there were sections of Route 66 still open to motor traffic. The road was red-dirt road passing through lots of dense private forest. Occasionally the road ran through small-lake/big-pond. There was not much traffic.
I asked a gas station attendant if the Route 66 is still open somewhere nearby, she told me the roads were all "chopped up". The route can now only be imagined in songs and cheap souvenirs.