NEW MEXICO trip
Oct. 8-15 2021
PART 10
I-40 near Santa Rosa, N.M.
Mountain Road in Tucumcari trails off into unpaveyness. This town of 5,000 has an unusually high number of businesses for travelers. That includes the Love's gas station and store where we saw more smiling faces! There were also people suspiciously standing around inside this store, leading me to suspect either an organized theft ring or - well, something else.
Heading away from Tucumcari, the frontage at right was probably old US 66.
I-40 near San Jon.
Leaving New Mexico...
...and entering Texas!
The official Texas welcome!
The frontage at right was probably not old US 66, as once again, the freeway appears to be a direct overlay.
I-40 in Amarillo.
We overslept in Amarillo, and there were plenty of meaningless delays throughout this day of misadventure. This has to be I-40 heading away from Amarillo.
Probably I-40 near McLean, Texas. This could be a stretch where US 66 was a divided highway by the 1960s and became I-40.
This too, though US 66 may have had a narrower median and had to be widened somehow.
I-40 enters Oklahoma!
Passing the Oklahoma welcome center in Erick.
I-40 near Elk City. US 66 was divided here by 1961.
Maybe near Foss.
I-40 in Clinton.
Notice the skyline of Oklahoma City peeping up in the background.
Approaching I-44 on the west side of Oklahoma City.
Oklahoma City was where the band Color Me Badd formed. Contrary to what photos suggest, Color Me Badd was not a supergroup formed by Vanilla Ice, Rick James, Kenny G, and George Michael.
I-44 actually bypasses the central city on the west and north.
I once read that Oklahoma City was the only major American city with a "fully planned" freeway system. What that really meant was that many of the freeways are parallel to each other, allowing redundant routes that relieve congestion.
A view of downtown Oklahoma City with a tangle of ramps in front.
North on I-44/OK 3 in Oklahoma City.
This is about where I-44 splits off OK 74, a freeway known as Hefner Parkway - which is probably not named after Hugh Hefner.