Thursday, October 24, 2002 P.M.

Laying on my sleeping bag off the Oatman Hwy in the Warm Springs Wilderness near Battleship Mountain between Oatman and Kingman on the Kingman side of the Sitgreaves Pass (47 miles from Oatman).

Got out of Carpinteria at about 9:30 a.m. It seemed to take forever to get through Los Angeles so we could actually make some eastward progress. At noon, we took a slight detour into Old Pasadena to get lunch at the Pumpernickel Deli on Colorado Blvd. Good cheap sandwiches made by an older Korean couple.

We detoured on to Route 66 at Barstow and stopped in Amboy at Roy's for some pictures. It's very cool seeing the places almost frozen in time but it's sad also to think about how progress passed them by and how lives were affected.

From Amboy, we continued on to Needles and after a few turn-arounds found Route 66 again in Topock. We drove through the Havasu National Wildlife Refuge on the Oatman Highway (old Route 66), also known as the Backcountry Scenic Byway. The country around here is very rugged and jagged. Lots of cacti and barren rocky peaks. Oatman is known for its wild burros and sure enough, we saw a couple as we drove through. Oatman reminds us of a much smaller Bisbee but now that I consider it, I'd say it's actually more reminiscent of Los Cerrillos.

Tomorrow on to Kingman and Holbrook. So far, this is looking like an awesome place to camp. It is close to the road but there will probably be no traffic during the night.