Day 1 – Off to Flagstaff!

As we did last year, the first stop on our Fall trip was the Route 66 Days Car Show in Flagstaff Arizona. This year we drove over with Rick & Kim Fernau and Donny & Hadey New and instead of taking I40 (ugh!) we went 260 to Payson and then 87 up to Happy Jack where we picked up the Lake Mary road.

We had a beautiful sunny day until we hit the rim at Woods Canyon Lake. Before dropping down into the heat we took a photo op stop at the Rest Area. It rained consistently and fairly hard until we hit Christopher Creek where it started drying out.

Once in Payson we stopped for lunch at Mackey’s Grill. Good food and service BTW, we would definitely stop there again. As usual, the yellow flowers were blooming again at Mormon Lake, so we stopped for another photo op of the cars with the great background of flowers and clouds. Mormon Lake still is pretty dry, but both Upper and Lower Lake Mary was in great shape for a change.

When we hit Flagstaff we got hit with a rain storm of Biblical proportions. Of course it hit during rush hour traffic while we were trying to find the Bank of America branch. I had had the A/C on prior to this and when I switched on the defrosters the whole wagon fogged up. My single speed wipers could not keep up, so I had my window down with my head sticking out of it to try to see if I could find a break in the continual stream of traffic that was turning left onto the street that we were on. Finally, both the rain and traffic slowed enough to where we made it to the bank.

Latter that evening we were all invited to a great party at Chuck & Diane LaVetter’s home where everyone had a great time! All in all a good start to our trip!