Route 66 Stays with Personality
For the Car Junkie The 1939-built Blue Swallow Motel, in Tucumcari, is a classic motor-court gem. Sure, guests love the glowing neon and restored midcentury decor, but the historic garages attached to…
Read More
New Mexico’s Route 66 Neon
GET YOUR FIX Johnnie Meier picks a few of his favorite renovated signs. Blue Swallow Motel, Tucumcari “A blue swallow is the symbol for safe homecoming, and the sprig of laurel leaves invokes the…
Read More
Johnnie Meier Lights Route 66
H ISTORIC PRESERVATIONIST Johnnie Meier is an alchemist of sorts, restoring the magical glow of yesteryear’s neon signs along New Mexico’s Route 66. He’s also the owner of the Classical Gas Museum, in…
Read More
Guided Tours Along Route 66
ACOMA PUEBLO ALONG ROUTE 66 Acoma Pueblo was settled atop a 367-foot sandstone mesa nearly a millennia before nearby Route 66 came through. A 90-minute guided tour from the Sky City Cultural Center…
Read More
Route 66 Through Vintage Postcards
TUCUMCARI MOUNTAIN (ABOVE), 1938 “This card is pure Americana,” Lambert says. “As indicated by the messages on many other cards, heading west on Route 66 and seeing Tucumcari Mountain for the first…
Read More
Party Central on Route 66
KNOWN TO MANY as “Mrs. Tucumcari,” Bettie Ditto owned the Best Western Pow Wow Inn for more than 50 years. Her brother and sister-in-law, Tom and Helen Lins, opened the adjacent Pow Wow Room that…
Read More
Where to Eat on Route 66
FOR A GREEN CHILE CHEESEBURGER Housed in a 1913 adobe that was a former trading post, Bibo Bar & Grille serves up some of the spiciest green chile cheeseburgers west of the Río Grande. The authentic…
Read More
100 Years of Route 66 in New Mexico
THE ORIGIN STORY When Route 66 officially opened on November 11, 1926, the roughly 2,448-mile highway linking Chicago and Los Angeles was pieced together from a patchwork of existing, mostly unpaved…
Read More
Happy Hour at Market Steer
NEARLY 40 PEOPLE line up on a Saturday outside Market Steer Steakhouse for happy hour. When the doors open at 4 p.m., the crowd steers toward the Tack Room’s sleek midcentury-style bar, leather-topped…
Read More
Sirphey Brings Flavor to Bandelier
“GOOD THING WE BROUGHT our appetites,” I tell my husband, Kyle, as we walk into Sirphey at Bandelier, in the former lobby of Bandelier National Monument’s Frijoles Canyon Lodge. But he’s too entranced…
Read More