Amarillo to Tucumcari (120 miles)

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After the large steak dinner last night we were a glutton for punishment and went back this morning for all you can eat buffet. We were pretty hungry after a monster sleep going to bed at 8.30pm! I don't think I've gone to bed that early since I was a kid! We were up at 7.30 and off to the buffet. We ordered pancakes and French toast whilst Kerry had just the pancakes. Whilst they were being cooked we went to the help yourself section and got some bacon, sausage patties, and some scrambled egg. There was the option of the biscuits and gravy which me and Kerry had been intrigued by the whole trip so far. We wanted to try it but it always looks so gross! The 'biscuits' are actually scones with the 'gravy' some weird white sauce with bits in. We took one look at each other and I decided to try a bit of the sauce. To be honest it tastes of nothing and just looks like batter. Suffice to say I won't be trying the full on version. French toast and pancakes arrived with lots of syrup! The french toast was lovely but the pancakes were the worst we've ever had and we all agreed even Asda smart price ones were better! These were like a doughy cake and not like the usual pancakes. So far I have to say the best pancakes we've had have been in Chicago in Lou Mitchell's, they were melt in the mouth.

After breakfast we went back into the gift shop and I bought a cowboy hat - it had to be done! Although I admit I did get one that's a little versatile so I can use for sunny days and holidays. The lady in the gift shop asked where we were from. We seem to be getting asked that daily now compared to the first few days. Whenever we stop we seem to get an obligatory hey y'all and have a safe trip message. We feel like we are in 'proper America' now as Kerry calls it. Steph reminds me she forgot to mention the singing three some in the restaurant last night. There were three old guys all at least 70 probably knocking on 80 or more dressed in jeans, checked shirts and cowboy hats with a guitar, violin, cello. We saw them coming round the tables and steph hoped they didn't stop at ours but as they got closer I could see the violin man had an oxygen tank with tubes up his nose bless him. That was it I'm a sucker for old people so they stopped at our table and asked us which song we wanted playing. I asked them to play anything and they started up with ring of fire! We all cracked a joke and hoped it wasn't a sign :-) I had visions of the oxygen guy doing this night after night to pay for his medical bills or retirement so I gave them $5 and then went on to the next table.

We hit the road about 9.15 with the skies blue and run shining again. The weather forecast for the next couple of days is sunny and late 20's so we've all put shorts on. Today's journey is the shortest of the trip and should only take us 2-3 hours. We've got the Cadillac ranch today which I've been looking forward to the whole time. We get to spray paint graffiti onto Cadillacs which have been buried nose first in the ground. Kerry's a little excited as she'll be blue to get her tripod out for some good shots. I'm hoping some people have left some half empty cans of paint around when we get there. We arrived at the Cadillac ranch after a tiny bit of getting lost, got out the car and it was absolutely blowing a gale. The cowboy hat was left in the car cause it would never have made it. A short walk across the dirt and we got to the Cadillacs. I managed to find a silver and a red can of paint with quite a bit of paint left in and set to work but it was so windy I had to stand in the right place to avoid getting sprayed with paint from the wind. Kerry's tripod was a no go as it was so windy but after scrambling up onto one of the Cadillacs managed to get a photo of be hanging off one then with steph up there with me. Although getting down off the thing was a different story! There were only a few others there so we managed to have a good uninterrupted wander round. There were lots of references to Jesus on the Cadillacs and Jesus saves - so much it feels like we're in the Bible Belt! On the journey so far we've been struck by the amount of churches we've seen, probably at least 40-50 a day.

We got back in the car and checked our Route 66 notebook where steph had written all, the things we wanted to see and realised that next up is midpoint. This is where midpoint cafe is and the sign that signifies the middle point of Route 66! Another great photo op. Its hard to keep track of the days never mind the dates. Worked out its only taken us four and a half days to get to the half way point. The number of miles on the clock when we stop at midpoint is 1290. On the sign at midpoint it says 1194 so I think we added few somewhere! We stopped at the cafe and had some drinks and I had some of their famous chocolate cream ugly crust pie which looked very filling but was in fact pretty light. We had a chat to the owner as we bought some gifts and signed the guest book. He said the last week was the first of the season and he'd just counted that they had visitors from 21 different countries in a week. Last year they had people from 69 for the whole year. We got some good photos here including a lie down on the road by a Route 66 sign.

We carried on and took a route down a dirt track for 18 miles which was one of the oldest stretches of Route 66. It was down here we decided to change into the outfits we'd bought for a photo op. To explain before we came away we decided to each get a funny outfit for each other to pose in at some point. I bought stephs, steph bought Kerry's and Kerry bought mine. So we got changed into some strange outfits at the side of the road and Kerry set her camera up. Then just as we were posing, another car drove past - they must have wondered what was going on! We hadn't seen a car for miles at that point and they chose that point to come past! We carried on off road on the dirt track with Kerry now driving in 4x4 mode and it was sweltering in the car. Just before joined back onto concrete at the side of the road was a postbox for a house with US Route 66 and the name Burton in wrought iron. It was like it was meant to be! I hopped out for a photo! We'd crossed into New Mexico by this point and a different time zone going back an hour. We then carried on the extra few miles to the Blue Swallow Motel with gorgeous weather and pretty roads. The scenery is very desert like, with flat plains and tumble weeds. We aren't too far from Roswell and if I was an alien looking to land on planet earth in a desolate place this is just the place I'd choose.

We arrived in tucumcari about 2pm and found we couldn't check in until 3pm so went to the local subway for lunch. We then sat outside for a bit then headed over to the motel and checked in. The owner (Kevin) there was very welcoming taking us to our room and as soon as he realised we were English he said he had twining a and pg tips and would put the kettle on. We dumped our stuff and me and steph went for a cup of tea and had a nice chat to the Kevin. We'd actually seen him at the midpoint cafe on his motorbike earlier when Kerry commented on his bike. We've got the family room tonight so we've got a bed each instead of two of us having to share, although I was last in and got the single bed like a child! The room has an old fashioned pink 1950's cooker in it and authentic telephones. The phones work but the cooker doesn't which doesn't matter cause we're heading to the local Mexico restaurant with free shuttle back tonight and we're planning on having a few margaritas. We put our beers in the outside pink American style fridge and took one each kicking back in the sun outside our room catching some rays. We've all agreed the Americans have the right idea when it comes to beer with the twist off caps - why don't we have it back home?! Anyway it's been nice to have a bit of relax this afternoon after the relatively short drive today.

We've discussed tomorrows plans as Roswell in this state but as we're staying in Santa Fe tomorrow evening we've decided against heading south to have to head right back up north which would have been almost 400 miles overall so instead we've decided to go to Las Vegas (not the Las Vegas that comes later on!) then head on to the hotel in Santa Fe which has really good reviews and a hot tub outside as we're going to have a dawn start the day after tomorrow.

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