Climbing up to Williams

We completed our first leg to Williams without any real concerns, and other than the stop and go through Havasu City we had one planned stop at a rest area in Yucca.  You would think when a city has a main highway running through town they would synchronize lights so when you hit the first one green the rest stay green if you do the speed limit.  Other than approaching lights that were already red, we ended up with a number of “don’t turn yellow, don’t turn yellow, don’t turn yellow” events.

The Haviland Rest Area in Yucca is right next to another proving ground; this one operated by Chrysler.  So that is the second proving ground that operates, or used to operate in Arizona that we have come across.  I say used to as the google entry for it says ‘May be closed’.  I could not get any pictures as we drove by, but there are a number of old hotels and business fronts that are all run down and half torn down so not sure what that is about.

The Long Climb To Williams

Quartzsite is at an elevation of 879 feet above sea level and when you travel north from there you can see the road steadily descending as it works its way north.  By the time you get to Parker you are down to 325 above sea level and right next to the Colorado River.  From Parker it is a steady rise in elevation until Williams.  Williams is only a few miles West of the first peak we will need to cross on the way back.  Williams is at 6,800 feet and the peak just to our East is 7,162.  There are ups and downs throughout the leg to Williams but overall the elevation change is 6,000 feet from Quartzsite.  When we leave here later in the week we will go up and down a few more times as we pass over three peaks between here and Amarillo.  The first is the one just east of here, the second and highest is near Gallup, New Mexico at 7,192 feet and the last is just East of Albuquerque at 7,024.  After that it is all downhill baby. 

One of the things we noticed as we travelled along was the subtle change in scenery from desert to small coniferous trees to large Ponderosa pine.  It is desert scrub until Kingman and then a few miles East of there the landscape changes to more small pines and even some grassland.  By the time we approached Williams it was almost like being back in Ontario with large expanses of pine forests climbing up the peaks.  At the higher elevations they slowly recede to smaller trees near the peak.  The highest peaks are snow covered with what looks like a few inches of snow and we have been told this year is unseasonably warm as last year in February there was standing snow in town.

Williams is on the route of the original Route 66, and was one of the last big towns to be bypassed when they put in I-40.  If it were not for their marketing efforts as the Gateway to the Grand Canyon a number of local people we met said the town would be dead.  In fact there are two large RV parks right in town, and eight large chain hotels.  From what we can see the parking lots look about half full for each so I think the town is certainly on the map as a destination for the Grand Canyon.

As I mentioned in my earlier post we wanted to stop here to see the Canyon and take the train up and back.  I will make a separate post about that trip, but we found it very worthwhile doing it that way as we could relax and enjoy the scenery.  We met a number of people from various parts of the US, but it seems by far the majority of people on the train were from Phoenix, Tucson and various places in California.

Downtown Williams is essentially one street which is the original highway through town, and is very vibrant with all kinds of Route 66 diners and bars and museums.  We will be spending time there in the next few days.

On the short drive from I-40 into town we passed by a large cemetery, so made a point of going to see what it was all about.  It is quite surreal as the cemetery is literally in the middle of a large pine forest.  These are big trees and it is obvious they carved the cemetery out of the forest, rather than planting trees.  It reminded us of a cemetery in Brunswick, Georgia that was under the canopy of those large trees with Spanish moss hanging down.  There were a lot of people visiting and tending to their loved ones sites so it is obviously well cared for.  Very peaceful and quiet.  We did not see any names that were familiar to us at all.

Thanks for reading.