Route 66: from Chicago to Santa Monica, America's legendary road

Route 66 linked Chicago to Santa Monica, over 3,940 km and across eight states. It has not officially existed since 1985, but long sections can still be driven, among old motels, period petrol stations and villages that live off its legend. There’s no need to do the whole thing: a few hours on a good section are enough to get the feel of it.

History and origins

Route 66 was created on 11 November 1926. It was one of the country’s first major numbered federal highways. It crosses Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

In the 1930s, during the Great Depression, thousands of families ruined by the dust storms of the Dust Bowl took it to flee to California. John Steinbeck told the story of that exodus in The Grapes of Wrath (1939) and gave the road its nickname: the Mother Road.

Its golden age came after the war. In the 1950s and 1960s, Americans went on holiday by car, and the road filled up with motels with colourful neon signs, diners and petrol stations. A television series, Route 66 🎬, finished turning it into a legend.

The decline began in 1956, when President Eisenhower launched the Interstate Highway System. Wider and faster, the interstates bypassed the towns of Route 66 one by one, and they lost their customers overnight. The road was decommissioned in 1985. Two years later, a preservation movement that started in Arizona brought it back to life under the name “Historic Route 66”.

The highlights, from east to west

• Illinois: the official start in Chicago, with its “Begin” sign on Adams Street, then the Gemini Giant in Wilmington, a giant statue of an astronaut.
• Missouri: St. Louis and its Gateway Arch, then the Meramec Caverns, long advertised by signs painted on barns.
• Kansas: the shortest stretch of the whole road, about twenty kilometres around Galena.
• Oklahoma: Tulsa and its Art Deco buildings, the Blue Whale of Catoosa, built in 1972 by a local man for his wedding anniversary, then Oklahoma City.
• Texas: Amarillo and Cadillac Ranch, ten Cadillacs planted in the ground that visitors spray-paint over. Close by, the Big Texan Steak Ranch gives its 2 kg steak free to anyone who finishes it in an hour.
• New Mexico: Tucumcari and its neon motels, Albuquerque and the signs of Central Avenue. Santa Fe is on the original alignment, abandoned as early as 1937.
• Arizona 📷An "Arizona Historic Route 66" sign at the roadside: Petrified Forest, Holbrook and its Wigwam Motel, Winslow, Meteor Crater, then Williams, the gateway to the Grand Canyon. From Ash Fork to the Colorado River, 254 km of original road run without a break: it’s the longest continuous stretch still intact.
• Seligman 📷The big Route 66 sign in Seligman, with Lightning McQueen and Mater: the village where the preservation of the road began, with its Western-style fronts and old cars.
• Oatman 📷An old bar in Oatman, on Route 66: a former mining town in the mountains, where wild burros wander along the main street. You get there on a narrow, winding road.
• California: the crossing of the Mojave Desert, Roy’s Motel & Café in Amboy, San Bernardino, then the pier at Santa Monica 📷The "Santa Monica 66, End of the Trail" sign on the pier and its “End of the Trail” sign.

Stories and good to know

• The road’s revival owes a great deal to a barber in Seligman, Angel Delgadillo. In 1987, as his village had been emptying since Interstate 40 opened, he launched the campaign that won recognition for “Historic Route 66”. He turned 99 in 2026, and his barber shop, now a souvenir shop, can still be visited.
• Route 66 celebrated its 100th birthday in 2026, with events in all eight states throughout the year.
• The official end of the road was never on the Santa Monica Pier. From 1936 to 1964 it was at a junction a few streets away, at Lincoln Boulevard and Olympic Boulevard. The sign on the pier is symbolic, and it’s the one everybody photographs.
• Several vintage motels still take in travellers: the Wigwam Motel, where you sleep in a concrete tepee, or the Blue Swallow in Tucumcari.
• In San Bernardino, on the route itself, a small free museum stands on the site of the very first McDonald’s, opened in 1940.

Practical information for your road trip

• Doing part of it: that’s what most travellers do. The Arizona section, from Williams to Oatman via Seligman and Kingman, slips easily between Joshua Tree and the Grand Canyon.
• Direction of travel: tradition has it that you drive it from east to west, from Chicago to Santa Monica, but both directions are equally good.
• Navigation: be aware that the road is not continuous everywhere. To follow the historic alignment, get a guidebook or an app devoted to Route 66.
• Closed sections: not all of the original road still exists. Some portions are abandoned or buried under the interstate. In 2026, in the Mojave Desert, the section between Amboy and Essex is closed for bridge replacement.
• To Oatman: the road over Sitgreaves Pass is closed to vehicles over 12 metres long, and not recommended for large motorhomes.
• Vehicle: no special vehicle is needed; an ordinary rental car is enough.
• Where to stay: in a vintage motel, if you can. There’s no shortage of convenient stops: Williams, Seligman and Kingman in Arizona, Holbrook for the Wigwam Motel, Tucumcari and Albuquerque in New Mexico, Amarillo in Texas.

Our experience on Route 66

We didn’t drive the whole road, but we followed several pieces of it during our road trip 1, in May and June 2024, between Joshua Tree and the Grand Canyon, then on arriving in Santa Monica:

⏳ Our day-by-day journals are coming soon.