As the chorus of the 1988 Prefab Sprout song King of Rock n Roll said “hot dog, jumping frog, Albuquerque”, I was wondering as we drove into Albuquerque whether the chorus had any relevance or was just poetic licence. Time would tell.
It was Memorial weekend when we arrived in Albuquerque and the receptionist at the historic El Vado Motel told us that most restaurants and shops would be closed including those that were part of the motel. This seemed rather strange by current day standards as businesses normally take advantage of the extra available consumers to make money on public holidays. Not in Albuquerque where we only found one pizza restaurant open that day. The El Vado Motel is situated on the historic Route 66, opened in 1937 and was one of New Mexico’s first motels to greet Route 66 travellers. Although updated, the buildings still have that retro feel.
The next day dawned and, as Albuquerque is not a walking city like Santa Fe, after some research we decided to take their equivalent of the Big Bus tour. This tour goes around the three principle areas of the city being the old town, downtown and Nob Hill.
The old town is the principle area where tourists congregate as it is a mixture of shops and restaurants with a few strategically placed local First Nations people selling their knick knacks. It has a plaza at its centre and is a nice area particularly when the sun is shining as it does for 300 plus days a year in Albuquerque. Being in the desert, Albuquerque cools down over night and can be chilly in the morning, but at this time of year gets up to 31 degrees Centigrade by the time the sun starts setting in the evening. Our tour bus guide pointed out the new developments around the old town, many of which were still feeling the effects of the Covid lockdown, and the museums that were in the area. We decided to visit one of the museums later that day being the Rattlesnake Museum and would have looked in at America’s only nuclear museum if it hadn’t been 12 miles out of town. One of New Mexico’s claims to fame is that the scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project to produce the atomic bombs dropped on Japan in WW2, Little Boy and Fat Man, did so in the state at Los Alamos and Albuquerque.
The Rattlesnake Museum was very interesting and opened our eyes to how many different types of rattlesnakes there are and just how poisonous some of them can be.
Between the old town and downtown was an area called ‘country club’ (see photos below) where there were some very nice houses. This area if often used by film companies for big budget productions and many film stars have lived in, or stayed, during filming in the area. One of the claims to fame was the Breaking Bad series which was filmed in the area and around locations in Albuquerque.
The downtown area was less interesting and seemed to be only populated by homeless people, as very few people were walking on the streets. One interesting thing about downtown Albuquerque is that it has the only crossroads where Route 66 crosses itself.
How could this be you ask? It seems to stem from a political controversy in the 1920s between politicians in Albuquerque and Santa Fe. There was an attempt in 1927 to move Route 66 out of Santa Fe which had to do with the gubernatorial election held in 1927. Then Governor Arthur T Hannett lost his bid for re-election and he directly blamed the Republican politicians in Santa Fe for his defeat. In one of his last acts in office, before the new governor would be sworn in on January 1st, Hannett ordered construction to begin immediately on a bypass taking Route 66 to Albuquerque by bypassing Santa Fe altogether. That bypass cut circa 100 miles off the original route via Santa Fe and cut all the business that Santa Fe gained from the Route 66 traffic. So the crossroads in Albuquerque are where the old route via Santa Fe and new route now meet in Albuquerque.
Nob Hill was more interesting and, we understand the area is named after its namesake in San Francisco. We were shown some very strange houses built by architect, Bart Prince. Make up your own mind as to whether you would like one next door to you.
We also visited the Aquarium and Botanical Gardens which were opposite the El Vado Motel and both were interesting although not really Route 66 related.
Next we go to Monument Valley at the heart of the Navajo Nation which is a 6 hour journey and a divergence from Route 66.
Copyright: Words and photos John Cruse 2022