Rain Rain Go Away

Being washed out.  

Talk about being a walking rain magnet. It rained on and off all day—mostly on.

Every single time I stepped out of the car, the heavens opened. Like clockwork, the rain stopped as soon as I got back inside. Not even the tiniest sliver of sunshine dared to make an appearance. It was one long, grey, soggy day.

The silver lining? I haven’t reached the good stuff on Route 66 yet—the part I’m most excited about, starting west of Springfield, MO. But here’s the kicker: the weather isn’t set to improve until Thursday. If tomorrow (Wednesday) ends up as wet and miserable as today, I’m staying put. No point trudging forward when I can’t enjoy it.

One cool moment, though: rolling into Litchfield, IL, I spotted two different Route 66 signs. Turns out, the famous road split into two routes in some places. Apparently, about a decade after the original road was built, the traffic gods decided it couldn’t handle the load. My guess? The newer route was a bypass to let drivers zip past towns instead of crawling through them at a snail’s pace.

In Litchfield Route 66 becomes two

Once was considered 1st class

The coffee has long since gone cold

Some things have been preserved

The trip from Springfield, IL, to Springfield, MO, was smooth sailing—until I hit the chaos that is the St. Louis highway system. Navigating the outer corridors of St. Louis felt like trying to untangle a plate of spaghetti while blindfolded. The road signs? Absolutely no help. To a tourist, they might as well have been written in hieroglyphics.

Twice I made the rookie mistake of doubting my GPS and instead tried to rely on the trusty old CAA Trip-Tic maps. Spoiler alert: not my brightest moment. Both times, I ended up on the wrong interstate. At one point, I half-expected to see a sign saying, “Nice try, but wrong again!”

Finally, I admitted defeat, chucked the map aside, and put all my faith in the GPS. It might not be perfect, but at least it knows how to speak fluent St. Louis highway. Eventually, I made it through, but not without a few new gray hairs.

Which lane to take

 

Having made it through the outer chaos of the highway system, things finally started to make sense—thanks to the magical appearance of lane numbers painted directly on the road. Genius, right? Of course, this enlightenment came after facing five lanes, all labeled with the same route numbers on overhead signs. Because, apparently, whoever designed this system wanted to play a game of "Guess the Correct Lane." Spoiler: some of those lanes merge later, but for a first-time driver, it's like navigating a maze blindfolded.

Anyway, we’ve officially landed in Springfield, Missouri—confused but alive!

More to come…