Trip Peek #53
Trip #96
Hail, Hail Rock ‘n’ Roll

Posted on March 19, 2017 by Denny

This picture is from my 2011 Hail, Hail Rock ‘n’ Roll trip. As you probably suspected, its selection is not at all random. In anticipation of an approaching trip, I had just finished scheduling this blog’s next few posts when I learned of Chuck Berry’s death. I immediately thought of the only time I had seem him and, with the scheduling of posts fresh in my mind, of posting a “Trip Peek” of that 2011 trip. Even as I began to do it, I was unsure about whether or not breaking with the random selection of “Trip Peeks” is proper. I did it once before when I picked a Christmas related “Trip Peek” to appear during a Christmas road trip. If I can break the sequence for a Christian holiday, I can sure as hell do it for Rock ‘n’ Roll.

Berry was doing one show a month in 2011 and I had secured a ticket to the May 25 event. As the date neared, my father, two years Berry’s senior, was hospitalized and it seemed likely that the trip would not occur. But Dad’s condition improved a few days before the show and I went ahead with my plans. The idea was to spend two or maybe three nights on the road with some time on Route 66 in Saint Louis on the way to the show and some time on the National Road as I returned. The first day went pretty much as planned culminating in an extremely satisfying concert in the Duck Room at Blueberry Hill. Somewhat to my surprise, Berry was on stage for the entire show and performed almost all of his familiar hits. The featured photo was taken near the end of the concert when Berry invited adoring ladies from the audience to join him on stage.

Dad’s health took a turn for the worse during the night and I headed directly home in the morning. He died one week later.

Trip Peeks are short articles published when my world is too busy or too boring for a current events piece to be completed in time for the Sunday posting. In addition to a photo thumbnail from a completed road trip, each Peek includes a brief description of that photo plus links to the full sized photo and the associated trip journal.

Trip Peek #52
Trip #43
The National Road at 200

Posted on March 12, 2017 by Denny

This picture is from my 2006 The National Road at 200 trip. In 1806 Thomas Jefferson signed legislation authorizing the first piece of what became known as the National Road. My personal celebration of the 200th anniversary of that event consisted of driving the Historic National Road Byway from Baltimore to Saint Louis. Preceding that was a two day drive from home to Washington, DC, and the celebration of the USA’s 230th birthday in the nation’s capital. The Historic National Road Byway is something of an expanded version of the National Road as was, in some sense, the National Old Trails Road. When named auto trails were replaced by numbered highways, the NOTR was commemorated with a Madonna of the Trail statue in each of the twelve states it passed through. Maryland’s Madonna was erected in Bethesda on a spur of the NOTR. When I stopped to visit it on the way to DC, I was shocked to find it absent. A water line break had undermined the statue and threatened to topple it. It had been moved for safety and to allow repairs. After continuing on to DC, I learned where the Madonna was stored and drove to see her early on the Fourth of July. The statue and base had been disassembled and the Madonna was standing directly on the ground so that I could get a photo standing next to her. It’s a picture that will forever be one of my favorites.

Trip Peek #51
Trip #18
Big E, DC, and the Cardinal

Posted on February 26, 2017 by Denny

This picture is from my 2004 Big E, DC, and the Cardinal trip. The trip appears in my top ten “Decent” list and it certainly deserves to be there. The Big E in the title is the USS Enterprise, the world’s first nuclear powered aircraft carrier. My youngest son was serving aboard the huge carrier at the time and I was privileged to be part of a three day Tiger Cruise as she moved from Florida to her home port at Newport News, Virginia. With no military experience of my own, those few days sleeping and eating with my son’s crew mates was quite educational even though it was a spruced-up danger-free family-style version of life at sea. All airplanes were removed from the carrier before we civilians came on board but a few returned to provide landing and take-off demonstrations. The photo shows a S-3B Viking being launched.

After a couple of days in Newport News with my son and his family, I took a train to Washington, DC, and checked out a few museums and monuments. The Amtrak train that runs between Chicago and New York City is named the Cardinal. It provides Cincinnati’s only passenger rail connection and it carried me home at the end of the trip.

Trip Peek #50
Trip #28
Wigwams and Dixie

Posted on February 5, 2017 by Denny

This picture is from my 2007 Wiqwams and Dixie trip. The trip was the result of a discussion in the then quite active American Road Magazine e-group and included folks from Missouri, Tennessee, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. Using Cave City’s Wigwam Village #2 as home base, we traveled sections of both the Dixie Highway and the Jackson Highway in Kentucky. The picture shows the shiny nose of Pat Bremer’s Corvair coupe peeking from behind a not so shiny sign.

Trip Peek #49
Trip #126
Stone Pony Picnic

Posted on January 22, 2017 by Denny

This picture is from my 2015 Stone Pony Picnic outing to see Willie Nile in Asbury Park, New Jersey. The trip name comes from the fact that the performance took place at the legendary Stone Pony and the picture at right proves it. Although this was the fifth time I’d seen Willie, it was the first time I’d seen him with all members of his current band in place. Killer! The Nile show was on the second night of the six day trip and I bracketed it with a stop near Philadelphia to see a guitarist I’ve been listening to for years and a return to the Stony Pony for a tribute to the man who is responsible for a whole lot of its legend. So that took care of half of the trip and I filled out the remainder with a gay pride parade, a stop on E Street, a visit to a pretzel factory, and nitro powered beverages at a pair of breweries just 140 miles apart on the same “street” (US-50).

Trip Peek #48 Trip #117 Wonderland Way

Posted on January 8, 2017 by Denny

This picture is from my 2014 Wonderland Way trip. It was springtime, I had a new-to-me convertible, and I has just learned of a named auto trail that began nearby. From downtown Cincinnati I headed west along the river into Indiana. The first of two nights on the road was spent in Corydon, Indiana’s original capital, where I got to watch the arrival of the Run to the Wall motorcycle caravan. The second day brought more river scenery and a stop at the prehistoric Angles Mounds. My route home from the Wonderland Way’s western end in Mount Vernon, Illinois, was mostly expressway but l still got in a little sight seeing. The featured photo is of Wilson’s General Store & Cafe, outside of Evansville, Indiana, where I had dinner on the second night.

Trip Peek #47
Trip #15
Hot Rods and Lincoln

Posted on December 11, 2016 by Denny

This picture is from my 2003 Springfield Route 66 Festival trip. The name “Hot Rods & Lincoln” was used for the trip in a few places. It was just my fifteenth trip to be documented on the web and many conventions (like consistent names) had yet to appear. The festival was my first contact with what I now think of as the “Route 66 community” despite the fact that I had already driven Route 66 end-to-end twice. Of course, the community had already existed for many years but it took the internet for it to spread beyond the route’s physical reach. It was a three day trip with the first day spent reaching and crossing the Chain of Rocks Bridge then moving on to the festival. The second day was spent at the festival meeting a lot of people and looking at a lot of cars. I saw the pictured Rat-Mobile several times as it cruised the streets. I drove home on the third day and caught a few more interesting sights along the way.

Trip Peek #46
Trip #55
2007 Illinois 66 Festival

Posted on November 20, 2016 by Denny

This picture is from my 2007 Illinois 66 Festival trip. Day one of the four day outing was spent crossing the Chain of Rocks bridge, cruising to Springfield, Illinois, on Historic Route 66, and taking part in the festival’s huge cruise-in. There were more festival activities, including a downtown car show, on the second day and the third and fourth days were spent traveling home. I had recently developed an interest in the Pikes Peak Ocean to Ocean Highway and followed portions of that historic named auto trail as I returned to Ohio. The featured photo was taken on the last day of the trip as I followed the PP-OO through Hillgrove, Ohio, where I lived as a child, and past the town pump that I remember faintly.

Trip Peek #45
Trip #112
American Songline in Hayesville

Posted on October 30, 2016 by Denny

This picture is from my 2013 American Songline in Hayesville trip. During the Lincoln Highway’s centennial, singer Cece Otto performed a series of concerts along the highway including one at the historic opera house in Hayseville, Ohio. I centered a three day trip around the concert by preceding it with a Carey Murdock concert in Van Wert, Ohio, and following it with a visit to the Columbus Zoo. Cece documented her centennial concerts with a 2015 book which I reviewed here.

Trip Peek #44
Trip #22
Tulsa 66 Festival

Posted on October 9, 2016 by Denny

This picture is from my 2004 Tulsa 66 Festival trip. After attending my first Route 66 Festival in 2003, I was ready for another. This time I managed to get registered for both the awards banquet and the e-group breakfast. I took expressways to St. Louis then followed Historic 66 to Tulsa. This being my second festival, I now knew some of the participants but hardly all. I met several new people in Tulsa but the two new meetings I remember the most occurred on the way. In Joplin, I met Swa Frantzen whose online turn-by-turn directions I had followed over the entire length of Sixty-Six in 2003 and, in Lebanon, I met Glen Wrinkle, the owner of Wrink’s Food Market. I have met Swa several times since then but that was the only time I would meet Glen. He died less than a year later on March 16, 2005. The sign in the picture came down just days after I photographed it. The building on which it had been sitting since the 1930s was being demolished and the sign was removed for safekeeping. In May of 2009 it was relit atop a purpose built brick structure less than a mile away and still on Route 66.

Denny G's Road Trips Blog

A DennyGibson.com accessory

Category Archives: Trip Peek