Bicycling Guide to Route 66 by Bob Robinson (Spirits Creek paperback), 198 pages, $19.95
What makes Bob Robinson think anyone is going to pedal across the country on U.S. 66, the "Mother Road" of 20th-century American automobile culture?
Because people are already doing that. This book is a text companion to a series of six maps for a bicycle version of Route 66 that the Adventure Cycling Association sells to bicycle tourists.
Bicycle tourists aren't a real thing.
Yes, they are. Arkansas is home to some, and it is competing to attract more, witness the tourist-attracting bicycle infrastructure being built here: Arkansas River Trail, Big Dam Bridge, Razorback Greenway, Clinton Presidential Park Bridge, Lake Ouachita Vista Trail, Delta Heritage Trail, Slaughter Pen, Rogers Bike Park, the Harahan Bridge renovation ...
But back to this book. As he did for his Bicycling Guide to the Mississippi River Trail, Bob Robinson has pedaled the whole 2,425-mile shebang and taken copious notes and some photos.
He breaks the route into day-trip legs ranging from 37 to 117 miles, with most in the 80-mile range. He devotes one chapter to each leg and describes pedaling conditions such as terrain and traffic, places to sleep, where to get water and buy food, turn-by-turn directions, mileage, a rough map. He sees the sites and reports what they're like, and also he relates a bit of history here and there.
Opened in 1926, the highway passes through eight states. During automobile tourism's Golden Age, ingenious entrepreneurs turned Route 66 into one very long carnival of roadside attractions, the remains of which create umpteen opportunities to climb off the saddle, peer at a ruin, take pictures, think about mortality or chat up locals.
How up-to-date is his advice likely to be?
Many of the western legs pass through scantily populated desert, where nothing has changed for decades. But others are populated, so readers will also want to consult the website he's using to collect and report updates as well as Adventure Cycling's website updates.
For instance, chosen at random, take his descriptions for a 117-mile day trip from Tucumcari, N.M., to Romeroville, N.M. Knowing that the mapped route uses frontage roads that start and end with cattle guards will be helpful, considering the width of the typical road-touring bike's tires.
Also, he reports, "There is a convenience store when you leave I-40 at the 321 exit; however on my most recent trip through here, it had burned down. I don't know if they will rebuild. Please email me if they rebuild and I will post it on the updates section of my website."
Which direction does his narration travel?
He goes east to west, from Chicago's Grant Park to the Santa Monica pier in Los Angeles but his mileage logs can be read the other way, too.
Is Arkansas on the route?
No.
Why review a book about a bicycle tourist attraction that's not in Arkansas? Because Oklahoma is right next door and Route 66 goes through that state. Because Robinson lives in Fort Smith. He also writes the occasional freelance article for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
ActiveStyle on 04/11/2016