#RSRSeesTheUSA Day 24: Amboy, CA
Part of adventuring is attentiveness to what new circumstances can put into your path.
Today, I set out to drive along old Route 66 to Amboy, California (aka the town that was once for sale on ebay).
I love a ghost town. I love places that are still extant but clearly decayed from their glory days. I love the sense of mystery and layered stories these places exude. I love the aura that floats thick in the air of unknown people whose lives were lived there and unknown occasions the places have seen. It’s like all the good parts of nostalgia (the missing and the past gone by that’ll never be returned and the evocative lure of memory) without the bad (the oversimplification and the writing out inconvenient parts of the story and the backwards-looking attitude without an eye for the benefits of change).
So, yes, Amboy was right up my alley, and I made it a point to get out there before leaving the desert behind for the big city (I’ll be in LA for the next week or so).
And it did not disappoint.
All of this is completely shut, except for the gas station (where premium unleaded gas was $7.99 per gallon!) and the “cafe” which is a snack and souvenir shop (you bet I bought the t-shirt).
The whole place is now privately owned by Albert Okura, who owns the Juan Pollo restaurant chain. This all seems somehow fittingly USAmerican: a third-generation immigrant grows up to work in and eventually found and own fast food chains. He buys a landmark of classic 1950s Americana from the heyday of the fabled Route 66 and plans to fix it up and make it a tourist attraction.
I swear, this was a total highlight of my trip so far, despite all the geologic and landscape gorgeousness and museum explorations I’ve also done.
Give me somewhere mysterious and broken down, especially somewhere I can poke around and explore on my own (you know I went into all those motel cottages), and you’ve got me for life.
Now, about that attentiveness to new experiences part I opened with.
While I was in Amboy, I chatted with the man running the store and the local Pacific Gas & Electric employee who’d stopped for a chat. They were a font of recommendations for things I may yet do on my trip, and also a couple other hyper local Amboy sights to see. So before I left my new ghost town best friend, I drove a little way down Route 66 to see “Mad Mike Hughes”’ mobile home. Mike was a rocket afficionado and flat-Earther who died in 2020 on his last steam powered rocket launch. What was his mobile home is still parked in the desert and has been decorated by a whole variety of folks. Thanks to the PG&E guy, this was a fascinating addition to my Amboy exploring.
Now you think I’m done with Amboy, right?
WRONG!
Also inexplicably discovered were two roadside guardians: a Chinese guardian lion and a shiny gold Buddha, each generously bestowed with offerings. Why are they there? I have no idea. Was it worth pulling off the road yet again in tiny, abandoned Amboy and looking at them while the long freight trains slid by in the distance? You know it was.
The day held other adventures (ask me sometime about the 53’ truck that got stuck in the roadside sand pulling over to see if I needed help when I was stretching and taking flower pics, and how it led to me meeting Emma and Daniel and eventually helping them get a tow truck and Venmo’ing them part of the cost of it), but Amboy was a real sweet spot for me of so many things that I love, so Imma leave it there.
