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canyon before dropping you in Kingman, your destination for the night. Founded in the heady 1880s railway days, Kingman is a quiet place today. Check out the former Methodist church at 5th and Spring St where Clark Gable and Carole Lombard tied the knot. Or learn about hometown hero Andy Devine, who had his Hollywood breakthrough as the perpetually befuddled driver of the eponymous Stagecoach in John Ford’s Oscar-winning 1939 movie. At the western end of Kingman, in a 1907 powerhouse, is the Route 66 Museum, with a charmingly put-together collection of memorabilia. Admission here also gets you into the Mohave Museum of History & Arts, a warren of rooms filled with extraordinarily eclectic stuff. It’s old-fashioned, sure, but heck, they’re making the most of meager funds, so give ’em a break. Kids get to clamber around a 1923 wooden caboose, while grown-ups may well be enthralled by the documentary on Route 66. The Hotel Brunswick delivers a winning cocktail of historic grandeur, modern amenities and upbeat young owners, Jen and Jason. The hotel dates to 1909 and is supposedly haunted. Have dinner at Mr D’z Route 66 Diner. Order a cheeseburger with onion rings and a root-beer float. If you’re craving over-easy eggs and toast before bed, breakfast is served all day.

The hills surrounding the town of Chloride, situated some 20 miles northwest of Kingman, once spewed forth tons of silver, gold, copper and turquoise from as many as 75 mines. These days, this peaceful semi-ghost town is inhabited by quirky locals who create bizarre junk sculptures and proudly display them outside their ramshackle homes. You can post a letter in Arizona’s oldest continually operating post office – it’s been around since 1862 – or snap a picture of yourself behind bars at the crumbling jail. Up in the hills, reached via a super-rough 1.5-mile dirt road, are Roy Purcell’s psychedelic rock murals. If you don’t have a 4WD, hike up or risk a busted axle. Two gun-fighting troupes stage rip-roaring shoot’em-ups each Saturday at high noon. When the sun goes down and the stars come out, you’ll feel the true Wild West spirit. Spend a night under the velvet sky, at Bonnie and John’s simple place, Sheps Miners Inn & Yesterday’s. It offers plain, but cozy, adobe-walled rooms with squeaking mattresses behind the onsite restaurant and Western saloon. Even if you don’t stay the night, Yesterday’s is worth a visit for hearty American grub, international beers and toe-tapping live music nightly in a creaky wooden floor, vintage gas pumps and hand-painted mural environment. It’s Route 66 at its bohemian Wild West best.

From Chloride backtrack to Kingman. Here the Mother Road arcs northeast away from I-40 for 115 miles of old-school Route 66 motoring. Teensy Hackberry is one of the few still kicking settlements on this segment of the Mother Road’s original alignment. History comes alive inside an eccentrically remodeled gas station housing the Old Route 66 Visitor Center. The life’s work of highway memorialist Robert Waldmire, the building started as a general store in 1934, and is a great place to stop for an ice-cold Coke and Mother Road memorabilia. Check out the vintage petrol pumps, cars faded by decades of hot desert light, old toilet seats and rusted-out ironwork adorning this quirky roadside attraction. After a drive through a few more blink-and-miss-them towns, you arrive in the Hualapai Reservation tribal capital, Peach Springs. Nine miles after passing tiny Peach Springs, look for a plaster dinosaur welcoming you to the Grand Canyon Caverns & Inn, a cool subterranean retreat from the summer heat. An elevator drops 210ft underground to artificially lit limestone caverns and the skeletal remains of a prehistoric ground sloth.

Slice through rolling hills for 23 miles to Seligman, a town that takes its Route 66 heritage seriously – you can still grab a burger at a mom-and-pop shop or refuel at a full-service gas station. This is thanks to the Delgadillo brothers, who for decades have been the Mother Road’s biggest boosters. Juan sadly passed