Where in the world...

. . . did all these people come from?

At Afton Station today, they came from Perth (Australia), Copenhagen (Denmark), Mallorca (Spain), Madrid (Spain), and Zurich (Switzerland). It was definitely an international day here in Afton. Of course, we also had domestic-variety tourists, from W. Paducah KY, Vinita OK, Joplin MO, and Chesterfield MI.

All of the foreign visitors were westbound, having rented cars in Chicago and intending to finish their trips in Santa Monica. A few were taking side trips. The folks from Zurich had already visited NYC and New Orleans. A particularly interesting couple were those from Chesterfield, Michigan (north of Detroit) who were on a motorcycle and are rather seriously looking for a place on Route 66 to relocate and open a tourist stop of one kind or another. You'd better believe that Tattoo Man (who was there for the morning) and I did our best job of salesmanship to try to get them intrigued with owning the building across the street from the Station. Here they are, with their future building (I wish!) in the background:

Visitors from Joplin, MO had similar ideas. They already own property and a building on the KS-MO border, directly on the old alignment of Route 66, and they're interested in turning it into some sort of tourist-friendly stop, perhaps a souvenir store. If all these people really get going on realizing their dreams, the Mother Road will one day be infused with even more vitality and fun.

David came in and found some pieces of bricks that were apparently thrown at the Station overnight. Obviously, this is very disturbing despite the fact that the hurlers didn't manage to break anything. This is the first sign of vandalism we've seen in all of our years in Afton, and it just makes me sad. David also reported on the "Discover Oklahoma" TV folks who came back to the Station yesterday to film exterior views and the show intro, which they have decided to do from there. I was so sorry I couldn't be there. For Tulsa folks, the show will be aired Sept. 5 (Sat.) at 6:30 p.m. on Ch. 6. I'm not sure of the Oklahoma City area channel that airs "Discover Oklahoma".

And now for a couple of pics I took this morning. This is the Will Rogers Rodeo Grounds fence in Vinita. The rodeo is coming!

Once again, I photographed my breakfast (sigh....), this time at the wonderful Clanton's in Vinita.

Here's a very old sign behind Clanton's.