98 Fun Facts About Road Trips

Which 1939 novel popularised 'the Mother Road' as a nickname for Route 66?

The Grapes of Wrath was publicly banned and burned when it came out, including in the California county where its migrant family ends up.

What 1969 film follows Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper as bikers on a cross-country road trip?

Easy Rider cost little and earned a fortune, which showed the big studios that cheap films by unconventional young directors could pay.

Which president signed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, launching the freeway network that bears his name?

Dwight D. Eisenhower signed it quietly in hospital, with no ceremony, while being treated for an intestinal illness.

What is the surname of the family in the National Lampoon vacation movies?

Griswold family trips began in John Hughes's magazine story 'Vacation '58', where the drive ended at Disneyland, which the film changed to Walley World.

Which Amarillo, Texas art installation, created by the group Ant Farm in 1974, has ten cars buried nose-first beside Interstate 40?

Cadillac Ranch encourages visitors to spray-paint its cars, so a fresh coat rarely survives a day before someone paints over it.

Which 1957 Jack Kerouac book was first typed on a scroll roughly 120 feet long?

On the Road's original scroll used his friends' real names, such as Neal Cassady, which the published novel swapped for characters like Dean Moriarty.

Which travel-trailer brand did NASA convert into a quarantine unit for the returning Apollo 11 astronauts?

Airstream's converted trailer was kept at lower air pressure than outside, so any lunar germs Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins carried could not escape.

Which South Dakota roadside attraction is famous for its hundreds of billboards?

Wall Drug struggled until Dorothy Hustead suggested a roadside sign offering free ice water, and thirsty travellers soon came pouring in.

Which state officially named its Route 375, the road past Area 51, the Extraterrestrial Highway?

Nevada unveiled the name at a 1996 ceremony with Independence Day stars Jeff Goldblum and Bill Pullman, as 20th Century Fox promoted the film.

The Blue Ridge Parkway connects which two national parks?

The Blue Ridge Parkway's 469 miles link Shenandoah National Park in Virginia to Great Smoky Mountains National Park on the North Carolina–Tennessee line; construction began in 1935.

Which 1991 Ridley Scott road movie ends with its two fugitive heroines driving off a canyon cliff?

Thelma & Louise's Grand Canyon finale was actually shot in Utah near Moab, as Ridley Scott filmed the Arkansas-to-Arizona story in California and Utah.

Which Canadian prime minister officially opened the Trans-Canada Highway at Rogers Pass in 1962?

John Diefenbaker opened it at a pass so prone to avalanches that snowsheds shield the road and crews set off slides on purpose to keep it clear.

Which Interstate, running from Seattle to Boston, is the longest in the United States?

I-90's last traffic light hung in Wallace, Idaho, until a 1991 viaduct carried the highway past the town, and officials there held a funeral for it.

Which Australian coastal drive was built by returned First World War soldiers as a war memorial?

Great Ocean Road crews cut it largely by hand along a coast whose towns had until then been reached mainly by sea or rough track.

Which Steppenwolf song, written by Mars Bonfire, became a biker anthem?

Born to Be Wild grew partly out of the freedom Mars Bonfire felt driving around in his secondhand Ford Falcon.

Which brand's rhyming jingles were spread across a series of small roadside signs?

Burma-Shave signs grew harder to read as driving speeds rose, and they were taken down after Philip Morris bought the company in 1963.

The Darién Gap breaks the Alaska-to-Argentina road in which Central American country?

The Darién Gap, some 60 miles of roadless rainforest between Panama and Colombia, is the only break in the roughly 19,000-mile road from Alaska to Argentina.

Which Los Angeles-area landmark carries the sign marking Route 66's western End of the Trail?

Santa Monica Pier marks only a symbolic finish, since Route 66 officially ended a little inland, at the corner of Lincoln and Olympic boulevards.

Which brand introduced the Wagoneer in 1962 to replace its postwar station wagon?

Jeep's old Station Wagon was facing newer truck-based 4x4 rivals, so Willys had designer Brooks Stevens create the Wagoneer as its replacement.

In Forrest Gump, the hero ends his cross-country run on a highway through which landscape?

Monument Valley's stretch of U.S. Route 163 near Utah mile marker 13 draws fans who re-create the moment Forrest finally stops running.

Which German band had a 1975 international hit with 'Autobahn', a song celebrating motorway driving?

Kraftwerk's German refrain about driving was widely misheard by English speakers as 'fun, fun, fun', a Beach Boys homage the band denied intending.

Which 1988 film has Tom Cruise driving his newly discovered older brother from Cincinnati to Los Angeles?

Rain Man's airport scene, where Raymond refuses to fly, was cut from in-flight screenings by at least 15 airlines, which feared it would alarm passengers.

The 1925 Milestone Mo-Tel, source of the word 'motel', stood in which California city?

San Luis Obispo's Mo-Tel was meant to launch a chain of 18 motels a day's drive apart, but the Great Depression left architect Arthur Heineman short of backers.

Which city marked the eastern end of Route 66?

Chicago's road west was first mapped as US 60, but Kentucky's governor fought for that number and its backers settled for the unused 66.

Which state does John Denver's 1971 hit 'Take Me Home, Country Roads' celebrate?

West Virginia was a state co-writer Bill Danoff had never visited; the song's title line came to him on a drive along Clopper Road in Maryland.

The Tail of the Dragon, with 318 curves in 11 miles, runs from Deals Gap, North Carolina, into which state?

Tennessee's stretch runs between protected park and forest land, so no intersections break its curves.

Which classic American roadside restaurant chain, begun in 1925, was known for its bright orange roofs?

Howard Johnson's turned to franchising after the 1929 crash stalled growth, letting an acquaintance open its second restaurant in Orleans, Massachusetts, in 1935.

Which Interstate runs the length of the East Coast, from Miami to the Canadian border in Maine?

I-95 only became continuous from Maine to Florida in 2018, when a Pennsylvania Turnpike interchange bridged the gap left by New Jersey's canceled Somerset Freeway.

Which actor headlined the 1981 ensemble comedy inspired by the outlaw coast-to-coast Cannonball Run, alongside Dom DeLuise and Roger Moore?

Burt Reynolds's ambulance ruse copied the real 1979 race, in which Brock Yates and Hal Needham drove a disguised Dodge ambulance, the same van used in the film.

The Going-to-the-Sun Road crosses the Continental Divide in which national park?

Glacier's heavy snow at Logan Pass keeps the road's alpine stretch closed until summer each year.

Which Texas travel-center chain, fronted by a cartoon beaver, won Cintas's 2012 best-restroom contest?

Buc-ee's name blends founder Arch Aplin's childhood nickname, Beaver, his Labrador, Buck, and Bucky, the cartoon beaver from old Ipana toothpaste ads.

In Interstate numbering, what does a three-digit number starting with an even digit signify?

A loop that returns to its parent takes an even first digit, but numbers restart in each state, so I-80 has separate I-280s in California, Iowa, Ohio and New Jersey.

Which 1971 Spielberg TV movie has a businessman terrorized by a mysterious tanker truck on the highway?

Duel never shows the trucker's face, only glimpses such as his boots, so the truck itself becomes the villain.

Which roughly 30,000 km network of roads runs from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, to Ushuaia at the southern tip of Argentina?

The Pan-American Highway is interrupted only by the Darién Gap, a stretch of roadless rainforest between the two continents.

Which budget lodging chain, founded in 1962, took its name from its original nightly room rate?

Motel 6 was nearly Motel 4: William Becker and Paul Greene first targeted a $4 nightly rate, then $5, before settling on $6.

Which wartime supply road, finished in 1942, runs from Dawson Creek, British Columbia, via Whitehorse to Delta Junction?

The Alaska Highway was paid for by the United States even across British Columbia and Yukon, and Canada took over that stretch only after the war.

Which American author wrote the 1962 travelogue 'Travels with Charley'?

John Steinbeck told of roughing it in his camper, but a reporter retracing the trip found he seldom slept in it and often stayed at top hotels and resorts.

Which tycoon's railroad to Key West, wrecked by a 1935 hurricane, became the roadbed of the Overseas Highway?

Henry Flagler wanted Key West's deep-water port, the closest in the US to the new canal being dug between the Atlantic and Pacific.

The U.S. Army's 1919 truck convoy across America ended with a ferry ride across a bay into which city?

San Francisco was reached at an average of about 6 mph, as engineers shored up weak wooden bridges along the way.

The Karakoram Highway, one of the world's highest paved roads, connects China with which country?

Pakistan's stretch of the Karakoram Highway was cut in 2010, when a landslide dammed the Hunza River and the new lake drowned part of the road, so boats carried the traffic.

Which Kansas town has the giant sisal twine ball begun by Frank Stoeber in 1953?

Cawker City keeps its ball growing: visitors are invited to wrap on more twine, and the town holds an annual Twine-A-Thon to add to it.

Which Icelandic highway, circling the whole island, is the country's classic long-distance drive?

Route 1, the Ring Road, runs about 1,320 km around Iceland; it was only completed in 1974, when the Skeiðará bridge, then the country's longest, closed the last gap in the south-east.

Erwin Baker, the record-setting cross-country driver, got the nickname 'Cannonball' by being compared to what?

A newspaper writer likened Baker to the Cannonball Express, an express train, and it fit: one of his early stunts was racing passenger trains from town to town.

Which Indianapolis Motor Speedway co-founder was the chief promoter of the Lincoln Highway, launched in 1913?

Carl G. Fisher's backers pledged millions, but Henry Ford refused to give, reasoning that the public would never fund roads if industry paid.

Which road trip movie takes a family from Albuquerque to Redondo Beach in a yellow VW bus?

Little Miss Sunshine was first written as a trip from Maryland to Florida before the story moved west.

Which All-American Road winds 123 miles through Utah's red rock between Capitol Reef and Bryce Canyon?

Scenic Byway 12 reaches Boulder, a town unreachable by car for so long that it was among the last in the US to get its mail by mule.

The concept for the Volkswagen Type 2 bus is credited to Ben Pon, a VW importer from which country?

Netherlands importer Ben Pon saw a makeshift parts carrier on a Beetle chassis at the Wolfsburg factory and sketched a better van on the same chassis.

Which small New Mexico Route 66 town is home to the Blue Swallow Motel, a preserved neon-era motor court?

Tucumcari's Blue Swallow Motel was bought in 1958 as an engagement present for Lillian Redman, who went on to run it for about 40 years.

Which US road sign had a yellow background until 1954, because fade-resistant red material was not yet available?

Stop signs carried red or black letters on yellow from 1924. The 1954 switch to white on red matched the sign to the red traffic light, which already carried the same message.

Which famous river crossing was sold by its home city in 1968 and rebuilt at Lake Havasu City, Arizona?

London Bridge was bought by developer Robert McCulloch, who had its granite facing stones numbered and shipped to the desert. The rebuilt span was rededicated in 1971.

Which carmaker introduced the three-point seat belt in 1959, then let rival manufacturers use the patent for free?

Volvo opened the patent in the interest of safety. Its engineer Nils Bohlin, who had earlier worked on aircraft ejection seats, designed the belt.

In Pixar's Cars, Lightning McQueen is stranded in which rundown desert town on old Route 66?

Radiator Springs was a bustling attraction for drivers until a new interstate bypassed the town and took its business. Lightning ends up repaving its main road.

Which 24-hour Southern restaurant chain gives its name to an informal index FEMA uses to gauge storm damage?

Waffle House almost never closes, so a shut restaurant signals a severe disaster. Craig Fugate, later the head of FEMA, coined the index in Florida after Hurricane Charley in 2004.

Which Wyoming monolith, America's first national monument, hosts the climax of Close Encounters of the Third Kind?

Devils Tower, also known as Bear Lodge, stands 867 feet from base to summit. It was protected in 1906, 71 years before the film's aliens arrived.

Which US state capital, backed by a vast icefield, has no road connecting it to the rest of North America?

Juneau can be reached only by air or sea. State ferries carry cars up the Lynn Canal to Haines and Skagway, the nearest towns on the continental road system.

Which driving aid did blind engineer Ralph Teetor invent, reputedly after jerky rides with his lawyer at the wheel?

Cruise control came to Teetor, family lore says, because the lawyer slowed down while talking and sped up while listening. He patented his speed selector in 1950.

Which tyre company launched a restaurant and hotel guide in 1900 to get more motorists out driving?

Michelin brothers Édouard and André wanted to raise demand for cars, and so for tyres, when France had fewer than 3,000 cars. Their guide's stars came later.

Which president is carved into Mount Rushmore in South Dakota's Black Hills beside Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln?

Theodore Roosevelt was chosen to represent the nation's development. Sculptor Gutzon Borglum and 400 workers spent 14 years carving the four 60-foot heads.

In the car-ride game Punch Buggy, players race to spot which Volkswagen model before punching a fellow passenger?

Beetle spotters shout "Punch buggy" after the car's nickname, the Bug. Once a car has been called, no other player can claim it.

Which fill-in-the-blank word game, a back-seat favourite, did Leonard Stern and Roger Price invent in 1953?

Mad Libs went unnamed for five years, until its creators overheard an actor who wanted to "ad-lib" an interview and an agent who called the idea "mad".

Which restaurant chain, known for porch rocking chairs, began in 1969 as a Shell salesman's plan to sell more gasoline?

Cracker Barrel founder Dan Evins, a Shell Oil representative, devised the restaurant and gift store to boost fuel sales. The first one served biscuits, grits and country ham.

Which band's debut single put a street corner in Winslow, Arizona, on the Route 66 tourist map?

Eagles sang of standing on that corner because co-writer Jackson Browne's car is said to have broken down in Winslow. The town opened a park with a statue there in 1999.

Which singer's trio made the first recording of '(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66' in 1946?

Nat King Cole recorded it the year Bobby Troup dreamed it up on a drive to California in a 1941 Buick. Troup's wife Cynthia suggested the title.

The Great River Road follows which river through ten states, from Lake Itasca in Minnesota to Louisiana?

The Mississippi's Great River Road is a chain of state and local roads rather than one highway, marked by green pilot's-wheel signs. It ends at Venice, Louisiana.

The Road to Hana, with roughly 620 curves and 59 bridges, winds along the coast of which island?

Maui's famous drive covers only about 52 miles from Kahului, yet takes around two and a half hours because 46 of its bridges are a single lane wide.

In Dumb and Dumber, Harry and Lloyd drive cross-country from Rhode Island to return a briefcase in which ski town?

Aspen is where Mary Swanson was flying when she left the case at the airport. Lloyd never suspects that it holds ransom money meant for kidnappers.

Which brightly coloured vehicle carries Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy and their Great Dane in Scooby-Doo?

The Mystery Machine first rolled out in 1969, after parents' groups had pressured the networks to cancel their more violent Saturday-morning action cartoons.

Which state's license plates carry 'Live Free or Die', a motto taken from a Revolutionary War general's 1809 toast?

New Hampshire ordered the motto onto its plates in 1970. The Supreme Court later ruled that the state could not prosecute drivers who covered it up.

Which hotel chain did Kemmons Wilson found in 1952 after a family road trip of disappointing motels?

Holiday Inn was named as a joke by Wilson's architect, after a 1942 musical film. Wilson so loved the chain's roadside Great Sign that it is engraved on his tombstone.

Which Best Picture winner follows a Black pianist and his white driver on a 1962 concert tour of the Deep South?

Green Book takes its title from the travel guide that New York postal worker Victor Hugo Green published from 1936 to 1966, listing lodgings that were safe for Black motorists.

Which gonzo journalist wrote Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, first serialised in Rolling Stone in 1971?

Hunter S. Thompson sent his alter ego Raoul Duke and an attorney called Doctor Gonzo into the desert to chase the American Dream through a narcotic haze. Ralph Steadman illustrated it.

Which Louisiana body of water is crossed by a 24-mile causeway, the world's longest continuous bridge over water?

Lake Pontchartrain's twin bridges run 23.83 miles from Metairie to Mandeville. Guinness created the "continuous" category for them in 2011, after a longer bridge opened in China.

The five-mile Mackinac Bridge, opened in 1957, connects the Upper and Lower Peninsulas of which state?

Michigan's two halves were linked only by ferries until the "Mighty Mac" opened. By tradition the governor leads a walk across the span every Labor Day.

Carhenge, a Stonehenge replica built from 39 vintage American automobiles, stands near Alliance in which state?

Nebraska got its circle of cars from Jim Reinders, who built it as a memorial to his father on the farm where his father once lived. It was dedicated at the 1987 summer solstice.

Which car part did Mary Anderson patent in 1903, reputedly after watching a New York streetcar driver struggle in snow?

Windshield wiper blades in her design were worked by a lever from inside the vehicle. The driver she watched had to keep opening his window to clear the glass by hand.

Which Ford car, famously offered only in black from 1914, first made driving affordable for middle-class Americans?

Model T buyers could not get black at all in the early years of production, when the car came in other colours. By 1918, half of all the cars in the United States were Model Ts.

Which gasoline brand made a Brontosaurus its roadside mascot in the 1930s to stress the great age of petroleum?

Sinclair's dinosaur fed a popular myth that oil comes from dinosaurs. The company's own literature said only that its crude had been mellowing underground since they walked the earth.

Which national park's 33-mile Rim Drive circles what is left of the collapsed volcano Mount Mazama?

Crater Lake, at 1,949 feet the deepest lake in the United States, fills the hollow left when the 12,000-foot volcano collapsed about 7,700 years ago.

Which Colorado summit, climbed by a 19-mile toll road, inspired Katharine Lee Bates to write 'America the Beautiful'?

Pikes Peak was the poem's first title. Bates wrote it soon after reaching the 14,115-foot top in 1893, during a summer spent teaching in Colorado.

Which Florida city, where cars may drive on the hard-packed sand, staged motor races on its shoreline for over 50 years?

Daytona Beach moved its racing inland to Daytona International Speedway in 1959. Cars are still allowed on stretches of the sand, at a maximum speed of 10 mph.

U.S. Route 20, America's longest road, runs over 3,200 miles from Boston to the town of Newport in which western state?

Oregon's end of the road is an intersection with US 101, within a mile of the Pacific coast.

Which singer-songwriter named a 1965 album after Highway 61, the road that ran through his Minnesota birthplace?

Bob Dylan came from Duluth, where the highway passed on its way south to New Orleans. He called it "the main thoroughfare of the country blues".

In Smokey and the Bandit, the truckers bet they can haul 400 cases of which beer from Texarkana to Atlanta?

Coors has to make the trip in 28 hours, so a black Pontiac Trans Am runs ahead of the truck as a "blocker" to draw the police away from the illegal cargo.

Which country singer wrote 'King of the Road' after seeing a barn sign reading 'Trailers for sale or rent'?

Roger Miller first recorded the song in November 1964. Its narrator is a penniless hobo, a "man of means by no means", who revels in his freedom.

The Beartooth Highway, called America's most beautiful drive by Charles Kuralt, leads to which national park?

Yellowstone's northeast entrance lies at the end of the road, which crests the 10,947-foot Beartooth Pass. Heavy snow keeps the pass open only about five months a year.

Which state had no numeric daytime speed limit from 1995 to 1999, asking only for 'reasonable and prudent' driving?

Montana's highest court threw the rule out as unconstitutionally vague. Even during those years, a posted limit of 65 miles per hour applied at night.

Which state opened a toll road in 1940, built through old railroad tunnels and branded America's First Superhighway?

Pennsylvania's turnpike had no cross streets or traffic lights, and some early drivers pushed their cars to 90 mph. The road became a model for the Interstates.

Which state capital installed the world's first parking meter in 1935, an idea pushed by a local newspaper publisher?

Oklahoma City switched on the first meter on July 16, 1935. Its champion, a lawyer as well as a publisher, waited until 1938 for his patent on the device.

Which novelist crossed America in 1964 with his Merry Pranksters aboard a psychedelic school bus named Furthur?

Ken Kesey bought the 1939 International Harvester bus to reach New York for a book launch and the World's Fair. Its misspelled name was painted on the destination board to urge the crew onward.

Which US territory drives on the left, even though most of its cars are left-hand-drive mainland imports?

Virgin Islands drivers therefore sit on the kerb side, and their American-pattern headlights cast light to the right, tending to dazzle oncoming traffic.

Which Native American nation maintains the Four Corners Monument, the only point shared by four US states?

Navajo and Ute artisans sell souvenirs and food around the marker, whose disk reads "Here meet in freedom under God four states", two words in each state.

Which Lookout Mountain attraction advertised itself by painting its name on more than 900 barn roofs and walls?

Rock City hired Clark Byers in 1935 to paint "See Rock City" on barns across 19 states, and he kept at the job until 1969.

Which roadside chain, begun as a Georgia pecan stand in 1937, is known for its pecan log rolls?

Stuckey's started after its founder borrowed $35 from his grandmother to trade in pecans. By the early 1960s the chain had more than 368 stores full of candy and kitschy souvenirs.

Which rocker wrote 'I Can't Drive 55' after a ticket for doing 62 mph on a New York highway?

Sammy Hagar was protesting the national 55 mph limit imposed in 1974. The 1984 single became a concert staple that lasted through his years fronting Van Halen.

In David Lynch's The Straight Story, Alvin Straight travels 240 miles to see his ailing brother on what?

A lawn mower was his only option, because his eyes and legs were too poor for a driving licence. The film retells a real 1994 journey from Iowa to Wisconsin at 5 miles per hour.

The Yungas Road, a cliff-edge route nicknamed Death Road and popular with mountain bikers, lies in which country?

Bolivia built the 40-mile road in the 1930s to link La Paz with the Yungas region. It drops about 11,500 feet through fog, landslides and cascades.

The Lincoln Highway, dedicated in 1913 as a coast-to-coast auto road, began at which New York City landmark?

Times Square has a marker for the highway's eastern end at 42nd Street and Broadway. The whole route was first officially measured at 3,389 miles.

Which map publisher, the first major one to adopt numbered highways, launched its famous Road Atlas in 1924?

Rand McNally also put up many of the actual roadside signs for the numbered routes it mapped. Its atlas began life in 1924 under the title Auto Chum.