The Road That Built a City’s Dream
There is a passage in Don Felder’s account of writing “Hotel California” that captures something true about Route 66 and Los Angeles: “Everybody had driven into Los Angeles on what used to be Route 66. And as you drive in through the desert at night, you can see the glow of Los Angeles from a hundred miles away. The closer and closer you get, you start seeing all of these images, and these things pounded into our heads: the stars on Hollywood Boulevard, movie stars, palm trees, beaches.” That approach — desert to dream, highway to city — is the essential Route 66 Los Angeles experience. The Mother Road did not end at Los Angeles. It was transformed by it.
Route 66 in Los Angeles is the most surprising, most contentious, and arguably the most remarkable section of the entire 2,448-mile highway. It is remarkable because the historic alignment is almost completely intact — the streets that Route 66 followed through Los Angeles from the 1920s through the 1960s are still there, still active, still among the most celebrated streets in the world. It is surprising because most travelers have driven Route 66 in Los Angeles without knowing it: they have traveled Sunset Boulevard, Santa Monica Boulevard, and the streets of Hollywood, West Hollywood, and Beverly Hills without realizing that the Mother Road they have read about in John Steinbeck and heard about in Bobby Troup’s song ran beneath their wheels on streets they already knew by name.
And it is contentious because Route 66’s history through Los Angeles is complex: multiple alignments, extensions, and realignments across nearly four decades of the highway’s active life mean that there is no single “Route 66 in Los Angeles” but rather a series of overlapping historical routes that crisscross the city in ways that even devoted Route 66 enthusiasts struggle to fully untangle. This guide will help you navigate all of it — the original 1926 downtown terminus, the 1935–36 extension to Santa Monica, the Arroyo Seco Parkway, the Figueroa Street Tunnels, Sunset Boulevard, and the long westward sweep of Santa Monica Boulevard through Hollywood, West Hollywood, and Beverly Hills to the Pacific Ocean.
Understanding Route 66’s Multiple Alignments Through Los Angeles
Route 66 through Los Angeles shifted repeatedly across its history. The color-coded alignments that Route 66 historians use to track the changes reveal a highway in constant adaptation to a city that was itself being continuously remade. For travelers today, the key alignments are:
1926–1935: Broadway and the Original Downtown Terminus. Route 66’s first western terminus was at 7th Street and Broadway in downtown Los Angeles — the point where the highway met US 101 and US 99. Traffic from the east came into the city via Broadway, which curves through Chinatown and the downtown core. Historic Route 66 signs reading “circa 1926 to 1934” still mark this alignment through Chinatown today.
1935–1953: The Extension to Santa Monica via Sunset Boulevard. When Route 66 was extended 13 miles west to Santa Monica on July 8, 1935, the alignment followed Sunset Boulevard west from downtown through Hollywood, then turned onto Santa Monica Boulevard to continue to the new terminus at Lincoln and Olympic in Santa Monica. Prominent beige road signs reading “Historic Route 66 1935–1964” mark this alignment today.
1940–1964: The Arroyo Seco Parkway Freeway Alignment. When the Arroyo Seco Parkway — the first freeway in the western United States — opened in December 1940, Route 66 was aligned along it from Pasadena into downtown Los Angeles through the Figueroa Street Tunnels. After the Four Level Interchange opened in 1953, freeway traffic connected via the Hollywood Freeway (US 101) to Santa Monica Boulevard into Santa Monica.
For this guide, we focus on the historic surface street alignment from downtown Los Angeles westward — the route marked by signs today and the one that delivers the richest experience of the city for Route 66 travelers. We will move west as travelers historically did, from downtown to the coast.
Route 66 and Los Angeles: A Decade-by-Decade History
The Original Terminus: 7th Street and Broadway, 1926
When Route 66 was commissioned on November 11, 1926, its western terminus was fixed at the intersection of 7th Street and Broadway in downtown Los Angeles — chosen because federal highway rules required that one US Highway must feed into another. At Broadway and 7th, Route 66 met both US Highway 101 and US Highway 99, satisfying the requirement. In 1926, this downtown crossroads was described as one of the busiest intersections in the world — a teeming convergence of early automobiles and pedestrians at the commercial heart of a rapidly growing city. Today the same corner anchors the Jewelry District, still busy and entirely driveable and walkable.
The Extension to Santa Monica: 1935
The Route 66 story in Los Angeles changed fundamentally in 1935. For nearly a decade, the highway had ended ambiguously in downtown — technically at 7th and Broadway but without a clear coastal destination for travelers who had just crossed the entire continent. On June 14, 1935, the California Highway Commission requested the extension of US 66 to Santa Monica. On July 8, 1935, the American Association of State Highway Officials approved it. The October 1935 issue of California Highways and Public Works recorded the result: “U.S. 66 extended from Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles to Santa Monica via Santa Monica Boulevard.” Los Angeles was no longer Route 66’s destination — it was now the highway’s passage to the Pacific Ocean, 13 miles further west.
The Arroyo Seco Parkway and the Age of the Freeway: 1940–1964
The Arroyo Seco Parkway — which had been designated a Route 66 alignment since opening in December 1940 as the first freeway in the western United States — altered the way Los Angeles processed Route 66 traffic, replacing the surface street approach through Pasadena with a dedicated limited-access road. The parkway connected to downtown Los Angeles via the Figueroa Street Tunnels through Elysian Park, and when the Four Level Interchange — the world’s first stack interchange, connecting the Hollywood Freeway with the Pasadena Freeway — was completed in 1953, Route 66 traffic could move from Pasadena to Hollywood entirely on freeways.
Route 66’s designation in the Los Angeles area was officially removed during the 1964 renumbering. The US 66 shields came down along the former alignment in 1974. But the streets remained. Santa Monica Boulevard, Sunset Boulevard, Broadway — these were not abandoned highways but living city streets, and they continue to carry millions of vehicles daily.
Downtown Los Angeles: Broadway, Chinatown, and the Original Terminus
Olvera Street and El Pueblo de Los Angeles
The historic Route 66 alignment through downtown Los Angeles begins — appropriately — at the oldest part of the city. Olvera Street and the surrounding El Pueblo de Los Angeles State Historic Park at 125 Paseo de la Plaza occupy a 44-acre district celebrating the history and culture that distinguishes Los Angeles from any other American city. At the heart of El Pueblo is the Avila Adobe (circa 1818) at 10 Olvera Street — with walls nearly three feet thick, it is the oldest surviving residence in Los Angeles. Olvera Street itself was established as a pedestrian marketplace in 1930 by civic leader Christine Sterling, preserving a block of the original pueblo street as a celebration of the city’s Mexican and Spanish colonial heritage.
Adjacent to El Pueblo, the monumental Union Station at 800 North Alameda Street is the largest passenger railroad terminal in the western United States and one of the great public buildings in California. Opened in 1939 in a composition of Dutch Colonial Revival, Mission Revival, and Streamline Moderne architecture, Union Station was built in the same era Route 66 was at its height. Its cathedral-scale waiting room — with tile floors, coffered wooden ceilings, and the particular quality of late-afternoon light through its tall windows — is one of the finest interior spaces in Los Angeles and feels, as one travel writer has put it, “like stepping back into a noir film.” Union Station remains an active transit hub served by Amtrak’s Southwest Chief (which traces much of Route 66’s desert alignment), Metrolink, and Metro Rail.
Chinatown and the Historic Route 66 Alignment on Broadway
North Broadway through Chinatown carries the original 1926–1934 Route 66 alignment, marked by “Historic Route 66 circa 1926 to 1934” signs that orient travelers on the pre-Santa Monica-extension route. The New Chinatown Historic District, established in 1937, lines Broadway with Chinese-American commercial architecture; the Phoenix Bakery at 969 North Broadway, which opened in 1938 and relocated to its current location in 1977, remains one of the oldest continuously operating Chinese American bakeries in Los Angeles and a Route 66 alignment landmark. A second Historic Route 66 alignment sign stands at the northeast corner of North Broadway and César Chávez Avenue, marking the alignment for westbound travelers.
The Original Terminus: 7th and Broadway in the Jewelry District
Following Broadway south from Chinatown through the downtown grid, the alignment arrives near the Broadway Theater District — a concentration of more than a dozen surviving historic movie palaces built between 1910 and 1931, the densest collection of historic theaters in the United States. The Bradbury Building at 304 South Broadway — a Victorian masterpiece completed in 1893, with its light-filled atrium of ornate ironwork — served as a filming location for Blade Runner and a dozen other productions and remains one of the most architecturally significant buildings in California.
At 7th Street and Broadway, the original Route 66 western terminus from 1926 to 1935, the Jewelry District hums with the commerce of more than 4,000 independent jewelers operating in a compact few blocks. The historic significance of the corner is not marked with fanfare, but travelers who know the history will find meaning in standing at what was, for nearly a decade, the literal end of the road — the point where the 2,448-mile journey from Chicago’s Lake Michigan shore resolved itself in the middle of a Los Angeles city block. One block south at 317 South Broadway, the Grand Central Market has been feeding Los Angeles since 1917 — predating Route 66 by nearly a decade — and remains one of the finest urban food markets in the American West. It appeared in La La Land, Midnight Run, and other productions.
The Figueroa Street Tunnels and the Arroyo Seco Parkway: Route 66 on Film
The Four Figueroa Street Tunnels
One block north of the downtown core, the Arroyo Seco Parkway (State Route 110) enters Elysian Park and passes through the four Figueroa Street Tunnels — Art Deco concrete bores cut through the hills between downtown Los Angeles and the Arroyo Seco valley. These tunnels are the only surviving vehicle tunnels that carried Route 66 anywhere in the country (a Broadway tunnel in downtown LA no longer exists), and they were among the original infrastructure of the Arroyo Seco Parkway when it opened in 1940. They are designated as part of the National Scenic Byway and the National Historic Landmark that covers the Arroyo Seco Parkway as a whole.
The tunnels’ tiled walls, the rhythm of the arches, and the distinctive quality of light at the end of each bore make them one of the most atmospherically dramatic portions of the entire Route 66 alignment — and director Ridley Scott recognized this when he chose them as a filming location for Blade Runner (1982), in which Harrison Ford’s character drives through one of the tunnels while listening to a recording. They have also appeared in Rumor Has It (2005), the opening credits of Duel (1971), and the end credits of the 1995 PlayStation video game Twisted Metal. Driving the tunnels in the dark — particularly at night, when the reflective tiles and the sudden darkness of the bores create a genuinely cinematic experience — is one of the most unusual pleasures available on the Route 66 alignment anywhere in the country.
The Arroyo Seco Parkway: America’s First Freeway
The Arroyo Seco Parkway — now officially known again by its original name after decades as the Pasadena Freeway (State Route 110) — is the first freeway built in the western United States, completed and opened on December 30, 1940. It is a National Historic Landmark and a National Scenic Byway, and it reveals in its design the philosophy of its parkway era: 15-mph exit ramps (considered novel, never replicated on later freeways), a 45-mph design speed, gentle curves that follow the Arroyo Seco’s natural contours, and the landscaped quality of a scenic pleasure drive rather than a utilitarian transportation corridor. Driving it — particularly the northbound direction from downtown Pasadena — provides the closest available experience of what Route 66 travelers felt approaching the Los Angeles metropolitan area in the early 1940s.
The Four Level Interchange: Route 66’s Engineering Legacy
Where the Arroyo Seco Parkway (Route 66) met the Hollywood Freeway (US 101), engineers in the early 1950s built something the world had never seen: the Four Level Interchange — four levels of freeway stacked vertically, the world’s first stack interchange, completed in 1953. The interchange — visible from Sunset Boulevard one block west of North Figueroa — remains a landmark of California infrastructure and the template for the elaborate multi-level freeway exchanges that came to define Southern California’s urban form. It connects the Pasadena Freeway (the former Route 66 alignment from Pasadena) to the Hollywood, Harbor, and Santa Ana Freeways, and in its combination of engineering ambition and physical elegance it represents the precise moment when American highway construction became something more than road-building.
Sunset Boulevard: From Downtown Through Silver Lake to Hollywood
West from downtown on the 1935–1953 surface alignment, Route 66 follows Sunset Boulevard — a road that follows the path of an 1780s Spanish colonial cattle trail from the original Pueblo de Los Angeles to the ocean, a route so suited to the natural topography that it has served as the primary east–west corridor through this part of the city for nearly 250 years. Historic Route 66 1935–1964 signs mark the alignment westward through the city.
Silver Lake and Echo Park: The Creative Heart of the Alignment
Sunset Boulevard passes through Silver Lake and Echo Park — neighborhoods of craftsman bungalows, independent bookshops, music venues, and the kind of dense creative community that Route 66’s westward passage through Los Angeles has sustained for a century. Sunset Junction — where Sunset Boulevard kinks from a northwest trajectory to due west and transitions toward Santa Monica Boulevard at Myra Avenue — is the pivot point of the alignment, a Silver Lake neighborhood junction that has been a center of the city’s independent music, food, and retail culture for decades.
Hollywood: Route 66 on the Cusp of the Entertainment Industry
As Sunset Boulevard enters Hollywood from the east, Route 66 passes through the neighborhood that gave the American entertainment industry its identity — and that, in return, gave Route 66 much of its mythology. The highway that carried Dust Bowl migrants to California was also the highway that carried aspiring actors, directors, and musicians to Hollywood, and the reciprocal relationship between the Mother Road’s westward dreams and Hollywood’s projection of those dreams back onto the nation is one of the defining cultural stories of 20th-century America.
The Formosa Café at 7156 Santa Monica Boulevard (one block south of the Sunset Boulevard alignment, on the Route 66 Santa Monica Boulevard segment) opened in 1925 — almost concurrently with Route 66’s commissioning — in a repurposed Red Car trolley car owned by prize-fighter Jimmy Bernstein. Because the United Artists Studio lot stood directly across the street (later Samuel Goldwyn Studio, now The Lot at Formosa), the Formosa attracted generations of Hollywood royalty: Humphrey Bogart, Clark Gable, Frank Sinatra, Ava Gardner, John Wayne, Lana Turner, and James Dean among them. Frank Sinatra parked out back, with his studio bungalow directly across Formosa. The Formosa appeared in L.A. Confidential, Swingers, and other productions. It continues to serve Chinese-influenced cuisine and stiff drinks in an interior rich with authentic Hollywood history.
Hollywood Forever Cemetery: Route 66’s Most Storied Stop
At 6000 Santa Monica Boulevard, directly on the Route 66 alignment, Hollywood Forever Cemetery is one of the most distinctive landmarks on the entire Mother Road. Founded in 1899 — predating Route 66 by 27 years — its 62 manicured park-like acres are the final resting place of the people who made the entertainment industry that made Los Angeles famous:
Rudolph Valentino, who died in August 1926 — the very year Route 66 was commissioned — and whose death caused scenes of public grief not repeated in Hollywood until the mid-century film star era
Judy Garland, who sang of a place over the rainbow and who traveled Route 66’s cultural currents as directly as anyone in American entertainment history
Cecil B. DeMille, Mickey Rooney, Jayne Mansfield, Tyrone Power, Mel Blanc (the voice of Bugs Bunny), and hundreds of others whose names defined mid-century American popular culture
The cemetery’s iconic Paramount Studios water tower — the studio having originally built on land that belonged to Hollywood Forever — rises directly above the cemetery walls on the southern boundary of the studio lot, creating one of the most visually distinctive juxtapositions anywhere in Los Angeles: the living entertainment industry looking down on those who built it. Hollywood Forever also hosts outdoor classic film screenings in summer, concerts, author evenings, and cultural events in its grounds — making it a lively community destination as well as a historic one.
West Hollywood: Route 66 Along Santa Monica Boulevard
At La Brea Avenue, Route 66 crosses from the City of Los Angeles into West Hollywood — a city that was not incorporated until 1984, one year before Route 66 was nationally decommissioned. West Hollywood was previously an unincorporated county area known locally as “Sherman” (after Moses Sherman, who built the Los Angeles Pacific Railroad), and its status outside city law enforcement jurisdiction gave it a “free-minded” reputation — the 1939 WPA Guide described the Sunset Strip stretch as a place of “movie colony night spots, high-priced antique shops, salons, gift shops, restaurants hung with Venetian blinds, theatrical agencies.” Route 66’s Santa Monica Boulevard alignment runs for 2.9 miles through West Hollywood from La Brea Avenue to Doheny Drive — one of the most culturally concentrated stretches of the entire highway.
Barney’s Beanery: Route 66’s Most Legendary Surviving Bar
At 8447 Santa Monica Boulevard, Barney’s Beanery has been a fixture of Route 66 in West Hollywood since 1927, when John “Barney” Anthony moved his operation from Berkeley to warmer Hollywood. Positioned on the Route 66 alignment from the earliest years of the highway’s Santa Monica Boulevard extension, Barney’s became famous during the Great Depression for serving beans to those who could not afford food — and then famous again for serving everyone else. Travelers left their license plates after dinner as a gesture of their migration to California to start better lives. The bar attracted Jean Harlow, Bette Davis, Clark Gable, Errol Flynn, Jim Morrison, and Janis Joplin among its regulars; Joplin’s limousine was allegedly parked outside the night she died. The menu runs to a claimed 1,000 items, from pizza to burritos to burgers, and the atmosphere — accumulated history visible in every surface — is irreplaceable.
The Troubadour: Route 66’s Legendary Live Music Venue
At the western edge of West Hollywood, just before Santa Monica Boulevard crosses into Beverly Hills, the Troubadour at 9081 Santa Monica Boulevard is one of the most historically significant live music venues in the United States. Opened in 1957 — on the Route 66 alignment, just as the highway was transitioning from its surface street to freeway era — the Troubadour hosted Elton John’s first Los Angeles concert (and first US concert), as well as early performances by The Eagles, James Taylor, Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Van Morrison. The rustic, Western-themed venue remains one of the most important music clubs in the country, hosting performances regularly on the same stage where American rock music’s foundational artists established their careers.
Westlake Recording Studios and Other Route 66 Icons
At 7265 Santa Monica Boulevard, Westlake Recording Studios is one of the most important recording facilities in popular music history. Michael Jackson’s Thriller (1982) and Bad (1987) were both recorded here, alongside work by Quincy Jones, Donna Summer, Giorgio Moroder, Van Halen, and Alanis Morissette (who recorded Jagged Little Pill at Westlake). The studio sits directly on the Route 66 alignment — a quiet building on a busy boulevard that has been one of the quiet engines of American popular culture for decades.
The Tail O’ the Pup — a giant hot dog-shaped programmatic architecture stand that opened in 1946 and has moved three times across its history — currently stands on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood near the location where The Doors created their iconic LA Woman album. Programmatic architecture — buildings shaped like what they sell — was a characteristic Route 66 roadside tradition, and the Tail O’ the Pup is one of the last surviving examples in the Los Angeles area. The West Hollywood Halloween Carnival — the largest Halloween event in the United States, drawing nearly half a million participants to one mile of Santa Monica Boulevard between La Cienega and Doheny on October 31 each year — takes place directly on the Route 66 alignment, a reminder that the highway continues to serve as the organizing spine of West Hollywood’s civic and cultural life.
Beverly Hills: Route 66 Through the Most Famous ZIP Code in the World
At Doheny Drive, Route 66 crosses from West Hollywood into Beverly Hills — the 90210, the ZIP code synonymous with wealth, celebrity, and the aspirational California dream that Route 66 itself helped project onto the American consciousness. Santa Monica Boulevard runs through Beverly Hills for approximately 2 miles, past the Beverly Hills Civic Center (with its weekly farmers market), before re-entering the City of Los Angeles in Century City.
Beverly Hills’ most significant Route 66 connection is Dan Tana’s at 9071 Santa Monica Boulevard, just inside the Beverly Hills border — an Italian-American institution that opened in 1964 and serves comfort food in a red-leather interior with gingham tablecloths and tuxedoed waitstaff that has become one of the most characteristic restaurant experiences in all of Los Angeles. The Sunset Strip’s legendary Book Soup at 8818 Sunset Boulevard — one of the finest independent bookshops in the United States — sits just above the Route 66 Santa Monica Boulevard alignment and is a worthy detour for any Route 66 traveler with literary inclinations.
Century City: The Route 66 Lamp Posts
As Santa Monica Boulevard continues west through Century City and West Los Angeles — reentering the City of Los Angeles after Beverly Hills — attentive travelers will notice 16 aluminum bas-relief sculptures mounted on lamp posts along the boulevard. These Route 66 commemorative artworks — commissioned as part of a public art program during a major road reconstruction project — depict imagery from the eight states Route 66 passes through: a bust of Lincoln, an armadillo, a cactus, a Zia symbol, a Kokopelli flute player, a surfboard, and other icons. They are easy to miss among the Century City streetscape, but they are among the most unexpected and thoughtfully placed Route 66 memorials anywhere on the California corridor.
Into Santa Monica: The Final Miles to the Pacific
West of Century City, Santa Monica Boulevard continues into the City of Santa Monica, where Route 66’s California journey reaches its conclusion. The official western terminus of Route 66 from 1936 to 1964 was at the intersection of Lincoln Boulevard and Olympic Boulevard in Santa Monica — marked today by “Historic California US 66 Route End” signs on the traffic signal poles at the intersection’s northern and southern sides. This is the technically correct end of the highway, the point where US 66 connected to US 101A (the Pacific Coast Highway).
But Route 66’s symbolic and spiritual terminus is two blocks away at the Santa Monica Pier — where the iconic “End of the Trail” sign, erected in 2009, marks the completion of the 2,448-mile journey for millions of travelers every year. The pier extends into Santa Monica Bay with its restored carousel, the Pacific Park amusement park with its solar-powered Ferris wheel, and the view of the Pacific Ocean that has been the destination of every westbound Route 66 traveler since the highway’s extension to the coast in 1935. For the Route 66 traveler who has come from Chicago — or from Needles, or from Pasadena — the pier is where the road ends and the ocean begins.
Also in Santa Monica, the Will Rogers Highway Marker in Palisades Park near Santa Monica Boulevard and Ocean Avenue honors Route 66’s designation as the Will Rogers Highway — the name given to the road after Warner Bros.’ 1952 biographical film The Story of Will Rogers, when memorial plaques were unveiled in all eight Route 66 states. Rogers, the beloved humorist, performer, and social commentator, was a Route 66 traveler himself, and the designation of the highway in his name connected the Mother Road to one of America’s most warmly remembered public figures. The nearby Mel’s Drive-In at 1670 Lincoln Boulevard occupies a stunning late-1950s space-age building at the official Route 66 terminus — a Googie architecture gem that has become a fitting bookend to the highway’s Los Angeles chapter.
Practical Information for Your Los Angeles Route 66 Drive
Driving the Alignment
The full historic Route 66 surface street drive through Los Angeles — from North Broadway in Chinatown to the Santa Monica Pier — covers approximately 18 miles and takes between 45 minutes and 2 hours depending on traffic. Los Angeles traffic is notoriously heavy; the alignment is best driven in the early morning (before 9 a.m.) on weekdays, or on weekend mornings before 10 a.m. Evening drives on Sunset Boulevard and Santa Monica Boulevard can be spectacular for the urban light but significantly slower.
Using Public Transit
The Route 66 alignment through Los Angeles is served by one of the country’s better transit systems. The Metro Red/Purple Line serves Hollywood/Highland (for the Santa Monica Boulevard alignment), Hollywood/Vine, and other Hollywood stations. The Expo Line connects downtown Los Angeles to Santa Monica. Metro Bus lines 2 and 302 serve Sunset Boulevard; Bus 4 serves Santa Monica Boulevard through West Hollywood. For travelers who want to experience the alignment without driving, transit is a genuine option.
Time Required
A thorough Route 66 Los Angeles drive — Olvera Street and Union Station, Broadway through Chinatown to 7th Street, the Figueroa Tunnels, the Four Level Interchange, Sunset Boulevard to Hollywood, the Formosa Café, Hollywood Forever Cemetery, Santa Monica Boulevard through West Hollywood (Barney’s Beanery, Troubadour), Beverly Hills, Century City lamp posts, Santa Monica Pier — requires a full day. Individual sections can occupy a morning or afternoon. Hollywood Forever Cemetery alone warrants 1–2 hours; the Grand Central Market and the downtown Jewelry District another hour or two.
Route 66 Before and After Los Angeles: Connecting the California Corridor
Santa Monica Pier — End of the Trail — The symbolic western terminus of Route 66, two blocks from the official Lincoln and Olympic intersection terminus. The End of the Trail sign, the historic carousel, Pacific Park’s solar Ferris wheel, and the Pacific Ocean.
Route 66 in Pasadena, California — Immediately east on the Route 66 alignment, Pasadena’s Colorado Boulevard carries the Mother Road through a city of extraordinary architectural and cultural richness — the Colorado Street Bridge, the Norton Simon Museum, the Gamble House, and Old Town Pasadena.
Aztec Hotel, Monrovia — About 20 miles east on Route 66 in Monrovia, the 1925 National Historic Landmark is the first Mayan Revival architecture building in the United States and one of the most visually extraordinary stops on the California corridor.
The Wigwam Motel, San Bernardino — About 60 miles east on Route 66, the iconic teepee-shaped motel has been welcoming Route 66 travelers since 1950.
Route 66 in San Bernardino, California — The Original McDonald’s Museum site, the Wigwam Motel, and the full Route 66 heritage of the gateway city to the California Inland Empire.
California Route 66 Museum, Victorville — About 85 miles northeast, the free California Route 66 Museum in Old Town Victorville preserves the Hulaville Collection and the desert-corridor story of the Mother Road.
Route 66 in California — Complete Guide — The full overview of all 314 miles of California’s Route 66, from Needles on the Arizona border through the Mojave Desert, the Cajon Pass, San Bernardino, Pasadena, and Los Angeles to the End of the Trail at the Santa Monica Pier.
Route 66 Centennial 2026 — The 100th anniversary of Route 66 is November 11, 2026. Los Angeles — the original and final California terminus of the Mother Road — is at the center of centennial celebrations. Check this page for California events.
Route 66 — Complete Guide — The definitive guide to all 2,448 miles of the Mother Road, from the Begin sign in Chicago to the End of the Trail at the Santa Monica Pier.
