owner

Lifelong Angels fan Johnny Gonzalez has reached his boiling point as the team sits at the bottom of the standings, but he’s not giving up. And he’s not alone.

The Angels completed a surprise sweep of the Rangers Sunday, but the team still is tied for the worst record in Major League Baseball with a 20-34. Their fans spent the holiday weekend pushing back against the idea that the franchise would never be more than a bargain option amid rising prices all around them.

Frustrated fans have gone shirtless during the Angels’ homestand and chanted for owner Arte Moreno to “sell the team.” And about 75 fans heeded Gonzalez’s call for a protest, gathering in front of the Angel Stadium State College Boulevard entrance on Saturday chanting “sell the team,” “we want playoffs” and “winning matters.” Drivers passing the spectacle honked their horns in support.

“They’re not doing much for us fans,” said Gonzalez, who organized the protest using the Instagram account @AngelsBoycott. “It seems like every other team is just doing a lot more than us, despite us having a huge following [and] having some of the best players to ever play the game. I mean, it’s just like a lack of commitment, to say the least, and that’s why we’re here today.”

Angels fans wave signs and urge owner Arte Moreno to sell the team to an ownership group willing to invest more in winning during a pregame protest Saturday at Angel Stadium.

(Joaquin Ruiz / For The Times)

It has been three months since Angels owner Arte Moreno told the Orange County Register that, according to Angels survey results, winning was not a top-five priority for fans and that data showed they valued affordability, safety and a “good experience” first.

Outrage over the remarks has grown as the Angels remain anchored at the bottom of the standings.

With a megaphone in his hand, Gonzalez pointed to the Ducks’ recent Stanley Cup playoff run as proof that Anaheim enjoys winning. He also noted how the nearby Dodgers and even the Padres demonstrate how Southern California teams can play for the postseason.

The Angels have missed the MLB playoffs for 11 consecutive seasons — including six with stars Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout on the roster — and have reached the postseason six times since Moreno purchased the team in 2003 after the franchise’s sole World Series title win in 2002.

Team officials did not respond to The Times’ request for comment on the fans’ protest, but manager Kurt Suzuki addressed the “sell the team” chants that are so loud they can be heard during Angels television broadcasts.

“I know it’s a thing, the no shirts and waving,” Suzuki said. “But yeah, we see it. We recognize it. They have the right to their opinion, and … they cheer for the guys, they roll-call them. I think it’s pretty neat for them to have that kind of support.”

A fan wears a bag over his head that says “Sell the Team Arte!!!” during a game against the Rangers on Friday at Angel Stadium.

(Mark J. Terrill / Ap Photo/mark J. Terrill)

Suzuki added that the Angels remain focused on winning and haven’t paid the chants too much attention.

The Angels entered Sunday’s game ranked No. 9 in MLB attendance with 34,555 announced fans per night, according to ESPN. There are swaths of empty seats during every home game, suggesting some season ticket holders are choosing to stay home.

There is an expanding contingent of fans in the upper deck adjacent to the right-field foul pole who have chanted “sell the team” while waving T-shirts, joining in on a trendy “tarps off” fan movement across MLB sparked by Cardinals fans in St. Louis.

Angels fans who haven’t joined the protests are pleased to see the calls for change.

“I think it’s good that there’s fans that are passionate enough to actually speak out, to want to see a better team and really want to get us back into the playoffs,” Darren Shimasaki, an Angels fan from Yorba Linda, said Friday.

Debbie and Reed Olive, meanwhile, said they usually attend games for the promotions.

“You’re not going to come away with the wins,” Debbie said. “So, we got to get something for our ticket price.”

Even the fan experience unrelated to winning that Moreno touted has taken a hit.

Angels officials said they quickly resolved a rodent infestation Orange County health inspectors flagged at an outdoor food stand in View Level Section 432. Videos of stadium workers capturing a possum in one fan section and spraying gnats on the field during the last few weeks haven’t helped the team’s image.

Reed said the rodent infestation “was a bad look” and that the Angels need a new stadium in addition to a new owner.

Catcher Logan O’Hoppe, who has spent his five-year career with the Angels, said he understands the fans’ frustration.

“We don’t like not doing well, either,” O’Hoppe said. “It’s not OK to us. It doesn’t matter how much we’re getting paid or that we get treated great throughout the league and things like that. We hate it, too. I think people definitely don’t realize that. I think I can speak for a lot of guys in here that we dedicate our lives to this. … We’re not happy with how it’s going, but we’re doing everything we can to fix it.”

O’Hoppe is a New York Rangers fan and gets frustrated when his team struggles, but he said he reminds himself that “we’re all humans.”

The Rangers’ Josh Jung is tagged out at home by Angels catcher Logan O’Hoppe on Friday at Angel Stadium.

(Mark J. Terrill / Ap Photo/mark J. Terrill)

Angels left fielder Wade Meckler, who made his debut on Friday night, is an Orange County native who grew up cheering for the team.

“I mean, I get it,” Meckler said. “It’s a hungry fan base. The fan base is hungry for a winning team. So I understand, you know, being frustrated. They just really want a winning team.”

Meckler has been following the Angels since age 5 and remembers feeling dejected after attending the Angels’ 4-1 home loss to the Royals in Game 2 of the 2014 American League Division Series.

“It’s a super loyal fan base,” Meckler said. “I feel like they show up with energy every day.”

The Angels are on track to miss the postseason for a 12th consecutive season, prompting restless fans to call for new owners who will invest in building a team capable of reaching the playoffs.

“Arte don’t know what he’s talking about,” said Austin Kleschka, an Angels fan who joined Gonzalez at the front of Saturday’s protest. “Winning is a priority. We want that.”

Friends, motorists, fellow Americans: The road ahead is far from straight. But it will take us through eight states and dozens of small towns, past Muffler Men and Patel motels, beneath the bright lights of Tulsa and Tucumcari, up close to Edward Hopper’s “Nighthawks” and Angel Delgadillo’s barber chair.

In other words, it’s Route 66, an American artifact that turns 100 in November and seems to contain more curiosities and paradoxes than the Midwest has cornstalks.

To see all that up close and catch America’s Main Street making ready for its centennial summer, I drove the entire stretch — from Chicago to Albuquerque in one trip, then Albuquerque to Santa Monica in another, a combined 17 days on the road.

• Share via Close extra sharing options

Even before that first day of driving brought me to Springfield, Ill., I’d realized that more days would have been better. As traveler Leonidas Georgiou of Greece told me, “This is a lifetime journey.”

You quickly see that this 2,448-mile route is actually a medley of rural highways, small-town main streets, frontage roads and inescapable bits of Interstate 40. You roll from Midwest farmland to Southwest desert to the Pacific, rising and falling between sea level and 7,000 feet. The roadside signs and buildings, restored and ruined, cry out for more than a drive-by snap. And people are happy to see you, because Route 66 is what keeps some of these towns alive.

Beginning with your first miles — and a cup of coffee at Lou Mitchell’s diner in Chicago — you meet all sorts of travelers. A mother and daughter from New York. The California couple who just retired from the Air Force. The European cop who persuaded his mom to come along, then had her sleep in the car to save money. The “roadies,” many of them retired, who return every year. Some come for the scenery, some for the signage, some for the conversations.

Depending on whom you ask, this might be the most famous highway in the world. It is the inspiration for a short, happy song that’s lasted 80 years (Bobby Troup’s “[Get Your Kicks on] Route 66”) and a long, sad book that’s lasted 87 (John Steinbeck’s “The Grapes of Wrath”). Then again, if you were born in this century, you probably know the road’s story best from the 2006 Disney-Pixar movie “Cars.”

As the miles go by, you realize that Route 66 hasn’t been strictly American for a long time. Many Route 66 merchants and hoteliers say that most of their customers are travelers from abroad. Beyond that, many Route 66 entrepreneurs are from families that came to the U.S. in the last 50 years. I met a restaurateur from Lebanon, one motel owner from the Netherlands and four more motel owners, all named Patel, whose families arrived from India after 1965.

Route 66 west of Seligman, Ariz.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

“You never know what language or accent you’re going to hear,” says Rhys Martin, Tulsa, Okla.-based manager for the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Preserve Route 66 initiative. “You’ve got new business owners. You’ve got unique cuisine. You’ve got this cultural diversity. You’ve got the African American experience. It’s more complicated than just a trip back in time.”

And this year is especially complicated.

Hundreds of small businesses along the route have been investing in centennial upgrades and celebrations, including a 19-day national caravan that begins June 6 in Santa Monica. But 2025 was slow on 66, in part because many Canadian visitors stayed away after President Trump proposed taking over their country.

1.) Views of the Chicago skyline from Navy Pier. 2.) Millennium Park, Chicago. (Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

Now, on the brink of summer, soaring gasoline prices could keep many Americans home, and President Trump’s America-first rhetoric and nonresident fees might drive more international travelers elsewhere.

“We all worry about that,” says Terri Ryburn, owner of Ryburn Place Gifts & Gab in a 1930s gas station in Normal, Ill.

“We need new roadies,” says Anna Marie Gonzalez, co-owner of the Aztec Motel & Creative Space in Seligman, Ariz. “And the roadies need to be American this year.”

Now my rented Ford Escape SUV is rolling and my windshield is full of rural Illinois. Water towers, grain elevators, flags on barns. Black and white cows.

The skyline view from Chicago’s Navy Pier is half a day behind me, as are the crowds around the big silver bean in Millennium Park and the great American artworks in the Art Institute of Chicago (where “Nighthawks” hangs).

Experts say that about 85% of the old highway is still drivable. But some states post more signs than others. And everywhere, people steal signs.

Ah, but not these signs. One for a barn sale off Stripmine Road. A warning that Funks Grove has sold out of pure maple syrup. Somebody selling deer pee to hunters.

When I cross the state line, I face a billboard pitching “Uranus Fudge Factory, Missouri’s No. 2 Attraction.”

After I pass the exit comes the sequel message: “Uranus is behind you.”

The Wagon Wheel Motel stands along Route 66 in Cuba, Mo.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

The Route 66 timeline starts in November 1926. That’s when state and federal transportation officials embraced the idea of connecting scores of cities and small towns with one long, paved road.

As I pull over for a barbecue dinner in tiny Cuba, Mo., the 90-year-old Wagon Wheel Motel pops up like a slideshow illustration of that time. The stone-walled motel looks unchanged in decades, but sleepy.

“Never closed,” says a sign in the window with a phone number. “If office locked we are close by.”

The Rockwood Motor Court in Springfield, Mo., is a window into the same era. Built in 1929, my $77 room is compact and the plumbing is delicate, but all the vintage vibes are present. Phyllis Ferguson, desk clerk, owner and “old building hugger,” is full of tips on roadside businesses and where to stay, because “I know these little tourist courts are getting fewer and farther between.”

Boots Court motel opened in 1939 to capitalize on Route 66 traffic in Carthage, Mo.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

In Carthage, Mo., at Boots Court, desk clerk Jason Shelfer shows me a splendidly restored 1939 room where Clark Gable slept and tells me he never appreciated the reach of Route 66 until now.

“When people from Brazil come to Carthage, Missouri,” Shelfer says, “something magical is happening.”

And there’s another side to this magic: 66 can also be invisible up close. Not just because of missing signs, but because it has aliases everywhere. It’s Jackson Boulevard in parts of Chicago, Garrison Avenue in Carthage and Main Street in Galena, Ks., where 18-year-old cashier Kassidy Kell welcomes me into Gearhead Curios.

“Before my job,” she confesses, “I had no idea what the thing was with Route 66.”

It was John Steinbeck who called 66 the Mother Road. But if the Mother Road has a father, it’s probably Cyrus Avery, a Tulsa businessman and big wheel on the Oklahoma Highway Commission in the 1920s. Avery, who now has his own plaza in Tulsa, campaigned for a Chicago-Los Angeles route through his hometown. Little did he know what was coming.

The Cyrus Avery Centennial Plaza features a bronze sculpture called “East Meets West,” just off the now-closed Cyrus Avery Route 66 Memorial Bridge in Tulsa, Okla.

(Mike Simons / For The Times)

Within a decade, drought and Depression had forced legions of Dust Bowl migrants from Oklahoma and beyond on desperate journeys west, using Route 66.

A decade beyond that, the end of World War II in 1945 filled the road again, this time with happy travelers.

That postwar era is what many people now think of as a simpler time, and perhaps a better one. But segregation and “sundown towns” were still in place along much of the route. For travelers of color, a carefree road trip would have been impossible. And for many Native Americans, the roadside proliferation of cowboy/Indian caricatures would have been nothing to smile at.

But these were years that reshaped the look of Route 66. Hundreds of motels, shops and gas stations rose along the road, often designed in bold geometry and bright colors.

Mary Beth Babcock at her shop Buck Atom’s Cosmic Curios in Tulsa, Okla. In the background is her giant, Stella Atom.

(Mike Simons / For The Times)

Flash forward now to Tulsa’s Meadow Gold District, a.k.a. “land of the giants.” In 2018, retailing veteran Mary Beth Babcock took over an old gas station, dubbed it Buck Atom’s Cosmic Curios on 66, and soon opened more shops nearby.

Then, to get attention and make drivers smile, she put up a few “muffler men” — roadside fiberglass giants. She started with Buck and Stella Atom, a space cowboy and cowgirl who loom over 11th Street, looking to the past and future.

“Americana!” says Babcock. “Road trip! Who wouldn’t want to do that?”

Near the east edge of the Texas panhandle stands the most elegant gas station you’ll ever see: the 1936 U-Drop Inn and Tower Station in Shamrock, which drips with Art Deco style. (No, you can’t get gas there. But you can eat at the cafe inside or charge your Tesla in back.)

In Groom, stopping for gas, I spy the largest cross I have ever seen — 190 feet high and 110 feet wide. Nearby, I glimpse a crooked water tower — built to attract tourists and billed as the Leaning Tower of Texas.

Sorry, Groom. I’m not stopping.

The fastidiously restored U-Drop Inn, a Streamline Moderne filling station and cafe in Shamrock, Texas, is one of the architectural standouts of Route 66. It doesn’t sell gas, though.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

I reach Amarillo just in time, grab paint cans and hustle out to the field where a line of 10 old Cadillacs stand half-buried. As the sun sets, they throw 50-foot shadows while the scent of spray paint fills the air.

This is Cadillac Ranch, an art installation from the 1970s where visitors are free to add their own paint, whatever they like. Mine says “Read Something.”

Next comes Tucumcari, N.M., one of the few places to sleep between Albuquerque and Amarillo. Because of that, it used to get thousands of road-trippers. They’d slowly roll down the main drag, choosing favorites from a riot of snappy names and caricatures lit in gleaming neon.

“They tell me it was like driving into a little Las Vegas,” says Gar Engman, owner of Tee Pee Curios.

But I-40 changed everything.

In 1956, President Eisenhower called for a better interstate highway system. By the mid-1960s, wider, faster interstates started opening, flanked by chain hotels and restaurants. After I-40 bypassed Tucumcari in 1981, and train service dropped off as well, Tucumcari crashed. Just about every town along 66 has a version of this story, especially in New Mexico and Arizona.

Visitors to the Cadillac Ranch art installation in Amarillo, Texas, are allowed to spray-paint the 10 Cadillacs half-buried in the ground there.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

So is Tucumcari a ghost town? Not exactly. Many buildings stand empty and the Apache Motel’s vintage sign rests flat in a parking lot like a fallen soldier. But several motels are clearly doing fine, as is Tee Pee Curios. At night you still see a great set of signs. Most dramatic is the Blue Swallow Motel with its bird in flight, cursive letters and promise of “100% refrigerated air” — maybe the most photographed sign on 66. But you can’t ignore Motel Safari, the Roadrunner Lodge and La Cita restaurant, which wears a red sombrero and serves a fine Frito pie.

In Newkirk, N.M., four turkeys cross the road, leaving me groping for a punch line.

In Santa Rosa, N.M., I tiptoe into the Blue Hole, an artesian well that’s always 62 degrees, then tiptoe out again.

Turkeys on Route 66, Newkirk, N.M.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

In Albuquerque, I roll past many blighted blocks on Central Avenue, then jog 65 miles northwest to sample the art and wealth of Santa Fe.

In the farmers market there, I give public poet William Curius $20 to pound out a Route 66 poem on his Royal typewriter. In 20 minutes, he comes up with a solid effort, but it’s nothing compared to his answer when I ask his age.

“I don’t identify with age. This is how you die. Counting each year.”

In Petrified Forest National Park — the only national park directly on the route — I hike among red rocks and howling wind.

By the time I reach Williams, Ariz., several people have told me that the European travelers know more about Route 66 than the Americans do. So when I see four guys from Greece on the sidewalk, I try that idea on them. Alex Andros, age 30, nods immediately.

“If you come to Greece,” he says,”you probably know more Greek mythology than us. So that makes sense.”

Now we arrive at Seligman, Ariz. It’s tiny, with a population south of 800. But in the lore of Route 66, Seligman is big. Because of Angel Delgadillo.

By 1985, though the roadway was still mostly intact, Route 66 was officially obsolete, decommissioned as a federal highway. Starved for visitors, Seligman was dying. But Delgadillo, a barber with deep roots in the town, had an idea. He and his wife, Vilma, rallied business people from nearby towns to seek historic status for their stretch of Route 66. After they prevailed, they started a statewide organization and set a national movement in motion.

Angel & Vilma Delgadillo’s Original Route 66 Gift Shop on Route 66 through Seligman, Ariz. (Mark Lipczynski / For The Times)

Scenes from Route 66 in Williams, Ariz. (Mark Lipczynski / For The Times)

The Delgadillos’ business, now a gift shop, endures on Seligman’s main drag, as do Vilma and Angel, who celebrated his 99th birthday in April. Two daughters help run the shop, which includes an old barber chair where you can sit for a selfie.

The westernmost stretch of 66 in Arizona is a driver’s dream and a magnet for motorcycles. Those 158 miles make up the longest-surviving continuous stretch of Old 66, beginning just east of Seligman, veering away from the railroad tracks, cutting through Kingman, twisting and turning through Oatman and the Black Mountains, eventually rejoining I-40 at the state line.

Then it’s time to cross the Colorado River. Roar through Needles. Pause at the Roy’s sign in Amboy for dusk. Crash for the night in Barstow.

At San Bernardino’s Wigwam Motel, I wind up chatting with a mother-daughter duo of Canadian travelers.

“I was against coming down,” admits Sharon Prinz, 75, of British Columbia.

1.) The stretch of old Route 66 between Kingman and Topock in western Arizona is known as “Arizona Sidewinder” for its 191 turns, often without guardrails. The old mining town of Oatman, known for its roaming donkeys, is on the way. (Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times) 2.) The Magic Lamp Inn in Rancho Cucamonga. (David Fouts / For The Times) 3.) Foothill Drive-In sign on the campus of Azusa Pacific University. (David Fouts / For The Times)

“It’s a timing thing,” says Wendy Prinz, 51, who talked her mom into coming. “If you put off something for a year, you might never get the chance.”

The end is near, and I’m feeling like a marathoner at Mile 25. Creeping along Foothill, Colorado, Sunset and Santa Monica boulevards, I scan the scene for old signs. Rancho Cucamonga’s Magic Lamp Inn! Azusa’s Foothill Drive-In! (But there is no drive-in, just the sign.)

And then, at dusk, it appears: the Santa Monica Pier and the sign declaring I’ve reached the “end of the trail.”

All those miles. Yet already, I’m making a mental list of stops to add and detours to try next time.

A sign marking the end of Route 66 on the Santa Monica Pier.

(David Fouts / For The Times)

“It’s so easy to use up all your time and end up running behind,” says Ian Bowen, manager of the pier’s 66 to Cali kiosk. “It took me six years to do the whole road.” And then, he adds, “you become part of the community.”

And you see how, in so many ways, the road is one long small town. When Brenda at the Midpoint Cafe in Texas sends a guest westward with a coconut cream pie for Robert and Dawn at the Blue Swallow Motel, Robert and Dawn thank her on Facebook (“It’s like a hug in a box”) and scores of roadies applaud. When Angel Delgadillo turns 99, West Side Lilo’s Cafe is ready with carrot cake. After Beth Hilburn adds a giant outside her Hi-Way Cafe, Mary Beth Babcock heads over from Tulsa to Vinita to say hi.

And when a rookie roadie finishes his first 66 trip, he has to wonder: Who will be out there this summer? Will it be enough to keep this fragile recovery going?

If this is the story of America’s Main Street, what’s the next chapter?

Famous signs along the nearly 2,500 miles of Route 66 include the 66-foot soda bottle at Pops in Oklahoma, the wagging neon tail of Albuquerque’s Dog House and the hand-painted slogans for Snow Cap Drive-In in Arizona. But in L.A., none is so iconic as the giant looming penguin that signifies milkshakes, burgers, oldies playlists and sheer Americana at the end of the road.

Stories, photos and travel recommendations from America’s Mother Road

The Mother Road that stretches from Chicago to the West Coast unofficially ends at the Santa Monica Pier, but at its technical terminus, Mel’s Drive-In declares the “ROUTE ENDS HERE,” inlaid in terrazzo beneath that jumbo tuxedoed penguin. It’s been a beacon for decades, and though the beloved restaurant space recently was listed for sale for $26 million, Mel’s owners hope it remains a diner and destination for generations.

For much of its history, the diner at the end of Route 66 was the 1959-founded Penguin Coffee Shop, a Googie-architecture marvel of angular windows, rock walls and little cartoons of penguins hanging above swivel stools and an open kitchen.

The original penguin sign from the former Penguin Coffee Shop still stands at Mel’s Drive-In in Santa Monica.

As a very young child I remember sliding into the booths with my father, whose office was nearby on Wilshire. Back then, the tall angled ceilings seemed to soar and the breakfast combos looked mountainous.

“It was a Googie kind of restaurant — you know, we don’t have that many of them around anymore,” my dad recalls. “It had an aura of roadside diner about it. … Everybody would see the giant penguin out there. I don’t think Burgess Meredith ever ate there, though.” The joke takes me a beat before landing; my version of Batman’s Penguin will always be Danny DeVito.

“It was a Googie kind of restaurant — you know, we don’t have that many of them around anymore,” the writer’s dad recalls.

We’d visit every month or two, until the Penguin closed its doors in 1991 and transformed into a Western Dental office, which kept the penguin sign but dropped those high ceilings and removed the kitchen along with other hallmarks of its roadside charm. Thankfully, its journey didn’t end there.

The Weiss family, which founded Mel’s Drive-In diner in 1947, had been eyeing the property for years and signed a lease in 2016. Then there was the link to their own history: The prolific Armet & Davis architecture firm designed the Penguin as well as the current home of Mel’s Sherman Oaks.

“When the dentist office went out of business,” said co-owner Colton Weiss, “it seemed like a no-brainer to make it Mel’s and bring it back to the glory days of being a diner.”

What followed were two years of “very expensive” renovations, according to the third-generation Mel’s owner.

Beyond the iconic penguin sign — which obtained “historically or architecturally significant” designation in 2000 — Mel’s pays homage with the large sculptural, custom-made glass globe lights, which replicate the original’s. The Weisses hired garden specialists to review decades-old photos of the Penguin Coffee Shop to determine which varieties of flowers decorated the front of the restaurant, then they replanted them.

Since the building’s reopening in 2018, thousands of guests have ended the journey along Route 66 with a meal in the diner.

While sledgehammering drywall, they uncovered the diner’s original rock wall. Along a hallway near the bathrooms, a small gallery of Penguin Coffee Shop photos offers another glimpse of the predecessor. This location also features a marshmallow-and-chocolate-sauce Penguin Shake in honor of the tuxedoed mascot of the original.

It wasn’t until they were close to signing a deal that they realized it sat along Route 66.

“We’re like Route 66 authorities now,” said Weiss, whose father, Steven Weiss, was largely responsible for the restoration.

Since the building’s reopening in 2018, the owners say thousands of guests have ended their travels with a meal in the diner. They bustle through the doors after the long journey, sometimes bedecked in Route 66 merchandise, and sometimes buying Mel’s own brand of Route 66 merch while there.

Atmosphere and details of Mel’s Drive-In Diner.

“We had a guy do it in a ’67 Chevy, that was on his bucket list: Older guy who did it with his wife, and it was a convertible,” said Weiss. “He did it in summertime, so by the time he showed up he was covered in dust and dirt. He couldn’t be happier to make it to Mel’s and get a burger.”

Another, he said, did the whole route on a bicycle.

The diner offers certificates of completion for those who finish the trek, and devised a burger named for the route. A fish tank at the entrance features a Route 66 theme, as does a mural on a small wall of the parking lot. Two official signs, placed by the city, denote the location’s significance.

“The city knew there’d be renewed interest in a diner being the real ending of Route 66,” Weiss said. “Before, I don’t know anybody who’d want to end their trip at a dentist’s office. Maybe somebody who broke their teeth on the way.”

But the trail’s end could someday see its own end. The property was listed for sale in 2025. Representatives for the building’s management company didn’t respond to requests for comment.

“We’re trying to keep it there as long as possible,” Weiss said. “People really enjoy this location, and it seems like one of the last diners in Santa Monica.” Weiss declined to comment further.

Mel’s assistant manager Yazmin Minguelasays she sees more travelers now because it’s the centennial of Route 66. “But even before that, we still had a lot of visitors.”

She’s worked for Mel’s 22 years, six of which have been spent in the Santa Monica restaurant. Her shifts are full of Westside regulars, celebrities and guests finishing their trip along Route 66.

“Ending on a diner is nostalgia,” my dad mused. “Having a place like Mel’s, which is a substitute for the kind of flea-bitten ptomaine joints that you might get along Route 66, brings back memories to very old people. And very new people ask questions like, ‘Who’s Burgess Meredith?’”

Mel’s Drive-In is open at 1670 Lincoln Blvd., Santa Monica, Sunday to Thursday from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., and Friday and Saturday from 7 a.m. to midnight.

JET fuel restrictions could hit airlines on a global scale, a major airline owner has warned.

International Airlines Group (IAG), who owns British Airways, Iberia and Aer Lingus, initially said that most of its airlines will unaffected this summer.

However, they warned that if the crisis continues, shortages will result in restrictions across the globe.

They said: “If the current conflict continues to restrict flows of both crude oil and jet fuel from the Middle East, there is the potential for supplies of jet fuel to be restricted on a global basis.

“We are engaging with governments in each of our home markets as well as with the EU to ensure that the industry is getting the support it needs to navigate this situation.”

IAG has said they expect their profit to be lower than anticipated. It also expects spend more than £1.72billion extra on fuel costs that previously predicted.

Read more on flight crisis

FINAL CALL

All of the airlines that have been forced to close this year

FUEL FEAR

All the airlines that have cancelled flights amid jet fuel shortage holiday fears

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz since March has resulted in fears of fuel shortages, and caused airlines to start hiking prices.

Some airlines, such as Lufthansa, Scandinavian Airlines and Cathay Pacific, have already reduced their flights scheduled for the upcoming months in an attempt to avoid cancellations caused by shortages.

Other airlines like Air France and Virgin Atlantic have already increased the cost of flights.

Despite the warnings, UK airlines have said they are not expecting to be affected by cancellations this summer.

Tour operators including Jet2 and TUI have said they are operating a full schedule as planned.

And IAG said that 70 per cent of the company has hedged fuel for the rest of 2026.

Here are all the airlines that have cancelled flights due to the jet fuel crisis.

KIM Kardashian’s Met Gala megaboobs were spray-painted at an auto repair shop in Kent — and its owner said tonight it was an “honour”.

Martyn Smith, 55, spent 13 hours on the orange fibreglass creation at his garage in Lydd on Romney Marsh.

He felt “very proud” at seeing reality star Kim, 45, wear it in New York this week.

The Brit garage owner was asked to do the “top-secret” breastplate paint job — and was only told it was for Kim when he finished.

He said he agreed to drop work after being approached at his auto repair shop on a Kent industrial estate by two local artists.

Against the clock, he spent 13 hours prepping and spraying the orange fibreglass piece, worn two weeks later by Kim at the Met Gala.

Read more on Kim Kardashian

RACY LOOK

Kim Kardashian’s tribute to X-rated movie in pointy boob dress at Met Gala

price cut

Staggering amount Kim Kardashian’s hairdresser charges for a haircut revealed

Martyn, who runs MPS Body & Paint, would not say what he charged — but it was “in the hundreds not the ­thousands”.

He added: “When I saw it, I felt very proud and honoured. I only had 24 hours to do it.”

The breastplate was co-created by Kent artists Patrick Whitaker and Keir Malem, who then went to ­Martyn after he had repaired their car a few years earlier.

The dad of two, who works at the auto business with sister Nicki Hill, 50, said: “It looked great, but it had imperfections and tiny air holes which I had to fill with stopper.

“It had mould lines which I had to smooth out, before re-priming it and rubbing it down. It then needed a base coat and a lacquer top coat.

“With drying times, it was a lengthy process, but I knew it had to be perfect. I worked all day on it until 8.30pm.

“It was kept hush-hush as they told me it was top secret.

“I thought it might be for Madonna or Gal Gadot given the design.

“When they collected it they finally told me it was for Kim Kardashian.”

Martyn said he knew the name but was more of a fan of her boyfriend, F1 great Sir Lewis Hamilton.

Meanwhile, Nicki discovered Kim would be at the Met Gala on Monday night — her daughter Elli-Jane’s 20th birthday.

“She stayed up to watch it and said: “I was falling asleep as it was late and Elli-Jane shouted, ‘Mum, mum she’s wearing it’.

“She was bouncing up and down with excitement and then I was quite emotional.”

Martyn, who had gone to bed, said his paint job looked “fantastic” when he saw photos the next day, and the reaction since has been “crazy”.

He would welcome similar work but added: “I don’t know many people who have got a breastplate really.”

I’d heard Arte Moreno had told people recently that he thought the Angels could command $4 billion. He might sell the team. He might not. But the figure seemed ambitious, since no major league team ever had sold for even $3 billion.

Until Friday, that is, when the Wall Street Journal first reported the San Diego Padres were about to be sold for $3.9 billion.

The new owners: a group led by Jose Feliciano of Santa Monica-based Clearlake Capital, which manages more than $90 billion in assets, and his wife, Kwanza Jones. In 2022, Feliciano and Dodgers co-owner Todd Boehly led the investment group that bought Chelsea of the Premier League for $5.2 billion.

The new money should enable the Padres to build upon the legacy of late owner Peter Seidler, who simply disregarded the fact that San Diego ranks as one of the smallest media markets in the major leagues. He spent to win, and the Padres have made the playoffs four times in the past six years — after making the playoffs five times in their first 51 years.

The fans rewarded him, packing Petco Park. As of Friday, the Padres had the second-best record and second-highest attendance in the major leagues. The Dodgers, of course, had the best record and the highest attendance.

The party most immediately interested in the Padres’ sale price? The players’ union, since Commissioner Rob Manfred has cited sluggish appreciation in sale prices as one reason to pursue cost controls on player salaries, whether through a salary cap or some other restriction. In recent years, the owners of the Angels, Minnesota Twins and Washington Nationals all have put their teams on the market without completing a sale.

But Moreno should be interested, too. He turns 80 this summer.

The comparison with the Padres only goes so far. In San Diego, in a city without a team in the NFL, NBA or NHL, the Padres are virtually unchallenged for dollars from fans and corporate sponsors.

And, in San Diego, the Padres play in Southern California’s best ballpark, one the team has turned into a year-round events center, with major concerts in the stadium itself and smaller ones within a delightful park beyond center field.

Could Moreno get $4 billion without a resolution to the long-running ballpark stalemate in Anaheim? It sounds borderline insane to consider that the only available team in America’s second-largest market might not be worth as much as the team that just sold in America’s 30th-largest market.

In Anaheim, however, two deals that would have anchored the Angels there for decades collapsed, and the 60-year-old stadium is in serious need of renovation or replacement. A buyer likely would have to account for the billion-dollar cost of a new ballpark and might ask for a credit against the purchase price, effectively lowering how much profit Moreno could make on the sale.

Any potential buyer should be keeping a close eye on a bill slowly winding its way through the state legislature this year. That bill, if enacted into law, would give the city the ability to loosen development restrictions on the stadium property for a team owner willing to call the team the Anaheim Angels.

Still, even without that legal assist, there should be no shortage of parties interested in acquiring two rarely available assets in one transaction: an MLB team in the Los Angeles market, and a 150-acre site perfect for the mixed-use development coveted by owners in every sport these days.

Golden State Warriors owner Joe Lacob, who once worked as a peanut vendor at Angel Stadium, lost out in the Padres’ bidding and could take another run at the Angels.

Rams owner Stan Kroenke, who lost out in the Dodgers’ bidding in 2012, surrounded the Rams’ Inglewood stadium and Woodland Hills training site with major development and could consider replicating those successes in Anaheim.

Ducks owner Henry Samueli has denied interest in the Angels, but he could consider extending and complementing his OC Vibe development across the 57 Freeway — and his hockey team already wears the Anaheim name.

That assumes, of course, that Moreno opts to sell. He enjoys owning a team and, in a season in which the Angels are one-half game out of first place entering Friday in what appears to be a weak American League West, there is no hurry.

It is considered more likely that Moreno waits until after a new collective bargaining agreement is reached next year to determine whether to sell. All I can tell you for sure Friday is what one baseball official texted me when I asked for reaction to the Padres’ sale: “Great news for the Angels.”

A landlord fascinated by the space and the sky set up an observatory – in the back garden of his pub.

Alan Boddington, 67, first took interest in the space when looking at the moon with his uncle using a brass telescope on top of a coalbunker.

His fascination was further sparked when watching Neil Armstrong landing on the moon in 1969 during the Apollo 11 mission.

When he took over The Poltimore Inn, he saw an opportunity to build an observatory in back garden of the pub.

Located in the village of North Malton, Devon, the pub is on the edge of Exmoor National Park – Europe’s first ever dark sky reserve.

Minimal light pollution and cloudless nights mean thousands of stars and astronomical sights such as the Milky Way can be spotted.

COUNT ME IN

English county with some of the best pubs & beaches wants MORE tourists

BEACHY KEEN

Brits pack out beaches & parks as temps hit 26C on hottest day of the year

He said: “When a cloud comes over it means you can pop into the pub, have a pint and maybe sit by the fire to warm up.

“Once the sky clears you can come out with your pint and appreciate the dark sky.

“Takes a little while for your eyes to adjust but we have got red lighting all the way down to the observatory.

“It’s an unusual thing to have a pub with an observatory but also with our accommodation we can give people the opportunity to look at the Dark Sky.

Mr Boddington bought the Poltimore Inn in October 2012 from a large pub chain.

With his “long term” love for space he saw a potential to create an observatory outside the pub.

Five years ago he set up with observatory and it was funded by himself.

The telescopes costed around £10,500 and the building which was self-built was £27,000.

On a cloudless night it is possible to see the milky way, thousands of stars and astronomical sights from the Exmoor National Park.

He said: “I was introduced to the moon as a 9-year-old when my uncle brought over his telescope and set it up for me to have a look at the moon.

“The moon project Apollo went off and it was one of those things that your parents let you stay up for.

“I still have a lot of the newspaper cuttings.

“When it came to setting up the pub I thought it would be the ideal opportunity for me, with the Exmoor Dark Sky, to take advantage and also enjoy my hobby.”

Within the observatory, there is a permanently Polar and star aligned Meade LX200 12-inch telescope and a new era “smart” telescope in the Unistellar Ev-Scope.

There are also numerous other manual telescopes and Skywatcher Dobsonians for beginners.

It features an electronic roll off roof, a private outdoor decking observation area, as well as private amenities, plus tea and coffee making facilities.

He continued: “This has been a great boost to go from being youngster to seeing the Apollo to seeing this venture Artemis going off and going looping round the moon is amazing.

“Also the technology that is gone with it – we are going to be looking at tremendous pictures for the next six months as they are released.

“The Darkside of the Moon is something that we don’t generally see and I think we will have a lot of surprises from that.

“Also the eclipses will show us different details. We are really pleased to see the astronauts coming back safely and leave safely.

“I hope it really stimulates the whole space idea in Europe, in England and with the scientists in this country.”

The building of the Poltimore Inn Observatory helps him share his passion for astronomy and space exploration.

The Poltimore Inn Observatory holds regular monthly events run by astronomers Jo and Pete Richardson.

The primary school in North Malton also visits the observatory as part of their education.

He hopes his observatory keeps inspiring both young and old about the space and the sky.

To get to know more about The Poltimore Inn visit their website here.