The Little Towns of the Avenue

You're rolling through the string of small towns that give this drive its human scale — Phillipsville, Miranda, Myers Flat, Weott, Redcrest, Pepperwood. Blink and you'll miss any one of them. These were mill towns and roadhouse stops back when this was the highway, the only route through, before the freeway was pushed through the valley and took the traffic away. What's left is wonderfully old-fashioned — burl carvers with chainsaws, hand-painted signs, a general store, a diner, a few motels with neon. Stop at one. They're the last of a vanishing kind of American roadside, and the folks in them have watched these trees their whole lives. Myers Flat has the silliest attraction on the whole road, a redwood you can drive through.