Fruit 66 Sparkling Fruit Juice Fruit Punch

For as long as he could remember the road had called out to George. When he was younger he just loved the idea of cars. As he grew older he devoured the works of Kerouac and Ginsberg. Their words romanticized the road trip in a way that he had never imagined. When he was 16 he worked his little butt off and bought a junker car. He spent the next two years fixing up that car while he finished high school. The travel may have been in his blood, but he was a smart boy and he knew the dream couldn't last forever, well unless he fell into the druggy crowd and died of an overdose. That could seem like forever. The time had finally come and he had just graduated and it was also his 18th birthday coincidentally. He rushed home from the ceremony to print up the directions for his trip. He had decided to keep it old school and he was going to drive historic Rt. 66 all the way out to California, where he would bask in the sun and dip his toes in the tide.

When he got home he hit print, grabbed his backpack and was out the door. It was somewhere around his 7th hour of driving that he noticed something was wrong. He was pretty sure that Alabama was not west of Kentucky. He pulled over and took a better look at his directions; he was an idiot. He was so excited that he didn't really pay attention when he was typing into his computer. He must have hit the “F” key instead of the “R” and auto correct took care of the rest. He wasn't on Rt. 66, and from the looks of the map these directions wouldn't take him anywhere near it. Instead he was on “Fruit 66,” a series of roads that would take him to all of the major fruit farms that the United States has to offer. He decided that he had gone too far to turn back now, so he jut ran with it. He rationalized it by telling himself that it wasn't the destination that was important to this trip, but the ride itself, so it didn't matter where he went. It was also around this time that his old car was thirsty and needed to be filled up. When he pulled into the gas station he was surprised to actually see a Fruit 66 sign. He had assumed it was just a clever name the website had given to the route, apparently it was a real thing. He went in and there was a visitor's center with maps and photos and it looked like he was in for a treat. He also would be passing through South of the Border aka the most racist place in the United States. At the back of the center there was a cooler with cans of Fruit 66 sparkling juice. They were only $1 so he grabbed a couple of cans; one for now and one for the road. As he walked out of the center he cracked open the can and took a big gulp. It was getting hot now that he was getting further south and he was a growing boy, a very thirsty growing boy. As soon as the juice hit his tongue he knew his little snafu was for the better. If this juice was any hint of what this trip was going to expose him to, well then life was good. It was some of the best sparkling juice he ever had. It was basically seltzer water with a whole bunch of fruit juice in it; you know the fruit punch fruits. Normally seltzer water disgusted him, but the juice sweetened it up enough to make it still taste slightly dry, but to mask the seltzer flavor. It was 100% juice in this can and it reminded him of a better version of Juicy Juice. Sweet, fruity and healthy, it was exactly what he needed to lift his spirits and quench his thirst. If this was just the first stop of his adventure he knew he was in for a treat. He could only hope that all of the rest stops along Fruit 66 would also have cans of this juice. Perhaps if the beat poets had taken this route insted of Route 66, they wouldn't have had so many issues and they would have been content. Now onward to the peach orchards of Georgia!