‘Go Get Your Kicks’: The Europeans Obsessed With a U.S. Highway

Wolfgang Werz took a drag on his cigarette and a sip from his coffee cup, looked at his watch and blew his whistle. It was 8 a.m. in the parking lot of the Best Western in suburban St. Louis, time for Mr. Werz to rally his troops — a dozen German and Swiss tourists — so they could jump on their Harley Davidson motorcycles and head out on Route 66.

Mr. Werz, who is 67, rattled off the day’s stops on their roughly 200-mile stretch through Missouri: the Wagon Wheel Motel in Cuba; the rocking chair in Fanning; the Devil’s Elbow Bridge; the Redmon’s Candy shop in Phillipsburg; and, by about 5 p.m., Springfield, the birthplace of the highway known as the “The Main Street of America.”

Then Mr. Werz, a wiry, weather-beaten former ski instructor from Tubingen, Germany, looked at the group of middle-aged bikers in leather jackets and boots and gave them their marching orders on day three of their two-week, 2,500-mile sojourn from Chicago to Santa Monica, Calif.: “Let’s go get your kicks.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/06/business/route-66-highway-centennial.html