Travels with Charley

In September 1960, John Steinbeck began a trip across America. He felt as if he had lost touch with the country and its people, so he set out on a voyage of rediscovery to get to know the country again. He was accompanied by his famous French poodle Charley, and driving in his half-ton pickup truck Rocinante. His journey took him through forty states: from Long Island to Maine; through the Midwest to Chicago; onward by way of Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana (with which he fell in love), and Idaho to Seattle, California; heading south through San Francisco and Salinas to New Orleans, then eastward through the Mojave Desert and New Mexico to Arizona. He traveled through Texas, where he experienced hospitality so great that it could have filled an entire state, and finally traveled through Virginia, Pennsylvania and New Jersey to New York.