A rare photograph of John Steinbeck, his dog Charley, and the truck camper, Rocinante, taken in the hills near Salinas, California. The image is one of the few that exist from Steinbeck's 1960 road trip that became the basis for Travels with Charley.

You Don’t End up Here By Accident: Rediscovering Steinbeck’s California Beneath a Lone Valley Oak.

Inspired by an image of the famous author in an old poster, and after years of searching, Listening to America’s Russ Eagle, with the help of intrepid friends, discovers the remote spot in the hills near Salinas, California, that John Steinbeck, his dog Charley, and the truck camper, Rocinante, visited on their 1960 journey.
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near Fremont Peak

Where Steinbeck Said Goodbye to His California Home — Video Dispatch

Clay and Russ Eagle recently visited Fremont Peak, which overlooks California’s Salinas Valley and Monterey Bay. It was an especially important spot for John Steinbeck and deeply tied to his youth. Russ reads a passage from Travels with Charley, where the famous author writes about his last visit to there. 
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Rocinante keys

Were They Dreaming? A Rare Visit Inside John Steinbeck’s Iconic Rocinante

Clay and sidekick, Russ Eagle, spend time hanging out in John Steinbeck's historic truck camper, Rocinante.
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Off Interstate 40 (and old U.S. Route 66), at the Continental Divide in New Mexico.

Racing the Southern Interstates Across America

About three days and 2,870 miles: Clay makes a rapid dash across the continent. 
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Steinbeck House, Salinas

John Steinbeck’s Childhood Home — Video Dispatch

Earlier last summer Clay visited Steinbeck’s childhood home in Salinas, California.
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Nolan

Coast to Coast with Clay Jenkinson: Nolan’s 2024 Highlight Reel — Video Dispatch

Nolan Johnson, Listening to America’s intrepid videographer and podcast editor, shares highlights of his adventures with Clay while traversing the country from Long Island, New York, to the source of the Mississippi River to Monterey, California, on LTA’s 2024 Travels with Charley/Steinbeck Tour.
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Rockwell painting

Traveling With Charley: 1960 in the American South

Road-weary and keen to return home to New York, the final leg of Steinbeck’s cross-country journey took him through the troubled South of 1960.
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Ed Ricketts

A Visit to Ed Ricketts’ Pacific Biological Laboratories — Video Dispatch

Clay talks about John Steinbeck’s friendship with marine biologist Ed Ricketts and visits Ricketts’ Pacific Biological Laboratories on Cannery Row in Monterey, California.
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Steinbeck statue

John Steinbeck’s Beloved Monterey Bay — Video Dispatch

As Clay traveled across the country, he stopped at John Steinbeck’s beloved Monterey Bay, home of the author’s great friend Ed Ricketts and the inspiration for many unforgettable characters immortalized in his novels.
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Clay

The Grapes of Wrath on Route 66 — Video Dispatch

It was one of the hottest days of the summer of 2024. I was on Route 66, somewhere east of Needles, California.
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