Join the Hi-Desert Nature Museum in celebrating the centennial of Route 66 with the multisensory exhibition, “The Journey is the Destination – 100 Years of Route 66,” opening October 17, 2026. The exhibition invites visitors to experience the landscapes and legacy of this historic highway on a journey of sight and scent. It features color photography panoramas of Andy Romanoff and Brian Helder, as well as the “scents” of Route 66, led by Sofia Collette Ehrich, The Olfactory Contractor. Community participation is at the heart of this exhibition, with locally lent memorabilia and original artwork inspired by memories of living and travelling along Route 66.
Commissioned on November 11, 1926, as part of the newly established U.S. Highway System. The 2,400-mile highway connected Chicago, Illinois, to Santa Monica, California by linking existing regional roads into a continuous all-weather national highway . Route 66 served as a vital artery for westward migration, delivering hundreds of thousands of people from the impoverished, drought-stricken Southern Great Plains and South toward the booming agricultural and emerging aerospace economies of the West Coast. More than just a road between two cities and states, Route 66 became a national symbol of mobility, discovery, and adventure. So, get hip to this timely tip, and get your kicks for Route 66 at the Hi-Desert Nature Museum in Yucca Valley.
About The Olfactory Contractor: Sofia Collette Ehrich is an olfactory museologist, researcher, educator, and public speaker, and the founder of The Olfactory Contractor, which helps museums and cultural institutions use smell as a deliberate tool of interpretation. Working across the United States and Europe at the intersection of academia, museums, and industry, she translates research into exhibitions, educational programs, and public engagement, developing the vision for how scent can interpret a subject and collaborating with perfumers to realize the scents. She previously served as olfactory events manager for Odeuropa, the European research project dedicated to uncovering and preserving Europe's olfactory heritage.