Houston to La Junta, CO

Hello. Don't post on here much, mostly lurk, but I am planning a trip to visit a buddy of mine from Houston to La Junta, Co. I was wondering if anyone could suggest some good routes from the Houston area up to at least Amarillo. I am thinking after Amarillo the choices become few and far between.

I look forward to your replies.

It depends on whether you are looking for the fastest or wanting to take the back roads. Fastest of course is to take I-45 North to where you pick up I-35 West to Ft. Worth. When you get to Ft. Worth, take 287 to Wichita Falls and then on into Amarillo.

You can go through Amarillo North to Dumas and then swing NW to Clayton NM through Texline. US 64 then goes through the corner of NM and ends up in Raton, NM. That's a miserable stretch of road and has been under construction for 10 years and still has another 10 it looks like. About two thirds of that stretch in NM is 55 mph or less with cops behind every piece of construction equipment. At least it seems so. The only saving grace is you do see a lot of wildlife like antelope especially early in the mornings.
From there you pick up I-25 North into Colorado.

Another route into Colorado is take 287 North out of Amarillo to Hwy 50 and then West straight into Lajunta. That's probably your best route.

More of a Scenic route is 290 NW out of Houston to Austin, take 183 NW out of Austin to Lampasas and then take 281 north to Wichita Fall where it runs into 287 and then North to Amarillo.

I've done it more times than I can count. For my money, the ONLY way out of Houston going in that direction is to pick up 36 in Brenham and take it all the wat to Abeline. It is a very pleasant ride and you can make pretty good time. From Abeline on, the next 400 miles or so are generally pretty crappy, stright, flat, hot and boring, interspersed with small towns and sheriffs. I usually I-20 west to 84 to Las Vegas NM. from there you have some usable choices.

Even the worst (IMO) I-25 isn't bad.

Ride Safe
Dane

Lay your map down and draw a straight line from point A to B , Take the smallest roads printed on the map as close to the line as possible . Thats got to be better than any freeway . I probly will head to Colorado in mid july , then Wyoming , Montana , Idaho , Washington , Oregon , Callyfornia , then back home thru Nevada Utah and New Mexico . My route is 36 north west to Rising Star then north to 6 and north west to 385 and out of Texas . The biggest town on my route is Temple and it has a nice bypass around the south side of town . SEYA

Thanks for the replies. I definitely want to avoid interstates as much as possible and am planning on two days to get there and two to get back. I'll check out your suggestions.