Maybe 45 minutes or so? Just keep going on Amboy Road, which you would take to Sheephole Pass, then it curves around and there is salt "stuff" on both sides (processing center or whatever) until you get to the "sprawling metropolis" of Amboy by the train tracks. I'm pretty sure the salt mine is still in operation. There are little hills of sand or something on the east side, and a weird cracked looking surface on all the ground to the west. It's a cool place to pull over and let the kids break play with the cracked ground for a little while. lol There's not any place here to pull off the road and hide someone. Once you leave Sheephole Pass, there aren't the empty cabins and brush/bushes - it's flat and everything is visible for a long distance.
Amboy is probably the "ghost town" some people have mentioned previously, which looks like the people just vaporized. There's a really cool old motel lobby, floor to ceiling glass so you can see everything perfectly, and there's a grand piano and a stereo with a Frank Sinatra album propped up on it along with some other things. Pretty cool. It's right next to the gas station/cafe, and right across from the smallest post office I've ever seen. And that, my friends, is pretty much the entire town! lol (Actually, last week we saw 2 random Juan Pollo catering trailers abandoned out there. lol)
Wikipedia has some pics (the teeny tiny white building in the first one is the post office):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amboy,_California
Hilarious you should refer to it a sprawling metropolis. I was thinking exactly the same thing while "cruising" Rt 66 in Google maps. Still stuck in the space age and I bet Roy's was a hopping place back in the day. Used to be a cool old drive in called The Rocket around here that was similar vintage and style. Alas, long gone.
Cell tower behind Roy's looks a bit out of place though.
Nothing, just nothing out there. Lots of dirt.
ETA: What the heck is going on with quotes being blown out of boxes?