Oklahoma City and Route 66

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Spring has finally arrived here in the Midwest, and Fiona and I decided to celebrate by taking a road trip to Oklahoma City (OKC). What is at OKC you may ask, and that is a good question, because the answer is not much! However, the main reason for our visit was that OKC is almost halfway between Kansas City and Dallas where our good friends Leanne and Andy now live. Although Fiona has visited them a number of times, I had not seen them since they made the long trip out to Australia three years ago, so this was a great opportunity to catch up with them.



We loaded up our massive-ass car, somehow managing to fill it to the brim for a three day trip, and headed off on Friday afternoon after an early knock off from work. Although only a five hour drive away, it quickly became a laborious and punishing affair. The US Interstate system is bloody fantastic – the speed limits is 75 mph (120 kmph), so you can make pretty good time, but they are designed to be dead straight and flat. This certainly does not make for entertaining driving when said straight and flat road is carved through the dead flat grasslands that are the Kansas prairie. Miles and miles of drab and boring countryside rolled by as we powered our way down to Oklahoma….it was punishingly boring, but fortunately the kids had a good nap in the car.



After enjoying a traditional American meal - a Chinese buffet in some random small town, we arrived to our rental house in the heart of Oklahoma City. It was a beautifully finished old home surrounded by elegant homes in quite a ritzy suburb – very la-de-dah. Andy and Leanne were extremely excited to see us….so excited that Leanne fell asleep putting Zenia (her three year old daughter) to bed. This is the problem with catching up after a long and tiring week of balancing kids and work! However, Andy was up for a few drinks and so we enjoyed a couple of beverages (too many) before calling it a night at around 2am.



Next morning I was able to enjoy a gentlemanly sleep in thanks to Fiona and Andy getting up to attend to the wee ones. We smashed down breakfast and decided to head into the trendy ‘Bricktown’ area for the Saint Patrick’s Day festival that was being run. At this point I realized that I had forgotten to pack anything warmer than a t-shirt and found the cool breeze coming off the Rockies to be a little ‘nipply’. Andy thought I was just happy to see him! We had pretty low expectations of OKC – I have a US guide book which is about 1100 pages long and only four of them are dedicated to OKC, and two of those are a map. So we weren’t expecting much, but were pleasantly surprised by what we found.



One of the interesting things about OKC is that it is founded on oil. All through the centre of town there were functioning oil wells tapping into the liquid gold beneath the city. These oil wells were in the carparks of hospitals, the median strips of main highways, and even surrounded the state capital building – it was an incredibly bizarre thing to see in a large city. Bricktown proved to be a lively area with throngs of people dressed in green enjoying numerous live bands, street parties and green beer. The Bricktown area was centred on a man-made canal complete with boat tours which threaded it’s way through the city streets. This, and eight other rejuvenation projects, were the excellent initiatives of local government who introduced a ‘penny tax’ on goods and services within the city. In short time, this raised over $360 million and financed the rejuvenation of the Bricktown area, turning it from slum town into a thriving suburb full of restaurants and bars.



Another of the initiatives was the establishment of a new ball park for the local OKC baseball team. The ground was hosting a high school baseball game open to the public as we strolled past. We enjoyed America’s favourite pastime for a short while before the kids got bored and we decided to take a tour of the canal. The boat ride was a great way of seeing the city and understanding it’s rich and interesting history. The most impressive part of the tour was the almost complete 46 statue representation of the Oklahoma Land Rush of 1889 which literally founded Oklahoma City in a single day. The land rush was the opening of approximately 2 million acres of previously unassigned lands to the public. Approximately 50,000 people showed up to participate in the land rush which began with the firing of a cannon on midday on the 22 April 1889. The representation depicts the rush and chaos following the firing of the canon as the statues stream through the canal in order to seize the best possible plots of land on which to establish their future. With an initial population of zero, Oklahoma City literally emerged in a single afternoon with 10,000 residents by dusk with streets and city blocks staked out before evening. For those who have heard of them before, the terms ‘Sooner’ and ‘Boomer’ emerged from the Oklahoma Land Rush. Those who lined up for the firing of canon where known as ‘Boomers’, while those who (illegally) hid within the vacant 2 million acres waiting for the allotted time to pass were known as ‘Sooners’. It was a fascinating piece of recent American History depicted in an amazing peace of artwork which captured the chaos and sense of urgency of the event. After enjoying a few beverages at some of the local establishments, we headed home for dinner and a few quiet drinks. This time it was Andy’s turn to fall asleep putting Zenia to bed, so I seized the opportunity to catch a few extra hours of kip and left the girls to party on.



The next morning Fiona enjoyed a well-deserved sleep in while I played ‘King of the Kids’, or probably more accurately, 'unsuccessful cat herder'. After struggling to get food into four kids who just wanted to run, play Lego, and bang away at iPads, we headed out to the OKC National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum. It is a pretty impressive museum – it is relatively modern and beautifully appointed with outstanding exhibits. Whilst I wasn’t overly excited with the prospect of visiting, I found it a very entertaining and engaging museum. It had some great exhibits for the kids including an indoor re-creation of a generic 1880’s Wild West town which you could wander through, and a hands on kids area that they could run around in. This was all surrounded by beautiful grounds dotted with some intriguing sculptures including a giant depiction of ‘Buffalo Bill’.



After being immersed in cowboys and western heritage, we decided to head to Toby Keith’s (famous western singer) Bar and Grill. It specialized in good ol’ American cooking including some amazing BBQ ribs and their specialty ‘calf fries’, which turn out to be hand-breaded and deep fried calf testicles (otherwise known as Rocky Mountain Oysters)…..yummy! What was impressive was that he also offered a free Cheeseburger meal to any current or ex-military member in appreciation for service to their country. Pretty impressive generosity!



After lunch we all picked the veins out of our teeth (kidding) and said goodbye to Leanne and Andy as they trekked back to Dallas. We hung around a bit longer and visited the OKC bombing memorial site which was established to honors the victims, survivors, rescuers who were affected by the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19, 1995. It remains the most significant domestic act of terrorism in the United States which resulted in the death of 168 people with over 600 injured. The memorial is a peaceful greenspace laid out on the site of the bombing, which consists of a large reflection pool bookended by two gates reflecting the time immediately before and after the bombing. 168 sculpted chairs represent the victims of the bombing, with orchards used to remember the first responders who attended the incident site. It is a sobering experience wandering through the space and reflecting on how the actions of one individual could have a detrimental effect on so many lives and shape the character of a city which still bears the scars of an event almost twenty years ago.



After leaving the memorial we said goodbye to OKC – it had really been a great place to catch up with Leanne and Andy. It had a short but intriguing history, a vibrant social district which was dotted with oil wells, and the worst roads I have ever seen in a first world country. At times I was concerned the car could completely disappear into the pot holes in the roads - they were absolutely appalling. I am certainly not looking forward to opening the beers that were in the back of the car – I’m pretty sure they will be beer flavoured fizzing soda by the time I open them.



Whilst we said goodbye to OKC we started another short but entertaining journey – driving the famous Route 66. Oklahoma apparently contains some of the best and most original elements of America’s famous ‘Mother Road’. A 400 mile stretch that is relatively isolated from the terminal points of LA and Chicago and therefore driven less frequently than those parts easily accessible from the aforementioned cities. We chose to drive east towards St Louis before turning north along the small section within Kansas, and heading home. The first thing that struck us was that the road was bloody hard to find! In many places along the road, the interstate network subsumed Route 66 and so it was difficult to find our way onto the road as it was often actually part of an existing road. Following the near compulsory navigation argument we eventually struck out east along the famous road before hitting our first destination within about 10 mins – The Route 66 Soda Fountain in Arcadia, just outside of OKC.



Flagged by a giant 66 Foot tall soda bottle (see, we are already speaking American), this gas station (see!) has become an iconic landmark along the route. The Soda Fountain offers over 600 different varieties of soda and also has a retro diner style restaurant in which you can try the various types of beverage. Every flavour imaginable was available in all sorts of ridiculous luminous colours - clearly no natural colours and flavours here!!. The luminous bottles which were stacked floor to ceiling provided a modern day ‘stained glass’ which looked brilliant as the sun shone in through the glass walls of the shop. However, being so close to OKC, the place was absolutely packed with tourists buying soda by the bucket load – it was bloody noisy and crowded! We quickly left and jumped in the car looking for a place to eat. The answer soon presented when we arrived in Stroud OK, home of ‘The Rock Diner’ whose owner was the inspiration for the character of Sally in the Cars movie. The kids thought this was fantastic and the Disney and Cars memorabilia around the diner kept them entertained while we enjoyed a genuinely good meal.



We pushed on into the evening to find a place to stay the night in the oil boom town of Tulsa located in northeast Oklahoma. Fiona managed to do some wheeling and dealing with the hotel and was able to get us family rates for a hotel which had an indoor water park and breakfast included. We finally settled the kids and enjoyed a good night sleep before being greeted in the morning by super excited kids who couldn’t wait to hit the pool. We convinced them that they needed to eat first so we went to enjoy our free breakfast. Lucky it was free though – it seemed that they were out of everything…..including milk. What they did have was heaps of cereal (excellent) and loads of chocolate milk. The kids were in heaven….me, not so much. After a somewhat unique breakfast we threw the kids into the pool and they absolutely cut loose. It was such a great experience to watch as they really stuck together and looked after each other. Paddy showed his fiesty side and got into a tussle with another young boy he didn’t take a liking too….it was good to see him stick up for himself, although punches being thrown was not so great! After burning a bit of energy we threw the kids in the car and continued on our journey back along route 66.



Highlights of the final leg of the journey included a visiting a park full of totem poles, including the largest totem pole in the world. We also found a giant blue whale (wearing a green hat of course) built in a small lake which apparently passed as a water park in the 1950’s (things have changed a bit since then apparently). We also managed to find a very short stretch of the original road dating back to the 1930’s….if you blinked you would have missed it though (it was on the side of the current route 66). Route 66 was also dotted with a number of small towns which had seemingly withered on the vine with the establishment of the interstates (hence the storyline for cars). Many of the these little towns had boarded up or closed shops, but you could imagine how vibrant they would have been in the hay-day of the mother road. Overall, it was a great experience driving route 66 back home. It was a far more entertaining driving than ploughing along the interstates at 75 mph and it allowed us to experience small town America, providing a glimpse into the past at what things were like when travellers bought wealth and prosperity to these small towns. To quote the 'Cars' movie - you travel a road like route 66 not to make good time, but to have a good time.

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Photos

Route 66
Get your kicks baby!

Bricktown - OKC
Neither of the kids wanted a photo. Patrick was actually about 2 minutes post tantrum!

Bricktown Ballpark
I think Fiona is a bit confused about how to play baseball.....

Built on Oil!
We're not lying, the city is literally built on oil. Here's the State Capital building with an oil rig in the foreground.

Oklahoma Land Rush
Amazing Statues which capture the rush moments after the cannon was fired!

The Cowboy Museum
I clearly have insufficient wood...although Paddy thinks it's funny. Nick has the sads as he didn't want the little one, so he's off camera!

Bombing memorial
The reflection pool with one of the gates at the end. On the left you can see the chairs representing each individual who was killed in the bombing.

Soda Pop
'Weird Fluro Green drink that will kill you if you drink it' Steele

The Giant Soda Bottle
The huge soda bottle that attracts mucho tourists. Only a short drive from OKC.

Hanging with Lightning McQueen
The boys loved 'The Rock' Cafe.

Freaky Blue Whale
Why? And WTF is with the hat?

Random Totem Pole
Fiona enjoyed the park full of giant totems....for some reason I just found it unnerving...

Route 66
At the end of the trip...Route 66 in Kansas State.