Life in the Big City: Tulsa, Part II, October 15, 2011

Dennis and I woke up to the distant sound of a car alarm.  It sounded like my car.  Dennis got up and put on his glasses and looked out the window.  It was our car.  As Jack Webb would say, “Time.  3:03 a.m.”  We put on clothes, took a cell phone, room card, and keys and went out to look.  The driver side windows were smashed out completely and the trunk was open.  Dennis’ travel guitar was gone.  I called 911 and was directed to the online website to file a police report. 

We went back into the hotel and reported the incident to the (very) young man at the front desk.  He really didn’t know what to do.  Dennis stayed there to try to get more help and I went back to the room to file the police report.  When Dennis came back, we got a call from hotel management giving us the number of a glass replacement place – closed at this hour, of course.  I had almost finished the report and needed more info – vehicle i.d., license plate number.  So we went back out to the car to get that info.  I took a closer look and realized that a bag I was carrying was also gone.  It had a notebook in which I was taking notes and had, unfortunately, several prepaid gift cards.  So, the thief just grabbed the things that would net a quick profit and ran.

Dennis called the insurance company and I finished the police report.  After I sent the report, I called the police to see if we needed to do anything else and to see if a police officer would be coming out to examine the car.  I learned that Tulsa no longer responds to theft and vandalism reports.  I will receive a police report number for my insurance and no further action is needed.  Welcome to life in the big city.  And what is wrong with us out of town yokels that we would leave anything of value in a car?  It is 4:10 a.m. and I am going back to bed or going to work out.

Route 66 Coming into OK!

We saw a lot today! (yes as MaryAlice said below) Here are some pics that help you join us on da road!! Above are the Grand Falls. Of course, nothing like the falls in MI but very nice!!
OH YEAH!! Even though there is only 13 miles of RTE 66 in Kansas this was cool
Rainbow Bridge.... Beautiful!

They wouldn't give her the keys..... : ( Yes it runs and is road worthy!

BushyHead! Glad we found it but... very scary!!

Oooook-la-homa! October 14, 2011

We had a very nice dinner last night.  I’m working on curtailing my food ordering because I just do not need that much food.  I’m beginning to long for a homecooked meal. 

This morning in Joplin, we had some Mother Nature time before we had Mother Road time.  We visited, and photographed, Grand Falls a bit south of Joplin.  It is the largest waterfall in Missouri.  Then we went to the Wildcat Glades and Audubon Center, a lovely nature center with fun displays and lots of trails that Dennis did not want to walk.  I especially liked the entrance to the nature center.  They have planted extensive gardens with native wildflowers.  It helped us capture the peace of a natural setting.  We needed that for our next adventure.

Dennis and I talked about Joplin and commented on the fact that we had not seen any of the tornado damage.  We both felt that it would be crude and insensitive to ask people where the damaged area was.  We found it by accident as we were driving up to the historic Rte 66 starting point for this day.

All of a sudden we were surrounded with roof-less buildings and bare ground where buildings once stood.  The damage was stunning.  It left us speechless – except for the occasional “oh my God – this is awful.”  The people of Joplin are obviously tough – they still live there – and they are re-building, but it was so numbingly sad. The damage was so complete and indiscriminate. We sent prayers up for the community and we were really glad that we had stopped there.

Once we hopped on the road our first stop on Rte 66 was at State Line Road to photograph the sign as we entered Kansas.  There are only 13 miles of Rte 66 in Kansas but they pack in the picturesque refurbished buildings.  We did not, however, stop in Kansas.  We traveled on to Oklahoma.

Remember the chorus from the song?  “Oklahoma where the wind comes sweeping down the plains.”  The wind comes sweeping because there is absolutely nothing to stop it!  Missouri was rolling and tree covered.  Oklahoma is really quite flat.  There are lots of ranches and hay.  We drove through many miles of rural vistas.  But we had to stop at Afton.

We drove by and came back to the Afton Station, a very nicely restored DX gas station.  We went inside and struck up a conversation with Phil who was working there.  He told us about the station and the cars – a collection of Packards.  We went into the display area and began shooting pix like crazy.  I hope Dennis posts the best ones.  It is an amazing and beautiful collection of cars.  Really – that’s when cars were CARS!

Then we drove toward some towns we were really looking forward to seeing – Bushyhead and Claremore.  This is a shout out to Lisa G. and Kelli F. and all of the folks who were in the Howell Community Theater production of Oklahoma.  Bushyhead (“I just come from there.”) is gone!  We tried to find it and found a street sign (picture) and some very Deliverance-like settings.  There were falling down houses and a few pick-up trucks and a few men who clearly knew that we (the folks in the shiny black Honda) were strangers.  Dennis agreed that we should not stop so I just snapped a photo of the street sign.  My how Bushyhead has changed!  And Claremore – everything is definitely up to date there!  We searched for the Lynn Riggs memorial (a story by Lynn Riggs inspired the musical) and found the remnants.  The original Surrey with the Fringe on Top was supposed to be there at the museum, but there was no surrey in evidence.  We took a picture of the site and the sign.  We saw the banner saying a new museum would be open soon and that things had been moved.  We followed directions and still no surrey.  Imagine our disappointment!  We really wanted the pictures of those two towns.

We headed on into Tulsa for our final challenge of the day – finding a hotel.  Now I know you think that this could not be too hard, after all, Tulsa is a large city with lots of hotels.  But, if you come into town on historic Rte 66 you do not see lots of hotels.  You see lots of declining neighborhoods.  We drove all across the city and finally – after taking an ill-advised turn – we turned around and drove back into the city on highways.  We know that all of the hotels are near freeways!  We found a La Quinta that is clean and seems reasonable.  We need to remember to do the hotel search in a more organized fashion.  We were also hampered by the lack of a good Oklahoma map.  Tomorrow we will try to find one and we will probably stop at one of the two Rte 66 museums.

Our hotel has laundry facilities.  This is good because our laundry is piling up!  Happy trails to you and to tomorrow!

More From MO!!

Stonehenge, 1/2 size at the University!



MaryAlice holding up Stonehenge..... and maybe the universe!

Yes, we drove over this bridge. REALLY FAST

Here's the statueof the Hubble, 1/4 scale.


The trip, as you can tell by what MA has said, has been awesome!!! The basis of course is 'The Mother Road' Rte 66. but it's becoming so much more. the history is truly coming to life. Not only are we the witness to the displays at museums and monuments, we are witnessing history in situ. The bridges designed and built 70 years ago, still standing, still beautiful, worn but beautiful. Other marvels of road construction, building construction, the places like the Trail of Tears and more... The spirit of America is so present in what we are witnessing. I will start adding some reflections now and then....I'll try not to get too deep but.... sometimes my philosophical background may come out!!
D

Through Southern Missouri, October 13, 2011

I find that I have lost my relationship with time.  I no longer have a clue what the time is.  We have discovered that breakfast and dinner seem necessary, but lunch can be skipped with no thought at all.  We left the car’s clock on Eastern time and let our phones keep track of local time.  We wake at sunrise and have coffee and work out before eating breakfast.  I am still concerned that eating in restaurants will result in weight gain and a serious lack of vitamins from fruits and veggies so we bought fruit from the grocery story (when we finally found one!).

I wanted to drive today – I really prefer driving through the rural areas, so today was my day.  We had a day of picture-taking and enjoying the serene and beautiful drive through the Ozarks.  Yesterday I described the terrain as gently rolling, but today we left gentle behind!  There were steep ups and downs and dramatic hairpin turns.  It was great fun to drive.  We started in Rolla with the goal of reaching Joplin before we stopped for the evening.

In Rolla we photographed the ½ scale model of Stonehenge.  It was created by the Missouri Science & Technology University students and staff.  We parked illegally in a staff lot and took a few quick but fun pix.  Then we hit the road.  We crisscrossed I 44 to stay on the “outer road.” And our first photo stop was at Devils Elbow.  The terrain was fiercely hilly and rocky and the road was very narrow.  We couldn’t even pull off when we stopped to take pictures, but we really had the road to ourselves today.  The bridge at Devils Elbow looks down on a sharp curve of the Big Piney River where the logs used to jam up because they couldn’t make the sharp turn.  It was a very steep drop and the view was breathtaking.

We stopped next in Lebanon at the Library to see their Rte 66 museum display.  The local folks have made a wonderful display that moved Dennis to take a short video of a pristine 1938 Buick Phaeton.  I was tickled by the huge salt and pepper shaker collection that was donated by one citizen.  It started as her mother’s collection and grew when friends traveled and bought the shaker sets as souvenirs.  Lots of them came from places along the Mother Road.  The library's map collection was truly amazing.  We saw one map of “Cloverland” – Michigan’s Upper Peninsula!  We also saw propaganda maps that were printed to stir up support for a national “good roads” system – contrasting that need to the building of the Panama Canal (the Canal was seen as a waste of our resources from which citizens did not benefit).  We were really glad we stopped there.

We worked our way through some confusing road construction in Marshfield so that we could take a picture of the miniature Hubble telescope in the town square.  Since you can see blue sky in the photo, you can tell it is not in space, but it was fun to see.  We have commented on the strong pride of place that we have seen in many Missouri towns.  Many of the water towers have the high school mascot name along with the town name, i.e., Strafford Tigers.  It is great to see the schools as such an important part of the community. 

Dennis did a great job of navigating us through Springfield and I paid attention with all my energy!  It was wildly busy with lots of highways and 4-lane surface roads.  I’ve been unusually cautious since I do not know the local laws.  I wanted to turn right on red but I wasn’t sure if MO allowed that – it does – and now I feel more comfortable.  But we’re headed into Oklahoma tomorrow and I have to observe and learn their rules.  After we left Springfield, we swapped driver and navigator duties and Dennis drove us into Joplin.  We did have one long stop when we sat in the car and waited on the “one lane road due to construction.”  When it was finally our turn to drive, our line of cars was escorted by a construction truck.

We chose to stay in Joplin today because we spend money wherever we stay and Joplin needs help.  It is a vibrant town with lots of events, and we have not seen the tornado destruction. We have seen evidence of a re-greening push to plant trees all over town. We found out that we are here one week too early, though, Octoberfest starts NEXT Thursday!

Traveling this way is an ongoing adventure and meditation on life in America.

Pictures from the THIRD day of travel!

The big Rocker!! MA wanted to check it out!

At the top of the Arch. 630 Feet up..... talk about getting high!

Note the bridge bending 22 degrees at the center! Incredible!

Crossing into Missouri, October 12, 2011

Oh my aching feet!  I had no idea we would be walking so much today.  We worked out at the hotel and left around 10:00 a.m. to find the Chain of Rocks Bridge into Missouri.  We have discovered that our guidebook often has terrible directions!  It never gives an estimated number of miles and rarely directs us to travel North, South, East, or West.  So we sometimes wander in circles.  We have begun to rely on our phones to help us find our way.  When we found the Chain of Rocks Bridge, we walked about one mile out and back and took pictures from the bridge (Dennis will post).  When we were in the middle of the bridge, we spotted a shoreline perch from which we would be able to take some great pictures, so we backtracked until we found the road that would take us there.  It was obviously a local fishing hole that was devoid of tourists – except for us.  Then we hopped on the highway and crossed the state line and exited to visit the Missouri welcome center. 

One of the workers there took pity on us and helped us with really specific directions to the Gateway Arch.  When we got there, we found parking that was a bit off the beaten path, so we walked some more.  We took the tram up to the top of the arch – awesome view!  Then we wandered around the museum of western expansion.  It is almost unbelievable when you see a covered wagon to imagine that people (families!) traveled the same distance Dennis and I are traveling under such extreme conditions.  It is amazing that the west was settled that way by such tough, determined people.  We are total wimps in comparison!

When we left St. Louis, we headed for Rolla – 106 miles away.  The terrain had changed dramatically from Illinois.  Now we were driving over rolling hills with lots of trees and rocky formations.  We are in the Ozarks.  We stopped at the Rte 66 state park in Eureka to see the great displays.  The park was formerly a victim of dioxin poisoning that has been cleaned up and memorialized with a great Rte 66 artifacts display.

We stopped at Stanton.  We wanted to see the Jesse James Wax Museum – a classic piece of Rte 66 kitsch.  We were so disappointed to discover that it is closed!  So we settled for a picture and jumped back on the road to Cuba.  Cuba is the Mural City.  There are 12 really beautiful and colorful murals on public buildings.  This was a brilliant idea of the community to bring attention to the local history and the many colorful elements of being part of the Mother Road.  We took pictures of one of the murals, but I have to tell you that this is worth the drive to see them all!  Outside of Cuba we had to photograph the giant rocker.  Hope you get a chuckle out of that picture!

We arrived in Rolla with the plan of staying at the “vintage” Xeno’s Motel and Steakhouse, but were greeted with the unpleasant aroma of cigarette smoke when we entered.  The reception desk was occupied by a man who looked like an undertaker (maybe even a vampire).  He told us that the rooms had wi-fi and that they had non-smoking rooms, but the only rooms available did not have wi-fi.  I said thanks but no thanks and we left.  That encounter set off all my “this is not a good place” alarms!  We drove back to the city center and checked into a Drury Inn hotel.  The pleasant young woman who checked us in commented on our wedding bracelets and on our fun journey.  We cheered up considerably and found our room to be comfortable, clean and satisfactory.

I really want to stay in a vintage Rte 66 hotel, but I really want the place to be clean and comfortable, too.  I will definitely post the results of this search!  When we were participating in the hotel’s happy hour, we met three other travelers: one who told us that Joplin is not back up to speed and may not have a hotel room when we need it (good warning for us), and two from Highland, Michigan.  This meeting of people along the way has been so much fun.  We are enjoying the road, the views of other places, the local people and the other travelers we meet.

We have found some fun things to do in Joplin so we may try to get all the way to Joplin tomorrow.