Getting our Kicks on Route 66: Foss State Park, OK 6/19/08

This entire road trip is really about the journey and not the destination. Nothing captured that spirit more than today. We did our best to leave the campground early (for us), and managed to be on the road by 8:30. We finally caught up with Route 66 just south of Tulsa at Sapulpa by about 10ish. We had a guidebook to point out some of the old icons on the Route, but half the fun was trying to spot them ourselves. On several occasions we did a couple of laps through the small towns to find the old gas stations or motor car motels that were hidden among the modern day logos. Today’s photo was taken of a gas station in Davenport, just sitting there by itself without any history markers. I kinda liked that! (BTW- this place is for sale if anyone is interested). Route 66 from Tulsa to Oklahoma City seems to be more in tact than other sections and it’s easier to follow. It was crazy trying to follow it through Oklahoma City, especially since the Route in this location is mostly expressways or freeways through the city. I am still quite surprised at how beautiful Eastern Oklahoma is! Everything is lush and green, with beautiful rolling hills and lots of rivers and streams. I’m really glad I saw this firsthand. I always imagined Oklahoma to be like the dust bowl in Grapes of Wrath, geez was I wrong. Once we finally got through Oklahoma City and connected up again with Route 66 we enjoyed stopping at the town of El Reno. We spotted several of the original road icons and, after consulting our “Road Food” book, we settled on Sid’s a true roadside burger stand. The big “thing” in this part of the country is onion burgers. Basically, it’s hamburgers with a baseball size of onions that are grilled with the burger. The onions and burger get all mushed together and the onions sticking out become carmelized. (Glad I tried it, but don’t see it in my future.) This was washed down with a chocolate malt. (burp). We proceeded to the town of Clinton, listening to some tunes on the ipod we thought were appropriate – Patsy Cline, cowboy singer Johnny Prine, and some other road tunes I put together. Ned, by the way, has kept me entertained for 6,000 miles with his singing. Once again, he surprised me with some cowboy and folk songs. Did you know he plays the banjo, too?! I think that’s where he got his hillbilly repertoire. We spent an hour or so at the Route 66 Museum in Clinton and boy, was that fun! Each room represents a specific decade of Route 66’s past. As you enter the room, the most popular song from that time period is playing, you can read about the road’s history (such as being built, the heyday of the route, etc) and tons of period specific items are on display. At the end there is a 20 minute movie about the Route. We really enjoyed this museum, especially playing with the old gas pumps, posing near the cars, and remembering are own family vacations as kids. Both Ned and I grew up doing family road trips/camping trips and have been swapping all our stories. (Yes, both our dads strapped the canvas water bag to the radiator on the car. We had an old Rambler Stationwagaon, Ned’s family had a Pontiac Bonnieville Stationwagaon.) We enjoyed ourselves so much puttering around all day that we decided not to push it and try for Texas tonight. We looked at our trusty State Park book and found a campground close by Clinton. It’s very much a “Home on the Range” type campground (i.e. camping in a grass field), but we are just enjoying hanging out, going for a bike ride and luxuriating in the cool evening. (It hasn’t actually rained, but the weather sure feels like it). Tomorrow continues Route 66 and more fun – perhaps the Cadillac Ranch.