Saturday
On the road dark and early. South on Interstate 135, then Interstate 35
through Wichita and into Oklahoma. South through Oklahoma City, Ardmore,
and "boom", we popped out the other side. That was fast. So much for
Oklahoma. Another four hundred fifty mile day.
Now we're in Texas. We're just north of Denton, which is just north of
Dallas. We're in a state park in an oak forest by a lake. Looks like it
might be birdy tomorrow morning, so I hung out a bird feeder and salted the
empty camp sites on either side. I'll sleep with my binoculars nearby so I
can look out if I hear any birds at dawn. I'm going to try really hard not
to wake Judy up to leave before dawn tomorrow. I'll wait for the birds to
wake us up. Honest. I promise.
It was a big raptor day. Must have seen fifty of them. Saw some black
vultures.
We stopped at a Flying J for lunch, and to check out the internet. Flying J
truck stops advertise that they are WiFi hotspots. The internet hookup
worked! It took about five seconds to connect. That was handy. The
downside, however, is that Flying J truck stops tend to be really crowded.
This one was a zoo.
We have an additional rider on this trip. Flat Stanley. He is a little
cutout figure, colored with crayon by Grandson Tony. Flat Stanley travels.
He fits well in envelopes. Tony has sent several of them out in the mail.
They return with notes about where they have been. Tony keeps track of them
with pins in a map on the wall. Our Flat Stanley is taped to the inside of
the window on Judy's side of the motorhome. He will report back to Tony in
about three months.
We've had some cold weather in Colorado already this year. We have had low
temperatures near zero. We're looking for more fahrenheits than that. We
found Fifty-eight of them the first day out. We did better than that today.
We found sixty-five. We went south. Lower elevation, less latitude, and
more fahrenheit. Last summer, at the north entrance to Yellowstone National
Park, we found ourselves at the 45th parallel, exactly the half-way point
between the equator and the north pole. What would it take to get halfway
between the equator and the halfway point to the north pole? Maybe we can
find that latitude.
We drove through the Arbuckle mountains in Oklahoma. Yes, they call them
mountains in Oklahoma. They are, after all, several hundred feet high.
Beautiful wooded rolling hills. They even have a waterfall. The highest
waterfall in Oklahoma. Seventy feet. It is more impressive than Florida's
falling waters. At least you don't have to look down into a hole to see it
fall.
Oklahoma has an interesting advertising campaign going. One sign touted
something, then claimed: "another reason we're better than Texas". How
strange is that when your self-identity campaign starts off with a
comparison to another state? Sound little defensive? Wait! I get it.
Think about all the political ad writers out of work in between elections.
They have to do something. The state campaign equivalent to negative
advertising. Don't say something about your state. Say something about
some other state and everyone will vote for you.
