Category: Oklahoma

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Hot Springs, Arkansas (Post #373) 8/5/2013

Mrs. Okierover picked Hot Springs, Arkansas for a short vacation this summer. As you may recall last year’s vacation was a 3900 mile jaunt to Glacier National Park. This year we decided to do something closer to home. Hot Springs is just a six hour drive if you pick the scenic route. Surprisingly Diet Mountain Drew made it almost an hour into the drive before he was asleep.

The drive in was not the one I planned. After a couple of wrong turns, the GPS was employed. The device had us driving all the way down to Broken Bow, Oklahoma and back up to Hot Springs. Not the prettiest drive.

As we turned northerly we watched the thunderheads rise and an impressive cloud to cloud lightning display. This only meant one thing, we would have some serious weather to drive through. It manifested itself in sheets of rain that double speed wipers were only just able to keep up with.

We followed what I figured was a local-yokel as he seemed to know the blind turns in the rain better than we. As we finally cleared the storm, we looked back to see he only had one headlight working. How he was able to see in that deluge was truly a mystery.

Our first day was a lazy day for the Mrs. and I. We took Diet Mt. Drew and his girlfriend to a water and theme park for the afternoon. We napped.

Day two we decided to rent a party barge and go tubing on Lake Hamilton.

El Capitan

Painful for my back, Mrs. Okierover found it therapeutic for hers.

Me and the Mrs.

That was a pretty good time.

We spent the rest of the day at Garvan Woodland Gardens. There was an art exposition of glass.

It was pretty. It was humid. Think Central American jungle humid with zero wind. We wandered around and enjoyed the quiet woods and gardens until the mosquitoes started in on us.

We ended the day with Pirate Cove Mini Golf. Your’s truly won by two strokes over Sadie, with Mrs. Okierover third and Diet Mt. Drew finishing last. A good time was had by all.

We spent our 24th wedding anniversary driving home. This time I had the route planned for some scenic driving. We skirted the lakes heading west out of Hot Springs and eventually made it to Highway 1 in Oklahoma. This is the Talimena Scenic Byway. This road is most popular in Autumn when the leaves are changing. It is truly a great drive. It is very popular with the motorcyclers.

When these vast stretches of timberland came up for auction only one bid was made. The National Park Service paid 1.42$(US) an acre. The land had been raped by forestry companies for years with absolutely no conservation effort made what-so-ever. Their operations consisted of showing up and running a rail line to the milling site. A boom town almost always followed. They would cut until it was no longer profitable and load everything back on the train and pull out. when they were through, it was a land of bare eroding hills, pock marked by fires and of little or no value.

On our way into the park, we came across this road side memorial to John F. Kennedy. It seems he was there to dedicate the opening of Highway 259 in October of 1961. There is a connection to the Knights of Columbus that I’m sure has more to it than the fact they asked him to come and they paid for the monument.

We stopped at Treats and Treasures in Talihena for lunch. Its an old fashioned soda fountain with a gift shop in the front. For the little town of Talihena it is a nice little place in downtown. I could retire to a town like this.

Ratty old gas station. I love it.

We got pulled over for speeding in Hartshorne, Oklahoma. It was a 45mph zone and I was probably going 60mph. I slowed down to 55mph when I saw the cop. He pulled us over and asked for my license. He said I was going “a little fast” back there. He then asked to see our insurance and asked if we were heading home. I was polite and answered all his questions with a “yes sir”. It took Janie quite a while to find the insurance form. I think he finally got frustrated with us and told me to slow down and let us go. He was respectful and very polite. I was impressed. He did have more tattoos than I’ve ever seen on a cop. If I were to guess, he saw the Marine Corps sticker, and hat and having served himself somewhere, he let us go. That’s my first pull over in over 10 years of speeding driving.

We continued on and turned north to Eufaula and then down Highway 9 to home.

It was a good weekend and we were glad to be home.

Thanks for reading and Happy Rovering.

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Coatsworth Road, Johnston County, Oklahoma (Post #370) 7/22/2013

On my last long drive home from the Fort Washita Rendezvous; I wandered into Bromide, Oklahoma (Wikipedia). Its a small town just north and west of Wapanucka. It straddles Coal and Johnston Counties in Southeastern Oklahoma. Before the great depression, it was famous for it’s mineral springs and a limestone quarry.

I decided to take the road less traveled out of town. I headed west out of town on Coatsworth Road, aka E1790. This gravel county road wanders westerly through some very rural country. You will pass Camp Simpson, a Boy Scouts of America camp with its own private lake. You’ll also pass some very colorfully named geographic features.

You will pass Deadman Springs Road. Just north of the intersection of Coatsworth and Deadman Springs Road is the Pilgrim Cemetery. Eventually you will get to the ford across the Blue River. The Blue River (Wikipedia) winds its way through our state to dump into the Red River. When I say wind, its course might actually define the word meander. Its course is 141 miles long to the Red River.

As I cleared the mount just on the left a Great Blue Heron distracted me as it went into the air. I must have interrupted his fishing. I wasn’t sure of the depth and took it easy across.

I took shots out both windows and continued to the other side. I know I’d like to come back to this spot and see if any fish could be caught here. I’m almost sure of it.

The first road you come across on the west side is Buzzard Road. What great names!

I continued on until the road came to a “T” at Highway 99/Highway 377. Once I was back on the blacktop I headed north on to Ada. I love to take these little side roads when I can. These types of roads are the same type of roads I expect to find as we circumnavigate this great state.

Thanks for reading, and Happy Rovering.

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May 20th Tornado (Post #341) 5/21/2013

Red path was the F4 May 20th tornado. Green was the F5 from May 3rd, 1999.

Several of you have emailed to check on us. That really means a lot to us. Thank you.

Me and all mine are safe.
My oldest daughter (#1) went over to a friend of our’s home. They have a safe room under ground. They watched the storm form and touch down. They scurried for safety and said for quite some time they could hear the roar as it passed by.

RovErica (#2) was traipsing between her new job in Norman and her apartment. She was at her apartment when it hit. Mrs. OkieRover was at the Norman Regional Hospital Heathplex waiting for the wounded. They sent most of them to the trauma center at OU in OKC. NRH’s Moore hospital was destroyed. They moved those patients to the Porter Avenue campus in Norman.

My son was in north Norman and I was at my office near the capitol in OKC when it hit. I had to drive east of Lake Stanley Draper to get around the mess and home.

Thanks for checking on us and say a prayer for the victims and the first responders who are dealing with the aftermath.

Thanks for checking on us and Happy Rovering.

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The Great Google Donkey Controversy (Post #315) 1/18/2013

If you follow any weird and unusual news you’ve probably saw this story which is “going viral” as you read this.

It seems there is a controversy brewing that a Google Street View car ran over a donkey in Kweneng, Botswana. I personally don’t believe that happened. Donkey Fact: Donkeys take dirt baths.

What on earth does this have to do with Oklahoma or Land Rovers? Good question.

It’s a weak link, but we have donkeys in Oklahoma too. Bet you didn’t know that…hehehe, whatever.

Donkey Fact:

 If you want to protect your livestock from coyotes you put a donkey out there with them. This is evidence all over central Oklahoma.

One of my best friends lost their family donkey just a few months ago. He was most likely attacked by a cougar or perhaps less likely, a pack of coyotes or wild dogs. It’s only marginally less dangerous to live in Oklahoma than it is Sub-Saharan Africa. Once you hear one of these big cats at night, you’ll think twice about camping on the South Canadian River overnight.

The Land Rover connection is much easier.
The Google Street view car passes a Land Rover Defender just before it encounters the donkey in the road. The Defender is from Africa Insight. You can see Africa Insight’s Chairman Christopher Race driving one of their Defender 110’s pulling a Sankey trailer. I don’t know the good people at Africa Insight, I just know how to use Google.

If you backup from the donkey lying in the road with the Google Street View application, you will see the above Land Rover Defender pass as you proceed down the road. This is why I love Google Street View, candid images of every day happenings, frozen in time.

This is a link to the Google Streetview in question. You are free to navigate around and see the sights.

I also created this animated GIF for you to enjoy…yeah, I’m a full service website.

This page is dedicated to my friend Tom Pecore’s donkey, 
“Cowboy”, 
so named by his grandson Jace.
Cowboy was attacked by a cougar in rural Norman
and had to be put down last year.
“A gentle and sweet animal.” – Tom
Cowboy and Tom

Okay, let’s review. Two donkey facts. One Land Rover Defender. One family pet. One best friend. That’s a full post if I do say so myself.

Thanks for reading and hoping you have thousands of miles of donkey free contact in your Land Rover. Happy Rovering.

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Roof Rack Dilemma (Post #308) 12/16/2012

I was visiting the Atlantic British website (Did you know that have partnered with British Pacific?) yesterday looking for springs and shocks. I think I have that sorted out and am ready to purchase them. Bilstein shocks and Old Man Emu/ARB springs, medium duty. I may still look at TerraFirma equivalents but short of that I’ll go with this solution. This should give me a little lift and still be able to be loaded a bit. Heavy duty springs would stiffen the on highway ride too much. I won’t be using the Range Rover hard enough or often enough to require springs of that caliber.

So after I was scoping out the springs and shocks I got to thinking about stuff to ready the Range Rover for our Circumnavigation of the Great State of Oklahoma. I’ve been thinking about a vehicle wrap and other such silliness. Sponsors? Hey now that’s an idea.

A realistic concern is getting too far from a petrol station. The range on the fuel in the tank is just short of 250 miles. I am thinking perhaps I should plan to carry additional fuel in jerry-cans. And if you are going to do that, you need a roof rack. Seriously, trust me, that is sound logic.

I was also thinking how cool a roof rack would look on the Range Rover. We are going on an expedition, we need to look the part! Am I wrong? I don’t think so!


So I was looking through all the great posts on making your own roof rack at Expedition Portal. Guys have made some seriously awesome roof racks. I know I could made a roof rack. I’d need a welding unit, some grinding wheels, cutting wheels, a ruler, some angle magnet thingies, welding goggles, pipe benders, and some material. It would have to be metal so should I use round stock or square stock?

By the time I spent the money on the tools and stock I still wouldn’t have a roof rack. I could go to my mate JagGuy’s awesome shop and have the welder, bender, and goggles sorted out. A four pack of Boddington’s and perhaps a nice bottle of wine and I’d probably have the basic training needed. But I still wouldn’t have a roof rack.

I could just buy a roof rack. WHAT? You have to be insane. Why buy when you can make? Well, time mostly, that’s why.

I am still in school and next semester is a busy one. Also I’m thinking weight is a factor. So I’m thinking of buying.

$199.95 50″x50″ Roof Rack
$54.95 Roof Rack Gutter Mount
$29.03 FedEx Ground Home Delivery

For around 285$(US) I could have a functioning roof rack. Easy-peazy. No welding, no sourcing steel, no new tools. Hotsy-totsy! I bet you thought hotsy-totsy meant something else didn’t you?

Doesn’t that look great? That rack would look great on my Range Rover. I’ll still need to fabricate some jerry-can brackets. The price on-line was a bit too much for what I saw. The brackets are more expensive than the cans. That seems a bit silly.

If I hit the lottery tomorrow I could probably drop 3000$(US) on kitting out the Range Rover and would probably be short a few items. As it stands I’ll be out shipping and nearly 800$(US) for springs and new shocks. The price above for the roof rack plus 2-4 fuel 20 liter jerry-cans. With all this bolt on poser stuff I still haven’t addressed some serious issues.

  1. The air conditioning is still non-functional.
  2. The transmission still needs to be refurbished.
  3. The ABS system is still in fault.

The repair parts for that stuff will probably run up to 2000$(US). At the end however, I’ll be pretty confident I have a rig we can use at some events. Perhaps I’ll even be able to get Mrs. OkieRover to go camping with me. Wait…how much more money will I spend for that?

On this day there was a terrible tragedy in Connecticut  Remember it isn’t guns that kill kids, sick people kill kids. That sick bastard was going to commit a horrible crime. If he didn’t have a single firearm he’d have used a car or something else.

Say a prayer for the families that lost their children, say a prayer for the people who will deal with this for the rest of their lives.

And finally say a prayer for our country to come together in these difficult times.

Thanks for reading and Happy Rovering.

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