It rained last night. Not a light Spring shower, nope, a Midwest rolling, windy, thunderstorm. Welcome to Oklahoma folks. The wind jostled the van and woke us both several times throughout the night, but by the morning a light shower was all that remained. The rain was supposed to last the day in El Reno, luckily we were heading West into Texas and would drive out of the rain mid morning.
We were on the road by around 10:00am, enough time for a relaxing breakfast as we watched others depart.
Out on the highway the spray from passing vehicles was bad but as stated above, the rain wrapped up mid-morning and the sun started to appear through the breaks in the clouds showing us the magnificence of the plains.
The temperature climbed into the low 20’s as we headed further West and we found ourselves turning down the heat closer and closer to the point of turning on the A/C. We didn’t, but it was close. The sun blaring in the windows on the South-side of the van really warmed the vehicle.
Nearing the Texas border we took a short detour off of I-40 and onto the historic Route 66 through the towns of Erick, OK and Texola, OK. Erick is still fairly well populated, as a small town but we couldn’t see much in the way of an active commercial district, just many boarded-up buildings.
Texola however is practically a ghost-town. Wikipedia lists the town as having 42 residents in 2022, we saw none of them.
We stopped in Texola as Barb had read that an old one-room jailhouse still survived from the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. We found it on a back street made of concrete blocks and a concrete roof. It’s as unspectacular as the town, but here it is with some other pictures. The list of names is evidently the school graduating class list from 1938; however, no sign of a schoolhouse remains and one wonders why it was engraved in stone and now stands besides the jail.
Returning to the I-40 we soon entered Texas and stopped in a rest stop to have lunch in the van.
Arriving in Amarillo we took the ring road around the South of the city to Canyon, TX to top off with fuel and groceries before heading to Palo Duro State Park where we will be camping for the next two nights. We had visited last year and did some hiking but this year have been able to successfully snag a couple of sites courtesy of the Milddogs and their Campnab subscription.
Our first night is in the Mesquite campground at the Southern-most end of the canyon. The site (#090) is perfect. Quiet with amazing views (see below) and level-enough that we don’t need to add blocks to level the van.
We enjoyed a quiet afternoon relaxing in the hammocks and made a Texas steak dinner before watching the sunset and the stars appear overhead. We’re both looking forward to a quiet day tomorrow before moving to a second campsite within the park.
‘night Y’all.
