24th April Tulsa to El Reno Oklahoma

What a difference a day makes. Woke up to sunshine and a cloudless sky.

Setting off for El Reno today not too far, some 140 miles but over what is apparently some of the best stretches of original road around.

This I guess is where I lose the remaining few readers who have hung on so far cos it is very anoraky!

It has been a brilliant day, I’ve ridden through countryside far away from any towns or interstates, taken dirt roads that are just passable on my bike in the drier weather and seen bridges that were part of the system in the 20’s but now closed – and I have been ecstatically happy – no, I can’t explain it!

So, apart from a few murials and a round barn I will find out about most of my photos today are of tarmac, red dirt and bridges – lost you yet?

I could have taken dozens of pictures of closed businesses, abandoned homes and rusting street furniture but that seems to be taking advantage of someone’s misfortune. When the Interstate came it cut off whole communities and though a lot struggled on – and still do – most have given up.

Immediately on leaving Tulsa I came to this bridge, closed now but Built in 1921 and taken into the Route 66 system in 1926 it was eventually bypassed in 1952. The decking is unusually redbrick which I have seen in some towns but the first so far out. Yawn yawn, I know!

Sapulpa Bridge

In Davenport I stopped to buy some stamps and whilst in the queue a siren started. I noticed it was 12 o’clock and assumed it was a factory or the like until someone said “hope that darn thing isn’t for real” and then I learned it was the Tornado Warning – but they were just testing it. Was advised to take cover if I ever heard it at other times!!!

That town is going to die if a tornado ever hits it at 12 noon.

 

From there the route just headed  west, and I say route because the actual current road  joined it and then abandoned it, taking new cuttings or avoiding sharp drops into deep valleys.  I’m now of the mind that although the “dream” I suppose is to do Route 66 on a Harley, that is not truly possible. On some of the tracks I’m on I’m on the limits of my bike – really would be easier on one of the Ewan McGregor ilk -

 

 

                                           and I cannot see anyone taking a customised hog down them. Which is a great pity as they are extremely pretty, crossing creeks and rivers where longhorn cattle are beginning to appear drinking in the red mud river banks.

Reminded of the importance of these cattle in these parts when crossed over “The Old Chisum Trail.

Some of the road could have been in parts of England I guess, well until two wild turkey’s ran into the road and one took off in front of me with the grace of a fully loaded Lancaster Bomber and nearly took my screen off. Still, one up on Billy Connolly – he never saw any.

There’s not much else to say today really, I just ambled along, taking the old route most of the way, even the dirt road bits as it was much drier now. I got lost once but as I was running short on fuel too I went into a gas station to ask the way and that was an experience in itself – talk about two nations divided by a common language There was a lot of grinning and staring and I’m sure I heard the strains of Duelling Banjo’s somewhere and I came out no better informed as to where I was.

I’ll just show the pictures and you can perhaps imagine me riding along in the sunshine,

 

Those that know me know how much I look after my bike, it got washed after every trip, however short – well it ain’t looking so good now – but I like to think that like me, it’s tired, dirty and as happy as a pig in the proverbial!