Saturday evening, March 6 and Sunday, March 7, 2021 - Great Salt Plains State Park, Jet Oklahoma
Saturday evening, March 6, 2021
I'm not sure why I didn't finish up last night, but I'll do that now. Once we returned from our ride around the lake area, it was time to cook. I decided to make a chicken alfredo pizza, so I lit the oven to get it heated. In the meantime, I also put rice on to cook, as we plan to have stir fry tomorrow night for dinner. I also wanted to make some brownies, so I had three things going at once. When I turned the gas on for the water to boil before adding the rice, I accidentally turned the oven off instead of turning the gas for the burner on. Oh no!!! If you have a small gas oven in your RV, you know how tight it can be to get your arm in there to light the pilot light. Let me tell you I was trying very hard not to shake as I worked to relight that pilot. It took me two tries but I came out with no burned hands or arm. Lol!
Once the water boiled I added the rice and covered it for 10 minutes (even though it only calls for 5 minutes. I like to make sure the water is absorbed), then went on to mixing up the brownies. I had to chop pecans - because you just can't have brownies without them. When the rice was done I laid it out on my two baking sheets to allow any remaining moisture to dry up. I've never done this before. Recently, I started watching another cooking show on Facebook - "The Farm Stand". I now follow four cooking shows on Facebook and I love each of them. They are such good down to earth recipes that I would have no problem making myself. Sometimes its just a slight difference in ingredients of things that I've made for years that can make a difference. Anyway, Rebekah of The Farm Stand recently made fried rice on one of her posts. I made enough rice for two meals. I froze one bag and the other will be used tomorrow with our pork stir fry.
While we ate our pizza the brownies baked, and we had one later in the evening after they had cooled.
It was such a great travel day and we enjoyed our quick visit around the park. We plan to spend more time looking around tomorrow.
Sunday, March 7, 2021
I thoroughly enjoy my early mornings and it was no different this morning. That first cup of coffee tastes so good!! I was sorry to hear the wind blowing so hard this morning after such a beautiful quiet day yesterday. It's supposed to reach 66-68, so hopefully it will still be pretty comfortable outside as we are checking out the countryside.
After Dean had his coffee, I made our shakes, did the dishes, made the bed and then I took a shower. With the water situation at the last stop, I was ready for one!! Once I was ready we left to explore more of the area on our last full day here.
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| Our first stop to get a closeup look at the spillway. There is a walkway to near the middle of the spillway, but it was extremely windy and just too cold to walk out there this morning. (at least for me!) |
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| Entrance sign |
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| Tum.Tum.Tumbling Weed - It almost looks like an ostrich in the middle of the green. |
I was disappointed to find out the salt flats are not operated by the State Park, but by the National Wildlife Refuge. They do not open the salt flats until April 1. I would love to come back to do this sometime.Salt Plains National Wildlife Refuge is the only known site in the world where unique selenite crystals with hourglass inclusions are found. Because these crystals form in wet soil, sand and clay, particles are included within the crystal giving them their unique "hourglass" shape inside.
It looks like an interesting day trip.
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| Just a neat picture of these cows enjoying this green grass. |
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| Welcome to Cherokee, OK |
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| I loved this cross - words below "In God We Trust" |
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| First time we've seen a Sonic, Subway and A Convenience Store in one Building! |
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| My dad's cousin Martha sent me a note to check out the Artesian Well in the area. When we stopped at the park office this morning we asked where it was located. She noted it on a map for us. |
When we stopped at the well, a semi pulled up and walked down with a jug to fill it with the water that flows freely as noted in the picture above. He told Dean he and his wife stop here to get water often.
On down the road we came to the National Wildlife Refuge area, so we drove in to see what it had to offer. We came upon this house (below) on the way in. I'm sure it was a really nice house in the day. It's so sad to see these homes falling apart.
There was an Auto Tour, so we drove it looking for animals, birds, anything that might move. We didn't see anything until almost the end - and we saw a few ducks on the last pond.
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| This is the pond with the ducks. |
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| Scary looking tree! |
As we made our way back to the campground from the auto tour, it took us past the Artesian Well again. There was a couple there in a truck. They must have had 5 or 6-5 gallon jugs they were filling with water. We returned to the RV for lunch. We rested for a bit and then we took out again.
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| As we crossed the river bridge, I took this closeup of the spillway. Isn't that a beautiful sight? |
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| Jet, Ok |
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| Great sculpture |
Immediately across the road from the entrance to Great Salt Plains State Park Office is Altus Air Force Base. There were planes taking off and landing several times on Saturday. The jet in the picture below is similar or like the ones we saw flying around the lake area.
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| Nice signs about Jet and the immediate area. |
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| Another sculpture - see the Indian to the right, with buffalo in front. |
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| Dean and I both love seeing these beautiful windmills. This one was spinning. |
We were coming upon this windmill when Dean noticed the cover over the bed of the truck had come loose at the back and was blowing the cover up. Dean pulled over to fix the cover and I got out to help him roll it up to the front of the bed, and fasten it.
Our next stop was Cherokee, OK at United Supermarket. This store was huge. I've never heard of this particular group of stores before this trip in Oklahoma. We didn't need anything except some lunchmeat for our sandwiches tomorrow. Without driving to Alva, I imgaine this is probably the biggest grocery store in the area. They certainly have a large inventory!
I set down to work on the blog. I received a text message from my step brother Mike, so I called to visit with him - and it was over an hour later before we hung up. I can't remember the last time I talked to him. The next hour or so Dean and I were trying to decide whether to stay here another day; stay for a few days in the area; or go on back toward home. I looked at a lot of different options but not decisions were made. I think we were both just too tired to think, so we called it a night.
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