Chapter Five

Eastern Oklahoma is primarily made up of huge Indian reservations. Seminole. Cherokee. Chocktaw. By the time we were halfway to OKC, the terrain had changed completely. The mountains were replaced by flat, featureless plains.

My two big memories of Oklahoma were cowboy hats and wind.

We stopped at a large western wear store in OKC, just off the interstate. I’m fairly certain we’d been lured there by an endless series of billboards on the interstate. Heading west, we wanted to look the part. Yee haw.

We each bought a cowboy hat…which isn’t as easy as you’d think.

First decision is hat material. Felt? Straw? Leather? Snakeskin, maybe? Is the hat to be worn in winter or summer? Work or play? Real cowboy hats all start out looking like “ten gallon” hats.  It takes a skilled hat shaper to crease the crown and bend and roll the brim, using a steam jet, to achieve just the right look.

We both went with light colored straw hats. They’d breathe and reflect the sun’s rays in the desert. And resist sweat stains. Or so we hoped.

A custom hat, shaped to fit your unique “look,” is a big deal out west. It says a lot about the person wearing it. And I’m pretty sure our hats said “Yankee dumbasses.”

The other big memory of Oklahoma was the constant, soul-searing wind that blew from the south out of Texas. The truck was literally heeled over, all the way to the panhandle. Just keeping it on the highway and off the shoulder was a chore.

Helpful Hint: If you stop to take a leak while on I-40 in Oklahoma, stand or squat on the leeward side of your vehicle. Always piss WITH the wind. And don’t worry about privacy. The driver in the car that just passed you likely did the same thing 20 miles back. That’s because there are no rest stops on I-40 in Oklahoma.

Speaking from experience, traversing Oklahoma is very similar to driving across Kansas and Nebraska. In other words, vast nothingness. If you occasionally wonder what death will be like, this is probably it.

John and I swapped off often, just to stay alert. It was our longest day behind the wheel so far. That’s because, aside from a few KOAs (which we both pledged we’d never resort to), there were no camping options until we got about 50 miles from the border.

We couldn’t have arrived at Sandy Beach Campground at Foss State Park on Foss Reservoir soon enough. It was late afternoon by the time we arrived. We ate. We drank. We built a campfire. We slept.

We had another big day ahead of us tomorrow.