HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MARY! HOPE IT’S A GREAT CELEBRATION!
TRAVEL DAY: NORMAN, OKLAHOMA TO INDIAHOMA, OKLAHOMA.
Day 53 – We got up at 7:30 a.m. this morning; it was 58 degrees and sunny. The campers next to us left first thing – we don’t blame them since the campers on the other side of them had a bit of a party last night – and it wasn’t even the weekend yet. We’ll be out of here, too, once we get moving and pack up for the drive. We were looking forward to this drive, and told the girls not to worry because it would be a shorter drive than usual, and at our upcoming stop, we’d be here for at least a week and they wouldn’t have to go for another drive soon. How wrong we were.
We departed Lake Thunderbird State Park at 10:15 a.m. after dumping tanks at our campsite – how nice to have a sewer hook-up at the site for a change. We only had 105 miles to drive so figured the drive would be fairly short. But we passed a gas station with gas at $2.69, so we had to stop there and fill up. Shortly thereafter we discovered that most of the remainder of the trip would be on a toll road and that they wanted exact change and EZ-Pass was not accepted. Boy, it’s been a very long time since we had to stop at toll booths! This all slowed us down a bit and we arrived at our campground at 12:30 p.m. Still not too bad.
The drive was same old, same old, pretty much until off in the distance we saw some mountains. Was that our destination in the distance – Wichita Mountains? Yes, it was and we were happy to see the terrain change! Our destination was Doris Campground in the Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge. We stayed here once before and it was SO interesting, we vowed to come back for a much longer visit.
We’re here, girlies, except we weren’t. Since COVID arrived we’ve found things have changed at campgrounds. Used to be you could go to a campground office and deal with a real person, pick a site, pay for it and you’re done. OR if no one was around due to it being off-season, instructions would be left regarding finding a campsite and leaving a payment. Lately, at most campgrounds, offices are closed and a note outside the window says to contact this site or that site on the computer and make a reservation AND “you may not occupy a site until you have reserved it”. But occassionally, there is no signal and you can’t use the computer or the phone without leaving and driving somewhere until you can get a connection. The last thing you want, especially if you haven’t had lunch yet and your cats want OUT, is to leave and drive somewhere searching for a signal. BUT, you need a campsite number to give – a site that is available on the days you want it and you want to reserve. So, first you have to drive through the campground and make a list of possible campsites.
This is what happened to us. After making a list with sites in preferred order, we drove all over the campground and surrounding area trying to find a place with a signal. Cats were still in their travel room and not happy about it. We pulled into an area within the wildlife refuge that had a big enough pull-out for the RV and the Honda which was still being towed. There, with informational signs about the refuge, were several Texas longhorn cows. We tried to reserve a site at recreation.gov, but the signal wasn’t strong enough. So, we called the phone number to make a reservation and got a message that there would be a 15-20 minute wait. We let the cats out, ate our lunch, and watched the cattle while waiting 35 minutes for someone to come on the phone and help us out. The girls were fascinated by the cattle, all of them clamoring for a place to watch them from the chair.
When we did get a live person and not a repeat of multiple messages, we had excellent service. BUT, site after site that we gave her to reserve for us was already booked for the weekend. Aaargh. We settled for one night (tonight), at one of our desired campsites, knowing we’d have to vacate tomorrow. She took our reservation information, and then we were put back on hold to wait for the person who would then take our payment information. Almost two hours later we drove back to the campground to site #70, no hook-ups, but private, and unpacked.
Our plan was to unpack and get the girls settled in, then drive to where we could get a decent connection. Then go online and search the campsites ourselves to get an idea of where we could move to after tonight – and make a reservation for once the campground emptied out some after the weekend. We figured we’d be here one to two weeks – several days driving around looking for buffalo and prairie dogs and long-horned cattle and elk; and I am scheduled for my COVID booster shot on Sunday. Once any possible side effects I might get were over, Rob would get his booster, and we’d wait until he was completely well before moving on.
Fortunately, the site we had booked for tonight was up on a hill and we were able to reach the online reservation site, but most of the campsites were booked for the Friday & Saturday, or Saturday & Sunday, time frames. We booked the campsite across from the one we booked for tonight for the rest of the weekend, then booked this campsite, #70, for the following five nights after the weekend. This way all we have to do is back up into our weekend campsite and stay there until the people occupying site 70 leave on Sunday, drive forward back into our original campsite, and it all won’t be a big deal. We hope.
Exhausted by all this? We are. Time for a drink and it will be a good one – the Newfoundland Partridgeberry Bourbon Drink. Nighty-night.