April's This and That

 We arrived back in South Dakota on April 9th. It has been cold (to us) and windy. There may have been a couple of days with 70º temps. The lawns are brown. There are no spring flowers. The trees are very reluctant to begin the budding and leafing process. Spring is late. So I am glad I took a couple of photos of the flowering trees in Oklahoma as we headed north. It is a reminder of what will be coming next month here in South Dakota.

I think this is the OK state tree

The three weeks since our arrival at home have been filled with some routine medical appointments, hibernating, a couple of local geocaching events, a couple of book discussion groups, more hibernating, a little geocaching and some family time.  The E family of seven were together for Easter. We had not all been together since our trip to the Black Hills in July last summer.

We were not around for Miss W's winter band concert but we got to hear the 6th grade band play their 4 musical pieces at their spring concert. We were 45 minutes early for her concert. We got front row seats! (A miscommunication on the time.) Her concert was followed by the 7th graders and the 8th graders that evening.

Miss W plays the flute

(most of those chairs were filled with the 6th graders)

And finally April is a special month because...

Miss W has a birthday!

Hard to believe she is 12 years old

As I mentioned earlier, it really has been unseasonably cooler this month. There has not been any moisture to speak of but rain is in the forecast for this last weekend of April. I checked the flower bed as soon as we got home to see what may have survived, but there was nothing green showing among the dead stems and leaves. We had some more seasonable temperatures earlier this week so I checked the flowers again.

I am always thrilled to see the pasque flower survive the winter. 

One of the columbine flowers survived and is making an appearance. Everything else is slow, late or dead. But then I get it as I have not had the urge to bundle up and get outside and play in the dirt. Flowers and plants will be arriving at the greenhouses this weekend. Our overnight temps have been in the 30ºs. Spring and planting and flowers will just have to wait a couple of weeks.

I See Dead People in Oklahoma

 We have spent two night near Oklahoma City on our northward journey. The reason was to complete another GeoArt. We had one in mind, but an email from some geocaching friends (Thanks Ruth & Chuck) recommended a different set of geocaches to solve and find. The GeoArt is called ISDP or I See Dead People.

We worked on finding the caches Thursday afternoon when we arrived in the area and completed it Friday at noon. Nice to have another one in our collection.

We had a half day to explore something else in the OK City area and chose the community of El Reno, a community along the Historic Route 66.

one of several buildings in the museum area

this is the FIRST Red Cross hut built in the US

erected in 1917 and rebuilt in 1975

served 50,000 troops in WWI

one of several historic building in El Reno

a mural showing the history of El Reno

in need of some TLC

more beautiful buildings along a dying Main Street

pad locks on the OK Route 66 sign

photo op location

When in the south...have BBQ. This was the third BBQ place we tried and the very best. If in El Reno, we highly recommend it.

another Historic Route 66 completed

there are a total of 90 Adventure Labs on the 2000 miles

from Chicago to Santa Monica

then we stopped in Yukon for this Adventure Lab

in the Yukon Cemetery

This was one of the most fun geocaches we found on this trip; a fake fire hydrant near a business in a location where a fire hydrant would not ordinarily be placed. 

We leave Oklahoma Saturday morning for home. Like horses headed for the barn...that is how we are both feeling after 9 days on the road.

22 OK counties before this trip

8 more counties added to the OK map

we'll leave the rest for another visit or two or three

So Saxy

 Denton TX area was our destination for 3 days and nights. We had some serious geocaching on the agenda.

the mamas and babies totally ignored us

searching for small bison tubes along barb wire fences

and stickery trees

tall grass often hid the wired bison tube

The country roads we traveled today were less busy, but just as narrow. The state highways were wider with a shoulder. Yesterday's roads did not have shoulders, making for very stressful driving! There was rain in the area last night so Hubby's rain boots came in very handy! Most of the ditches had standing water of various depths. The ditches in TX are not as steep as those we have geocached in IA and NE!

we completed our afternoon, Day 2, at 4:00

the temp this afternoon along with a hot wind

Today's accomplishment!

So Saxy saxophone geoart

another highlight was seeing Texas Bluebonnets

not fields and fields of them, but enough to make me happy!

another sign of spring!

Wichita Falls TX

 Sunday was spent in Wichita Falls seeing the main attractions through geocaching. Here are my highlights:

The Sikes House

This is the official home of the president of Midwestern State University and serves as the site for official receptions and dinners hosted by the president.

It was built in 1939-40 by Louis Sikes and his wife Glenna. Sikes was an oilman and rancher. The 9000 square foot home is a replica of Mt. Vernon sitting on 43 acres. The Sikes lived in the home for 31 years. Midwestern State University purchased the property from the Sikes in 1971. It has been the home of the university president since 1974.

There was a desperate need for office space in Wichita Falls in the early 1900s. A Philadelphia oil man/promoter named JD McMahon came running to the rescue with blue prints in hand and selling $200,000 in stock to investors caught up in the quick-buck frenzy of the day. 

What JD neglected to tell the investors willing to invest in multi-story office buildings in the downtown area was the size of the proposed office buildings. The scale of his blue prints was in inches, not feet! This building was completed in 1919. It is 12 feet long, 9 feet wide and 40 feet tall. When the construction was completed, McMahon was nowhere to be found. Duped investors tried to track down the scam artist with no luck. They also sought legal action only to be told the building was built to the blue prints specifications.

Kells House

Frank Kell moved to Wichita Falls in 1896 at the urging of his brother-in-law Joseph Kemp. The two men were involved in the grain industry, the development of Lake Wichita, utility companies, the newspaper, street car system, the railroad, the local college and more. In 1909 Mr. Kell purchased land overlooking downtown and built this home for his family. The Kell House is a museum displaying original family furnishings, textiles, decorative arts, and historic costumes. Currently, it is being renovated.

The mascot for Midwestern State University is the mustangs. We saw numerous horses in various poses and assorted decor throughout the downtown area and in the shopping areas near the university.

Wee-Chi-Tah

This sculpture of a Comanche family crossing the Wichita River was created by Jack Stevens, a local artist. The sculpture reenacts a legend of how Wichita got its name. The woman is testing the river's depth and describes it as waist deep, which is how Wee-chi-tah is translated. (Click on the photo to enlarge and see the woman holding her skirts.) The artist disputes the legend as his research showed the Comanches did not have a word for waist-deep; the Caddo Indians called the Wichita people Wichitas, which means big arbor because they built their homes along the rivers, often using leaves and limbs to thatch their homes.

Amarillo to Wichita Falls

Today's road trip (Saturday) was all about collecting a few more Texas counties and moving farther south towards Hubby's geocaching destination. Our road trip took us through small, dying TX communities where farming and ranching was how most inhabitants made their money. Now the ranching and farming is still there, but the inhabitants are not. Bigger farms. Bigger ranches. 

If you have followed us on our road trips, you know cemeteries are often a geocaching stop. That was the case today.

a country cemetery

Main Street of Claude on a Saturday morning

I hope the theater still shows movies

mushroom trees in another country cemetery

Rowe Cemetery

info sign helps explain what has happened to 

many rural communities

the cache was called Gunsmoke

it was also a grill/smoker!

Chief Quanah namesake of Quanah

beautiful small tiled mosaic with feathered headdress

can you believe this was a train depot?

it is a HUGE building

Quanah was organized in 1884 as a stop on what was then the Fort Worth and Denver City Railway. The city was named for Quanah Parker, the last Comanche chief. ~Wikipedia

This is not main street, but across from the former train depot about one or two blocks from what is now Main Street and a highway. Although not the main street, this is pretty much how the Main Street looked. I would say the (former) business district was 3 or 4 blocks long and did not have more than 5 buildings with a current operating business. SAD. The dome of the Hardeman Courthouse can be seen in the right edge of my photo.

Hardeman County Jail

(south side of building)

if it is a museum, it was not open nor had been for many years

AND in the jail window...

I couldn't resist