Cowboy country

Thursday, March 3, 2011

AMARILLO, TX — The Texas Panhandle is what they call this squared-off northernmost portion of the Lone Star State, which we have crossed to its mid point today. Although Oklahoma had already displayed a wide, flat prairie geography before we left that state, Texas seems to really feel like the wild west.

The colours of the prairie are so varied, with rust-coloured grasses, sage brush, soil that is almost pink in the sunken gulches, and brush that is as yellow as ripe wheat. Every now and then, an irrigated section of farmland gives a burst of bright green against this palette, and dotting the plains on either side of the road are black cows, grazing contentedly, and characteristic round windmills with a rectangular rudder spinning in the stiff breeze.

Three-armed windmills of a newer vintage, by the scores, rotated their huge arms in western Oklahoma. The structures are gigantic! Val figured each arm must be about fifty feet long. I tried to count them as we drove past, but the rolling hills obscured some of them and I lost track. There must have been over a hundred clustered in one area. To paraphrase the song from the musical, ‘the wind was so busy it didn’t miss a windmill’. It swept against the trailer too, and shredded the clouds into horsetails in the huge blue sky ahead.

Our travels took us along the old Route 66, which gained fame through a popular TV show in the sixties. There’s even a Route 66 museum in western Oklahoma. There are plenty of other museums too; one about aeronautics and space travel in Weatherford, the home town of astronaut Tom Stafford, which boasts a moon rock in its collection, and one dedicated to native son Roger Miller, who sings “King of the Road” and “Dang Me” and other country songs. Even singer Carrie Underwood comes from these parts and merits her own billboard by the roadside!

We stopped for fuel near Clinton, OK and bought a Dairy Queen ice cream cone – it actually felt summery today at 70 degrees! The lady who served us agreed that the weather today was “real nahs” and much better than last Sunday when grass fires had raged across the region. The Amarillo Globe-News paper said there was nearly $13 million in damage from two major fires, one of which covered more than 24,000 acres. The lady told us she had been visiting her daughter in Fritch, and when it was time to go home there was only one road out; all the rest were blocked by fires. Glad we missed that one.

Our campground tonight is sandy and flat, with stunted gnarly trees here and there, and cutout figures of cowboys lounging against fenceposts. Most of the places we have camped at so far are sparsely populated, since it’s not really the season yet. Today our neighbours happen to come from Sarnia, ON – they’re on their way back home after visiting their daughter who’s working at a mission in Mexico.

Just before our turnoff to the campground, we passed a huge billboard that said “Jesus Christ is not a swear word”, and behind it was a great big truck stop with fuel pumps and a convenience store. The name of the truck stop, emblazoned across the shelter over the pumps, was Jesus Christ Is Lord Travel Plaza. Good Food. Clean Restrooms. Isn’t this a neat country?