Livin’ On Tulsa Time

Headed up to Tulsa OK last week with my friend Desiree for some sightseeing.  Our first stop was the Tulsa Botanic Gardens.  The weather forecast predicted a great day, not too hot with a few clouds to keep it cool.  Well, what it really meant was that, it was going to be great weather as long as we were in the car driving.  As soon as we pulled in the parking lot, it started to sprinkle, but we thought “oh this won’t last long”, so we went ahead and paid the admission and headed out into the gardens. Yep, we were wrong, the entire time we were there, it rained.  Not a down pour, but enough to get us a bit soggy walking around.  The place was pretty cool, and since we were just about the only people there, we could take our time and look at all the trees and flowers.  I believe we had more fun in the Children’s Garden than any other part.  All in all, it was still a very pretty place.  After grabbing some lunch at Andolini’s Pizzeria, which by the way, is probably some of the best pizza I have ever had, we headed over to The Golden Driller.  I had seen pictures of this statue and wanted to see it in person.  It’s a 75′ statue of an oil worker.  That’s it, just a giant statue in front of the Tulsa Expo Center.  A few miles away was another Off the Beaten Path stop that I had read about online, the Center of The Universe.  It’s a strange acoustic phenomenon in the middle of a pedestrian bridge off of N. Boston Ave. by the old Union Train Depot.  So, you stand on this concrete circle and speak and for some unknown reason, your voice echoes back at you louder than the sound you made.  People outside of the circle can’t hear the echo, but you sure can.  Checked off, weird sound circle, on my bucket list and jumped back in the car.  With my, by now, exceptional navigational skills, I guided us to our next stop.  The Blue Whale of Catoosa !  Now who hasn’t seen pictures of the famous Route 66 that didn’t include a picture of the blue whale.  Yep, just as exciting as it sounds.  Apparently, a man built the thing for his wife for their 34th wedding anniversary in 1972.  Did not know that giant fiberglass blue whale was for 34 years of wedded bliss.  The lady that ran the gift shop, insisted on telling us the entire love story.  It was actually a pretty good story.  Snapped, the obligatory Route 66 pictures and down the road we headed, taking Route 66 back towards OKC.  Just outside of Arcadia, on the side of the road, (and yes you will miss it if you are not looking), we stopped for a second to grab a photo of “Baby Blue”,  a silhouette cutout of “The Blue Whale of Catoosa” that someone has put up next to their farm pond.  The gift shop lady had told us about it and said to make sure we took a picture.  Not wanting to upset the Roadside Attraction gods, we did as we were told and braved the traffic to pull to the side of the road, so I could lean out and grab a shot.  A few more miles brought us to the Round Barn, at 5:08 pm. which closed at 5:00.  Oh well, I had been there before, so a couple clicks on the iPhone and on our way again.  The next stop was Pop’s, not an old Route 66 stop but definitely a stop to make.  More than 700 different flavors of soda with a burger joint thrown in for fun.  Just about every flavor of soda you can think of, from the typical Orange, Grape, Cherry and Root Beer, to crazy stuff like Ranch Dressing, Bacon, even Sweet Corn Soda.  Of course, I grabbed a 6-pack holder and filled it with my personal picks, Grape Nehi, Orange Crush, RC cola, Saranac Root Beer, Orange Creamsicle, and just for the heck of it, a Blue Whale of Catoosa Cream Soda.  None of that off the wall crazy stuff for this kid.  All in all it was a great day.  We had fun where ever we went and we definitely got our kicks on Old Route 66.