Tag Archives: Turkey Mountain

A Walk in the Woods

Last week it rained for a whole day or two then it got cold. Turkey Mountain was closed to bikers but open for hikers. So off I went.

As usual I traversed a combination of legacy trails and new trails.

The new trails, thanks to their water shedding design were not muddy at all. By now the trails are very hard packed almost like pavement. The old trails were okay but a bit muddy at times.

It is amazing. There are no guards at the trails or rangers or anything and yet the bikers stayed away. I think most of the users are invested in the trails now and comply with the requests to stay off after rains. Bikers especially turn out huge for the trail work days and really buy into keeping the sustainable trails in good shape.

So on my hike I only saw a few other people, all of them hikers. No bikers nor signs of bikers at all.

I love trees in the wintertime. We get to see their bones and the results of them stretching up to the sky to get some sun.

I also love seeing the dead wood in the woods. You couldn’t buy a sculpture like this at any price. Turkey Mountain is an old growth forest. They don’t cut down old snags and they don’t clear the woods of them either. Sure they have done a little bit of controlled burns and mulching and their clear trails of fallen limbs and trees but they just push the wood off to the side of the trail. Dead trees make great habitat for all sorts of little critters.

I love the rocks on Turkey Mountain. Above is from a large outcropping called Rock City.

My boots got a little muddy.

And I had a great time. All by myself.

Kind of reminds me of a line from Mary Oliver’s “How I Go to the Woods”

“…If you have ever gone to the woods with me, I must love you very much.”

Three plus miles at my own pace.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday and My Corner of the World

Shadow Selfie

I captured a shadow selfie on this elevated walkway on Tulsa’s Turkey Mountain during a recent hike.

Shadow Shot Sunday 2

A Late Autumn Hike

I went on a late afternoon hike recently at Turkey Mountain. They are putting a new sign up. Kind of cool in that it is also a topographic map of the park. I think maybe they are going to make it into a planter of some sort.

I took the Lo Chi trail which goes downhill to the Arkansas River. It passes this beaver pond on the way down.

And the trail goes under this flyover for one of the downhill bicycle runs. I guess this is technically a table top because you don’t have to catch air. But you can if you want. A real flyover would be a gap. Talking to the bikers they have their own language. Many older people like me would “roll over” this rather than try and jump.

And I found this baby backhoe that the contractors use to build trails. I’ve lost track on the new trails. This looks like they are building a new trail already.

Lo Chi doesn’t get as much use as some of the other new trails. I only saw one other person on my two miles outing.

And the sun started setting. I was on the east side of the ridge so it immediately got a little cooler.

We still have some pretty good fall color on the mountain.

And some more color. I walked a short segment of the RiverParks bicycle trail as part of my route.

Only two miles but hey I had a good time.

Back at the parking lot, these two women had set up their apparatus on one of the pavilions and were having a lot of fun twirling around. I don’t know what you call this but it looks challenging.

Pretty darn athletic is what I thought. They would climb up to the top of the pole and invert with the their legs holding them up. I couldn’t do that in a million years. Got to have a strong core for just start plus not get dizzy twirling round and round upside down.

Changing course, one morning in our back yard.

Found this giant Santa Claus inflatable in a nearby neighborhood.

And we are slowly getting our house decorated for Christmas.

And after a long hiatus I started doing jigsaw puzzles again on my ipad. I love doing them even though they take a lot of time. A great advantage is that you can’t lose any pieces and I use the option to orient the pieces in the right direction. Plus the texture of cardboard gives me the heebie jeebies and so I avoid that as well. And! there is no table with the puzzle on it when you are not working on it.

And today (December 7) is Pearl Harbor Day. Let’s not forget the heroes that day.

And, I am linking with Skywatch Friday!

Skywatch Friday – Black Friday Edition

We had the full Beaver Moon recently on a very cold clear night. I always love the full moon.

We still have some fall color to go with our blue skies.

I hope everybody had a great Thanksgiving. Did you go shopping on Black Friday. I went on a hike in a secludeed area of Turkey Mountain here in Tulsa.

Saw some great sights, took a lot of photographs.

Got on some rugged legacy trails and then on some of the newer twisty turny trails.

I encountered four other people on my hike with is four more than what I usually see in this part of the park. I only went about two miles. but it was great.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday

Saturday’s Critters – Seen on a Bike Ride

I went on a bike ride the other day on Tulsa’s Riverparks Trails during a very unseasonably warm day.

I saw two groups of white pelicans on the river. They were both all hunkered down. I hope that they will get going to where they need to be for the winter.

The canadian geese are here all year long in Tulsa. Many of them still migrate south but I guess the others have figured out what some of politicians haven’t, that global warming is a thing.

And I saw a few great blue herons. They are everywhere. Back in the day when I still worked I was out in the natural gas fields of western Oklahoma and I stopped on a dirt road to make a cell phone call and suddenly noticed in the field next to where I parked there were a bunch of great blue herons. Not in a pond or water, just standing there in a field. I took a pic but it is long gone. Well before the days I knew about storing and tagging and all that other stuff.

I found a bunch of seagulls clear across the river.

I stopped and took a photo of the foliage on Turkey Mountain across the river. I never get tired of seeing it.

Nearby was this plaque commemorating the first Oklahoma Game Ranger killed in the line of duty. He was game ranger murdered in the line of duty in Oklahoma. On Turkey Mountain investigating a poaching case. I don’t think it was ever solved.

Back in the day, Turkey Mountain had a bootleggers, lawmen, oil field hands, ranchers, railroad men, and farmers. I have personally found “shake and bake” meth labs. It has a shady past. So does Tulsa for that matter. Machine gun Kelly, Pretty Boy Floyd, John Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde, Ma Barker. They all have Tulsa ties. Read more about Tulsa’s shady past here.

Oops I digressed. I am continually fascinated by the dichotomy of Tulsa. On the east bank are big companies, operas, ballet companies, symphonies, wonderful museums and on the gritty west side, like Turkey Mountain, refineries, oilfield manufacturing, factories is where the money was made to pay for all the nice stuff. That is where the outlaws hung out.

I’m linking with Saturday’s Critters.

Oops one more thing,

Excuse my appearance, I’m retired so I get kind of scruffy. That is me, (of course) and Lizzy early in the morning. I read the paper and drink coffee in the morning and she reads over my shoulder. I keep telling her that is rude but she won’t stop.

Shadow Shots – Here and There

Shadowy walk to the beach from our condo on vacation on the Gulf Coast.

Shadows on a bench on an overlook at Gulf State Park in Alabama.

Shadowy Benches installed at the hub of several trails on my beloved Turkey Mountain. A team of volunteers carried by hand about a half mile,the benches, several bags of concrete, several five gallon buckets of water and the tools for job and then installed them after clearing the area. (Note, I did not do any of the heavy lifting, but you know somebody has to take the pictures.)

A morning shadow in the backyard.

I’m linking with Shadow Shot Sunday 2.

Shadow Shot Sunday – On the River and on the Mountain

I went on a bike ride this morning on the RiverParks trails and stopped at the Cyrus Avery Bridge on Route 66.

Nearby is the Tulsa Sign Park memorializing old motels and their signs on Route 66.

And then earlier this week I hiked on Turkey Mountain and found this shadow.

I’m linking with Shadow Shot Sunday

River Critters and More

I went on a bike ride earlier this week along the RiverParks Trails here in Tulsa and took along my superzoom camera. I captured this flock of great blue herons egrets fishing along a channel in the Arkansas River.

I always like catching birds in flight.

Another mixed flock of birds fishing in a different spot.

This heron was all by himself.

Upriver were some geese.

A couple of egrets checking out the action.

Another shot of an egret with a heron.

And a butterfly flitting around our backyard.

Lizzy the cat checking on the cicada action on the back porch. She likes to watch them. Our pom Kodi likes to eat them. Yuck!!

Hoof prints found during a hike on Turkey Mountain. They have asked for people not to ride horseback on the new trails but some people insist on doing their own thing.

I’m linking with Saturday’s Critters!!

Flyover Shadows

Hiking on Turkey Mountain I came across this complex set of shadows.

The Riverparks Authority has installed “flyovers” on the trails to separate the suicidal, speedy downhill daredevils on mountain bikes from we more sedate pedestrians.

And, it’s my fifteen year blogaversary yesterday. Woo Hoo!!

I’m linking up with Shadow Shot Sunday 2.

Shade and Shadows Sunday

It’s Fathers Day. Congratulations to all the fathers out there, I hope your loved ones are spoiling you, my family is. This is my dad. He is gone now and I miss him. Here is in a shady spot in the woods with a beer in hand, relaxing with family and friends. He loved doing stuff like that.

And here is our Kodi the dog on a walk passing a guantlet of shadows. The little guy lives to walk.

And here is my favorite place, Turkey Mountain Urban Wilderness Area here in Tulsa. The bright sun sure makes for deep shadows.

Saturday I was part of a cleanup effort on Turkey Mountain sponsored by the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition. These two people were helping me clear one of the trails. Extra nice because they both had just finished running a 5K trail race on the mountain and then they grabbed the loppers and cleared out about three miles of trail. A very impressive pair of young people. I have no patience with people who disparage the generation coming up. Not me, I am very impressed with their work ethic, caring, and sense of community. Not just these two but almost everybody I meet. And as common in Tulsa we chatted a little bit and we knew people in common. I swear, Tulsa is the biggest small town I have ever lived in.

I was with them but then on a stubborn limb I was lopping, the limb gave way suddenly and one of the lopper handles popped me right on the mouth and split my lip. I bled all over my spiffy yellow safety vest. My companions gave me some gauze so I hiked a mile or so back to the lot and eventually made my way to urgent care where they cleaned my face up and sent me home with no stitches but a huge headache. I’m sure they are saying something like, “I knew we should of taken the old guy’s loppers away from him.”

Anyway, I digress. I’m linking with Shadow Shot Sunday 2 today.

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