Tag Archives: Osage Prairie Trail

Skywatch Friday – At Home, On the Road, Trail, and

A shot from the front yard during a rainy interlude.

My wife and Kodi the pomeranian on a walk in the neighborhood greenbelt. I love the orangey sky.

I went on a bike ride on the Osage Prairie Trail in Osage County. This gas station was a location for the movie “The Outsiders” filmed way back in the 1980s. It has been restored by some volunteers and has a sign, fake gas pumps, paint inside and out and geocache. Which I found. One of my geocacher friends had a big role in the restoration.

This is a pond in Skiatook at the northern end of the Osage Prairie Trail.

A nearby church is having a revival!

The old railroad bridge on the trail is a favorite spot of mine for photos.

Switching Gears, this is a scene from Turkey Mountain on a recent hike.

And a shot from the RiverParks trails in Tulsa. I wasn’t hiking or biking, I was handing out gallons and gallons of coca cola and red bull to exhausted runners slogging through the Tulsa Ironman competion. 141 miles combined of swimming in open water, an over 100 mile bike ride, and a marathon distance run. It was a warm day. They had a 70 mile race for wimps.

I’m kidding about the half distance people being wimps. I couldn’t do it in a week. I admire their dedication. I have to admit though why people doing an endurance race would want red bull or coke.

The volunteer fuel was pizza. Unfortunately, my table was next to the truck so I ate more than I should have done.

That’s about it this week. I am linking with Skywatch Friday.

Saturday’s Critters – On the Ground and in the Air

I went on a bike ride on the Osage Prairie Trail north of Tulsa. It is a Rails to Trails project done years ago where an railroad is converted to trails. I love it because it goes through a lot of back country including ranches. I saw this Hereford cow looking happy in some tall green grass. Don’t see too many white faces like this any more.

And some of his friends, Angus cattle also grazing.

And in a different pasture I found some horses with their heads down.

And I found this little turtle crossing the road. Why did the turtle cross the road? (To get to the shell station!)

And a few miles away another, bigger turtle getting across the road.

And on a different outing on my first hike on Tulsa’s brand spanking new Mooser Greenway trail system I found myself a deer.

I love seeing deer.

Later on I found this feather. Google lens says it is from a red tailed hawk. I left it near where I found it.

And this might be the Shell Station. Just so happens I worked for Shell Oill for a short time and I learned that nothing makes a die hard Shell Oil employee madder than calling their logo a clam. It’s a pecten they will say in a heartbeat. So of course I doubled down on calling it a clam. Alrighty, sorry, I’ll get back to Saturday’s Critters.

I found this fresh cut disk cut out of a tree blocking the trail. I tried to count the rings and I came up with a 102 years old.

And speaking of red tailed hawks, this dude was up- on power pole looking for his lunch. He was a long ways away. At the very limit of my ancient Canon Superzoom camera. How far away you ask?

He was on top of the rightmost power pole as seen from our back yard. I love my DSLR with all the various lens but it is hard to be beat a superzoom for lightweight and usefulness in a wide variety of situations.

Here’s another photo of the hawk.

And here is the mandatory pic of Kodi the Pomeranian in a pensive mood. He’s the same color as our floor so he is Kamo Kodi in dim light inside.

I”m linking with Eileen’s Saturday’s Critters. Go check it out. Lots of talented bloggers link up with her.

Riding the Osage Prairie Trail and Checking out Movie Locations

Earlier this week, I took my bicycle up to Skiatook, Oklahoma and rode about ten miles of the Osage Prairie Trail. It is on the roadbed of the now defunct Midland Valley Railroad. Being an old railroad, the grades are very easy and the route very straight. I love it though because you ride through old farm and ranch country away from the roads. Sometimes I see deer and other wildlife and always lots of birds. The other night there were lots of birds, no deer, but a couple of snakes crossing the roadway. Hmm, a thought just popped into my head. How come snakes always go across trails and never along trails? Let me know if you have the answer. Okay I’ll get back on track.

The trail goes right through the town of Sperry. So what you say?

This is what. This a former shooting location for the movie “The Outsiders” based on S.E. Hinton’s book of the same name. A coming of age novel set in Tulsa in the late 50’s-early 60’s. It was shot in Tulsa back in the early 1980’s. I don’t think it is used for anything these days. Check the image here.

Right across the street is another shooting location for the film.

So much for Hollywood. A little further along I come across this scene of a workover rig on an old well well. The rig has been up for quite a while and I am not actually sure they are working on it. Most activities in the oil field go on pretty much 24 hours a day. The way oil and gas wells are, if you lose a day’s production, you don’t make it up until the back end of the of well’s life which could be years away because you can’t double up to make up so producers end up being pretty demanding with their service providers. Speaking as a service provider.

The trail has several grade crossings of local roads. Best to slow down before you get there so you don’t get run over. That would ruin my whole day. I don’t know about you.

I passed a big group of people walking on the track. I love that kind of stuff. You know, getting out and actually talking to each other and exercising. Great stuff.

Relive ‘Biking the Osage Prairie Trail’

A video of my little almost 20 mile jaunt. Be thinking about me Saturday. I am participating in my first biking event. A 24 mile race. I expect to finish dead last in my big heavy cruiser bike. My goal is finishing.

Last Skywatch Post of April 2018 – Osage Prairie Trail

Last week I took my bicycle up north of Tulsa to the “Osage Prairie Trail” a rails to trail project that starts in north Tulsa and goes to Skiatook, way out in the country. I started in Sperry and went about five miles north to Sperry. The trail is deluxe, asphalt paved and well maintained.

I got some geocaching in on the way. How do you like my stylish outfit? I found that garish yellow top at Walmart for about seven bucks. Don’t feel bad if you don’t like it cuz I like it just great! Along with my mismatched socks. Where’s the law that says your socks have to match? There isn’t one, I already checked!

I love this bridge across Bird Creek.

I got to Skiatook and everybody in town was taking an exercise class. I felt like jumping in myself but they were just finishing up. I love community stuff like that. Except community sounds like communism. We don’t like communism here in Oklahoma, so I am glad I didn’t join this communistic exercise program. People need to be in there own homes watching Fox News and checking you know who’s twitter feed. Not out in the sun getting skin cancer and getting to know your possibly leftist, immigrant, non gun owning neighbors.

Enough about politcs. How about some cows? These are my wife’s cousin’s herd out in western Oklahoma. I love the calves especially. I always name one of them “Little Brisket.”

I went riding along the Arkansas River after work earlier this week during a pretty day. I am loving riding my bike this Spring!!

And it is Azalea season here in Tulsa. Here is a house in midtown that I just love. Look at the blooms, and the windows.

And I have a volunteer gig with the city of Tulsa picking up “litter on a stick” signs. I’ve picked up 17 so far. Within days of getting trained, me and my fellow 61 volunteers picked up over 500 trash signs off city rights of way. I’m all official now. I have a city ID Badge with my photo on it and some “cop gloves” to help protect from sabotaged signs. (Not yet in Tulsa but apparently in other cities the people who have put out litter on a stick signs have superglued razor blades to the wire frames.” The gloves will come in handy for geocaching also. On my bike ride on the Osage Prairie Trail I went looking for a cache called something like “In the hole” and I found the hole in the tree and as I went to inspect it, a snake slithered out! So as we say in the energy biz, I plugged and abandoned that cache, figuratively. I am just glad that I didn’t stick my hand in there, even though the slithery critter did not appear to be poisonous.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday this week.

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