Chapter 7: The One Where We Get Banished From Oklahoma Forever
We continued our drive to Florida by heading further west into Arkansas. It was the second of five straight days of long, tough driving, so we were keenly aware of the need to stop at various strategic points in order to keep everyone from going stir-crazy in the van. With that in mind, we drove for about two hours before stopping in the town of Hot Springs.
Hot Springs is a town that grew up in the Ouachita (WATCH-it-taw) Mountains over the site of—well, hot springs. Geothermal waters were considered to have medicinal properties, so it was a popular gathering site for Native Americans and then settlers who eventually built the town into a tourist destination as a spa resort. The various spas (or bathhouses) made use of the water from the hot springs as part of their spa treatments for the well-to-do. These bathhouses and geothermal features are now preserved in
Hot Springs National Park.
If you know anything about our family by now, you know that we are drawn to National Park sites like dimwitted keyboard warriors to political arguments on social media platforms. So, the presence of a National Park made it an easy stop for us.
There was a free parking garage conveniently located one block west of Bathhouse Row.
Captain_Oblivious Life Commandment #37 states: If It’s Free, It’s For Me. So that’s where we parked.
Hot Springs National Park holds a distinction in the U.S. as being the very first ground ever preserved by the federal government for recreation. It was originally set aside as Hot Springs Reservation in 1832, long before even the idea of a national park existed. It became a National Park in 1921 and is the smallest National Park by area in the U.S.
The area was an extremely popular destination in the early 1900’s. The first bathhouses were just simple huts or log cabins, but eventually businessmen built elaborate spas to draw in more well-heeled visitors with promises of luxurious spa treatments in the late 1800’s. If you’re wondering how entrepreneurs could build private facilities on public land in order to make a profit—well, the government got its own cut from concession fees. There’s always a deal to be made.
Despite its name, this park really isn’t about the geothermal waters that give the place its name. It’s more about the preservation and history of the famous bathhouses in the center of town. So if you’re like me and hear the term “geothermal features” and think, “Whoa, cool, just like Yellowstone!”—let me stop you there and throw some regular ol’ cold water on your hot spring. It’s nothing like Yellowstone. Not even close.
Let me state right off the bat that I am not the target audience for Hot Springs National Park, so take that into account when deciding if this is a place you’d like to visit. I’m sure the history of how rich people took baths in the early 20th century is interesting to somebody. I mean, there are people around here who look at a snail or a wilted piece of kale and think, “You know, I’d really like to put that in my mouth.” So anything’s possible. But for me—well, I’m a guy. Spas aren’t my thing. I can get on board with the idea of a massage (depending on who is giving it, of course) and I can enjoy sitting in a whirlpool for…oh, maybe 10 minutes or so. That’s about as far as I go.
We were primarily here to get our coveted National Park passport stamp, stretch our legs, and maybe pick up a Junior Ranger badge for Drew.
Ranger-guided tours of the bathhouses are available, and you can also watch a film on the park in the Fordyce Bathhouse, which is now the park visitor center. Or you can skip all that and just do a self-guided tour, which is what we did. And even a Neanderthal like me can admit that the buildings themselves are very beautiful and ornate.
We wandered the three floors of the visitor center. I thought there was an obvious disconnect between messages such as this:
And obvious sadistic, inhumane torture devices such as these:
Looks like something out of a prison movie. “That’s enough outta you. Get in the sweatbox!”
There were some fancy-pants stained-glass windows as well.
Thankfully, they did include one exhibit that was designed to entertain those of us who were just killing time on the tour. Julie may or may not have rolled her eyes and handed me the camera when I requested a photo of this exhibit.
Down in the basement, you could see where the spa was built directly over the hot spring so they could tap into the waters to supply the baths.
Behind Bathhouse Row is the Promenade, a wide public walkway set into the hillside. You can access it at various points like this:
Just to the left of those stairs was an actual hot spring, where we could walk up and actually feel the warmth radiating off the water in the pools. I found this infinitely more fascinating than anything inside the actual bathhouses.
The Promenade made for a nice place to take a walk.
At the corner is the Army and Navy General Hospital building, which also is supplied by hot spring water.
That was the end of the line for us. At the bottom of the walk was a public fountain where anyone could draw water from the hot springs. A man who bore a striking resemblance to
Stinky Pete, the Prospector from Toy Story 2, was doing just that. He had the back door of his van open and was filling jug after jug with hot mineral water. I started to wonder if the next Y2K threat was on the horizon. In any case, Stinky Pete did take some time out of his doomsday preparation to chastise our kids for sliding on walkway handrails. I’m thoroughly embarrassed—can you believe my children were acting like…kids??
That was the end of our brief taste of Hot Springs. There’s actually a lot more to do around there, including a tower at the top of a nearby mountain, but we didn’t have the time to stick around. Before our trip, we’d been in touch with Lisa (
@mickeystoontown ), and she had been gracious enough to mail us all sorts of brochures and info about Arkansas attractions. It was extremely kind and helpful of her to do so, and I’m sorry to say that we didn’t get to experience much at all. We were just covering too much ground on this trip to be able to stop to smell too many roses along the way.
However, Lisa did make one recommendation that Julie prioritized on the agenda as soon as she heard it. On the way out of town, we made a stop at the
Purple Cow.
Lisa told us this was one of her favorite places to stop in Hot Springs—it’s a diner and soda fountain. However, the big draw is the vanilla ice cream. It’s purple. I assume that’s supplied by the purple cows.
We didn’t have a full meal here—that’s what our PB&J was for—but we did get a vanilla milkshake to go.
It was the weirdest thing. It tasted like a delicious creamy vanilla shake. The disconnect between the taste and the color threw me off a bit. I just didn’t expect something purple to taste like vanilla. But it sure was good. Thanks for the recommendation, Lisa! And I’m sorry we didn’t get purple tongue photos.
The next stop was about an hour and a half further southwest, and was one that David had formally requested:
Crater of Diamonds State Park. We’d seen this on some travel show at one point and Dave had decided at that point that if we were ever in Arkansas, we needed to dig for diamonds. Well, son, it’s your lucky day!
Crater of Diamonds is in the middle of nowhere. The closest town is Murfreesboro, AR. It’s a 37.5-acre plowed field where the geology just happens to be right for forming diamonds. You pay a fee for admission and are free to pick a spot anywhere in the field, dig, and hope to strike it rich. You are allowed to keep any diamond or other mineral you may find, and over 75,000 diamonds have been found since first being discovered there in 1906.
Here's a big one from just last year.
This is obviously a money-maker for the state of Arkansas. Besides the admission fee, they’re only too happy to rent you tools to help in your quest. And given the hot Arkansas summers, some genius built a water park right next to the dig site. I imagine they’re pulling in the bucks hand over fist.
Naturally , we were too cheap to pay extra for any of that stuff. The family would just have to make do with bottles of water that had been sitting in a 95-degree van all day. (Side note: this is Julie’s ideal drinking water temperature. She’s weird.)
We were not unprepared for the dig. I had a camp shovel in the back of the van. We’d also stolen several paper cups from the Holiday Inn.
From the visitor center, you can see the plowed area in the distance and start dreaming of the fortune you’re about to make.
Time for some back-breaking hard labor in the middle of the day under a blazing Arkansas sun. This is how you vacation!
Well, it’s how we vacation, anyway. I hope Dave was happy.
I decided to declare myself a supervisor and let Drew do the work for me. If he found anything, I’d take credit for it later. Management 101.
Sarah got bored after a while and started playing in the mud, which is usually her happy place. Seriously, she loves getting dirty.
The ground was pretty solid and hard to dig into. Especially with a paper cup. We did our best for a while, but eventually the heat and lack of digging progress got to us and we resorted to wandering, hoping a shiny glint off of the ground would catch our eyes. But, sadly, there was no such luck, and I was still going to have to figure out how to pay for this trip later.
Making our way back to the visitor center, I saw a display featuring a man who’d found numerous diamonds over the years. He described digging down to the “sweet spot”…about 3-5 feet underground. I wasn’t going to be able to do that without a backhoe, so I think we cut our losses at an appropriate time. We loaded ourselves into the van and turned on the A/C full blast.
Next, we should have had an easy drive down to Louisiana for the night. However, we still had another state boundary to cross, and this was as close as we would get for the foreseeable future. So I drove another hour out of my way just so we could say we’d set foot in Oklahoma. This 50-state quest is no joke, let me tell ya.
On some back road way down in the southeastern corner of Oklahoma, we officially made it across the state line.
Julie made it, too.
Yes, this is a very shabby treatment of Oklahoma. There are many wonderful attractions for a family to visit in this fine state. Probably. I can’t name them right now, but I’m sure that’s just because I haven’t researched it. Let’s go with that. Anyway, this visit was
similar to our visit to Iowa, in that we really didn’t accomplish anything other than putting feet on the ground there. We felt like we should at least spend a little bit of time in the state, so it didn’t feel like a complete travesty and mockery of the 50-state quest.
So…
Actually, I have a confession to make here. This visit was worse than our visit to Iowa. There, we at least crossed a bridge on foot over the Missouri River, so it felt like we had accomplished something. In Oklahoma, we got out of the van on the side of the road, took a photo or three, and then Dave alerted us to an issue that needed to be addressed fairly quickly. Unfortunately, there were no, uh…facilities in the area. So he wandered down the road a bit, towards the brush by the fence. Look, when you gotta go, you gotta go.
Then Scotty decided he needed to go, too. Not one to be left out, Drew decided he might as well take advantage of the opportunity that afforded itself here. And so, on this fine sunny summer day, our visit to Oklahoma consisted solely of my three boys seeing which one of them could…um…mark their territory the furthest into the state.
I can't wait to list our accomplishments over the years of our trips together:
Hawaii: walked on a live volcano.
Wyoming: witnessed geyser eruptions, stayed in an historic lodge.
Utah: hiked to Delicate Arch.
Oklahoma: peed on it.
Oklahoma, I am so, so sorry. Truly sorry. We are awful people. The literal Worst. I will humbly accept my forthcoming banishment from the state. We deserve it.
Let’s move on, shall we?
Yessir, we’ll keep Louisiana beautiful! No problem here.
We drove down near the city of Shreveport, bypassing it on the highway to the north and staying for the night in a Springhill Suites just east of the city. We stopped for dinner at a burger joint called the
Twisted Root Burger Co. This is a chain, but mostly located in the Texas/Arkansas region. I’d never tried it before, so it was new to me.
It was a fun joint. When ordering, instead of giving your name, they’d hand you a card with a celebrity name on it. They gave me Johnny Depp. I was going to make a joke here that they saw the obvious resemblance, but then I knew my responses would be flooded with photos of Edward Scissorhands, the Mad Hatter, Willy Wonka, and any other Tim Burton Film Featuring Johnny Depp In Weird Makeup you could find.
It was more likely that they gave us that card so Julie would have something to daydream about while we waited. Anyway, it’s fun when they call out over the speakers, “Johnny Depp, your order is ready!”
The burgers were really good! I got a heart-attack-on-a-plate called the Freshman 15, which featured bacon, cheddar, a fried egg, and smashed fries on it. This took two years in a nursing home off my life, so it was totally worth it! Very tasty.
The other fun part of the restaurant was the bathroom. Yes, the bathroom. The walls featured all sorts of Chuck Norris jokes to ponder while you pulled an Oklahoma Rest Stop in there.
And if that wasn’t enough, this was on the inside of the men’s room door:
Made me do a double-take, which I’m sure was the intent.
When we got to our hotel, we had one last surprise waiting for us. We’d been talking with Lisa throughout the day about trying to meet up since we’d be passing through her hometown the next day. She was even talking about driving out to Shreveport to meet us at one point, which was far above and beyond the call of duty. But unfortunately, she had a big court case to attend early the next morning, so a DIS-meet didn’t work out.
However, when we entered our room, there was a huge gift basket waiting for us on the desk. Lisa had arranged for a Louisiana-style welcome for us—it was full of cookies, candies, and other treats and knick-knacks from her home state. Lisa, that was incredibly kind and thoughtful—thank you so much for spoiling us rotten! I hope our paths cross again someday.
Coming Up Next: A battlefield that the kids actually like! And then, the Oblivious Family takes on the Big Easy.