Oooooooooooklahoma, where the wind comes sweeping down the plain!
Well Memphis was hot, Texas was hot, Palm Springs was 106•. But Oklahoma trumps them all. It was over 110 when we arrived: not the weather for a leather jacket and a crash-helmet.
We left Amarillo and set out on the road. Made a couple of water stops and dropped into Shamrock before powering on out of Texas and into Oklahoma. Well there was a bright golden haze on the meadow but the corn was not as high as an elephant's eye, as the earth was dry, dry, dry. Saw some smoke coming from the trees not far from the road and thought it might be signals from the Cherokee. In fact it was brush fires and helicopters were scooping water from the river to pour on them. Almost wished they could drop a splash on us. Passed by Erick, hometown of Roger Miller, the original King of the Road. Made a gas stop in Elk City and a juice stop in El Reno and drove by Yukon, hometown of Garth Brooks - oh dear.
Anyhoo we reached Oklahoma City about 4. Quickly found the Midtown Inn which is really not anywhere near midtown, but it had wi-fi, breakfast and a pool and those were the real deal-breakers for us. Decided to stay two nights to give Mark a break (we had done 260 miles in today). By 5 o'clock we were in the pool cooling off. Later we strolled over to Trappers for a cool beer. It was an excellent place with a tank of live alligators (wee ones) and stuffed animals adorning the walls. Was hoping to take a bus into the centre on our day off, but guess what? Buses don't run on a Sunday. So looking forward to a day of chilling out.