Meador Manor

Starting Summer in Arkansas, Day 2: Hiking on Mount Magazine

Posted on June 12, 2015 by Granger Meador

June 1, 2015

The day after we drove to Mount Magazine, Wendy and I found the clouds lifting from the Petit Jean River Valley.

We enjoyed a tasty and late breakfast in the Skycrest Restaurant. Then we got our hiking packs and sprayed down with Cutter. To thwart ticks, we both wore long pants. We ended up hiking 5.2 miles, setting out from the lodge along a side leg of the Signal Hill Trail to take the scenic North Rim Trail over to the park visitor center. From there we used the Greenfield and Mossback Ridge Trails to return to the lodge in a large loop. The overall hike had an elevation gain of 885 feet, with the trails generally descending on the path to the Visitor Center and then climbing steeply up to Mossback Ridge before descending back to the Signal Hill Trail to return to the lodge. The average slope on our hike was 5.7%.

Signal Hill & North Rim Trails

A fairly dry ascent up Signal Hill was followed by a muddy descent to reach a brief segment of the Mossback Ridge Trail, denoted by yellow badge blazes. We then shifted onto the North Rim Trail, which thankfully was drier, punctuated by occasional creek crossings. This trail featured wildflowers on the south side and a series of panoramic views to the north. The tree badges changed to red. We saw Spiderwort along with many Carolina Rose or Pasture Rose blooms. The aroma of the latter flowers delighted Wendy. We were afforded repeated glimpses of Cameron Bluff across the Gutter Rock Creek Valley, with the bluff’s towering layers of rock jutting from the tree cover.

Later we could see past the end of Cameron Bluff to the lowlands beyond, and Wendy enjoyed more Carolina Roses, holding one up to a Spiderwort for comparison. We passed a beautiful stream, and I shot video of the waterfall. Then we posed at Dill Point, enjoying the panorama during a trail snack break.

The trail wound onward, with a panoramic north view to our left.

Along the trail beyond Dill Point we passed trees covered in fungi and found a Fire Pink wildflower, more Carolina roses, and enjoyed more panoramas. Wendy spotted a spiderweb covered in droplets. The trail led on to Dill Creek, with its pretty little waterfall.

We found a Lanceleaf Coreopsis and rock with mold spots before we reached School Creek, which wound through the woods to a rocky ford for our crossing. Wendy got a picture of me from behind as I was considering shots along the creek. We were 2.5 miles into our hike when we reached the park’s Visitor Center.

Visitor Center

We refreshed ourselves at the center, with Wendy browsing through the shop and purchasing a Mount Magazine coffee mug for herself and some local black raspberry jelly for me. Meanwhile, I surveyed the exhibits and found a side room with large lounge chairs and a bank of windows looking out over the forest. There we relaxed and watched hummingbirds flit at a feeder, including a ruby throated bird which warily eyed an intruding insect. Then we bought some sodas and snacks and ate them out front in preparation for our hike back to the lodge.

Greenfield Trail

We walked across the highway to the Greenfield picnic area to find the matching trail. That area was once the Greenfield family’s farm.

Greenfield Family

Will and Lulah Greenfield established a home near the head of Bear Hollow in 1893. Nine of their ten children were born on the mountain. The Greenfields expanded their house to rent out rooms and, in addition, built seven cabins to accommodate tourists escaping the summer heat in the valleys below.

Wendy was less than delighted that we had a big climb ahead to make our way up Mossback Ridge. The little drawing she made on our daily log illustrates her viewpoint as I merrily traipsed up the slope, with a tick along for the ride on the outside of my protective clothing. We crossed Big Shoal Creek and admired a colorful tree fungus and a rock shining with crystals.

Mossback Ridge Trail

After about a mile of hiking along the Greenfield Trail, we turned west onto the Mossback Ridge Trail, which began as a straightaway of taller grass through the forest. There was moss on the ground, but that is not the true origin of the name for this trail and ridge; “Mossback” is actually a corruption of “Morsbach”:

Albert Morsbach

Albert was the son of Friedrich August Morsbach. Friedrich was a Union veteran from the Civil War who hailed from Germany. He had arrived on the mountain in 1880 and was granted title to 80 acres on the northeastern leg of the mountaintop five years later. Like other homesteaders, he cleared his land for farming, a difficult task including removing an endless supply of rocks. All around his farm, these rocks were used to form fences and buildings. Friedrich’s son, Albert, and daughter, Clara, settled on what is now called Mossback Ridge. Albert’s first wife, Serena, died in 1896, and was buried on the northern slope of Mossback Ridge.

Albert married Susannah Walker the following year, and they raised four children. Children on the mountain attended classes in a one-room school house on the northern slope of Mossback Ridge not far from Serena Morsbach’s grave. The “Summer Home School” started in the late 1800s and had as many as 40 students. Albert Morsbach was one of the early teachers. Some of the students, like Tony Brown, became teachers in the school even though they lacked formal high school educations. The original building burned in 1920.

Along Mossback Ridge we saw many colorful butterflies flitting from one wildflower to another. The trail wound on for over a mile along the undulating ridge before descending to where we could cross the valley toward Signal Hill and the lodge. On the final stretch of the Mossback Ridge Trail we passed a small ruined building and other signs of abandoned park development.

Soon we were climbing the hill back to the lodge, where we carefully isolated our clothing and checked for ticks, and then bathed and rested. I know I was quite relaxed, since I actually sat out on the balcony with only my bath towel for modesty. It had been a great hike, and we wrapped up the day with dinner at the Skycrest and enjoyed the dusk view from the mountaintop, walking back to our room with the moon up in the evening sky.

The next day would be one of recovery, featuring a drive to the overlooks of nearby Cameron Bluff.

Click here for a slideshow from this day hike

Starting Summer in Arkansas, Day 3: Cameron Bluff >

< Starting Summer in Arkansas, Day 1: Lodged Atop Mount Magazine

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Starting Summer in Arkansas, Day 1: Lodged Atop Mount Magazine

Posted on June 10, 2015 by Granger Meador

May 31, 2015

The end of the school year meant that Wendy and I should be free to escape for a much-needed vacation, but, once again, I had to wait until our board of education adopted a budget, a critical event before contract bargaining in early June. So Wendy and I did not head out of town until the last Sunday in May. Summer heat has arrived, so we targeted two high mountains in Arkansas, which would be cooler than the fields and forests below. Wendy had enjoyed her first visit to Mount Nebo during Spring Break 2014, so we plotted a return there preceded by a stay on top of the nearby Mount Magazine, the highest point in Arkansas.

In June 2010 I first visited Mount Magazine. I hiked 7 miles on my first day there and 12 miles on the next day. But I had not been back since, except for a brief pull-in at the overlooks in October 2012. I’d never stayed at the nice lodge up top, so this time I booked us a room for three nights, figuring that would give us enough time to work in at least one good hike.

Day 1: Making Our Way to the Mountain

We left Bartlesville Sunday morning, driving south for an hour to have lunch at Oliveto’s in Tulsa. We’d be near the Arkansas River for the remainder of our vacation. We took the Muskogee Turnpike and I-40 to Ft. Smith, Arkansas. I’d hoped we could order refreshments at the antique soda fountain in the Ft. Smith Museum of History, but it is not open on Sundays until June, and we were a week early. So we walked the grounds of the old fort under overcast skies, picking up some biting bugs that presaged the insects we’d battle throughout our stay in “The Natural State“.

We drove east for 90 minutes to Paris, Arkansas, which advertises itself as the gateway to Mount Magazine. I playfully told Wendy we should look for the Eiffel Tower: we’d enjoyed the cowboy hat atop the replica tower in Paris, Texas during our Fall Break of 2013. Sure enough, we then drove by the Arkansas replica tower. Unsurprisingly, it was smaller than the one in Texas, but it had a nice fountain and a wonderful background mural.

We ascended toward the largest of the Magazines, the name French explorers gave to a series of mountainous plateaus in what is now west central Arkansas. The name reflects how the blocky plateaus reminded them of huge storehouses. Both Magazine Mountain and Huckleberry Mountain to the east had low clouds spilling over their peaks.We were giddy with excitement, having escaped the hot plains for the cooler cloudy mountaintops.

We drove up into the state park, passing a typically beautiful custom sign of the type which adorns all Arkansas state parks, and drove to the lodge, situated south of the Signal Hill peak and overlooking the Petit Jean River Valley. Wendy posed by the water feature out in front of the main entry, and the impressive wooden front doors silently and automatically swung open to greet us.

Wendy in front of the Lodge at Mount Magazine

We checked into our top-floor room and enjoyed its balcony, with low clouds obscuring the view to the south of the Petit Jean River valley. The panorama was tremendous, with Blue Mountain Lake to the southwest.

Mount Magazine Lodge balcony panorama - Day 1

Possum Pie at the Mount Magazine Lodge's Skycrest Restaurant

I discovered some bugs I’d picked up in Fort Smith were leaving little red welts, so I showered, and then we relaxed in the room before having dinner at the lodge’s Skycrest Restaurant, where we would have all of our meals during our stay, charging them to our room. The best part of our first dinner was the wonderful Possum Pie, which thankfully has no possum in it but does have three delicious layers, including a thick one of rich chocolate.

I worked off the Possum Pie with some vigorous rocking chair action on the patio. Sparrows ducked and dove around us as we walked along the mountaintop to our room, to rest up for our hike on the following day.

Click here for a slideshow from this day

Starting Summer in Arkansas, Day 2: Hiking on Mount Magazine >

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The Meat in the Sandwich

Posted on May 31, 2015 by Granger Meador

May 29, 2015

My first week of Summer Break was filled with school work, as I labored on:

finalization and adoption of a budget recommendation by the local board of education
summer curriculum revisions in five different science courses
slotting in two newly hired science teachers at the high school
purchases and planning for the Phillips 66 STEM Innovation Labs grant
updated floor plans and room numbers at our expanding high school
putting the high school website into summer break mode

among other things. I relaxed some during the week, but not much. Unfortunately, the week ended with my less-than-one-year-old Toyota Camry as the meat in a car sandwich:

A Mercury Grand Marquis says hello

A wet kiss from a Pontiac Sunfire

A Mercury Grand Marquis slammed into my car at a stoplight, propelling mine into a Pontiac Sunfire. The red Sunfire gave my car a wet kiss.

I was wearing my seat belt and that, along with the seat headrest, ensured I was properly supported for the unexpected rough ride. The car’s rear crumple zone absorbed the energy of the crash, and helped ensure that no one in any of the cars was injured.

Physics Lesson #1: The seat belt held me in position as the car lurched forward, ensuring that the seat applied a more distributed force across my body to accelerate me forward during the initial impact. When my car struck the car in front of me, my body’s inertia sent me flying forward, but the seat belt provided the necessary restraining force to keep me from striking the steering wheel and dashboard. In a worse crash, the seat belt would stretch and the increase in stopping time would lower the force on my body while the belt surface would distribute it more evenly. In a severe crash at the correct angle, the air bag would rapidly inflate and increase the stopping time further and distribute the force across a larger area, both factors reducing the pressure on my body.

Physics Lesson #2: I keep my car headrest high and positioned behind the back of my skull, not merely behind my neck. That ensured my head was properly supported as I was propelled forward, preventing whiplash.

Physics Lesson #3: The over $4,000 in damage to the rear of the car as it crumpled helped reduce injuries. The kinetic energy of the car behind me had to be conserved, and the bumper and crumpling metal parts of the trunk converted that energy into broken and stretched chemical bonds and heat, rather than passing it along to my body and the rest of the car as kinetic energy.

Ouch!

Thankfully the person responsible for the crash was insured, apologetic, responsible, and friendly, as were I and the person in the car in front of me. A helpful and polite police officer (and BHS graduate) issued the necessary citation for inattentive driving to the person behind me and gave all three of us handy information for our insurance claims. I spent some time on the phone with State Farm making a claim on the policy of the person responsible, and got an estimate from Coachworks, my preferred local body shop. They’ll fix up my car in a couple of weeks, with me driving a rental car provided by the insurance company during the repairs. The folks I dealt with throughout the day commented on my positive attitude about the damage to my car, which I purchased new less than a year ago.

Human Lesson #1: We all make mistakes, and no one benefits from someone pitching a fit over a non-injury car accident.

Human Lesson #2: Being responsible about having good car insurance and owning up to your mistakes makes everyone’s life much easier.

Human Lesson #3: People are grateful when you are positive and pleasant in your interactions with them, even when you have been greatly inconvenienced.

Funnoodle weatherstripping

Wendy and I are booked for a week away in Arkansas, and we’ll still be taking my car, even with its crumpled rear end. Her car has a CHECK ENGINE issue her mechanic will work to resolve when we return. Our region of the country has had heavy rain for a few weeks, so I knew we needed to do something about the gap in the Camry’s trunk lid. Thankfully the latch still works fine, and Wendy had the clever idea of splitting one of our Funnoodle lake floaters to turn it into extra-thick weatherstripping for the trunk lid. It worked well!

After we return from Arkansas I have to lead contract bargaining with the district, build new district and high school websites, and get my car repaired. Looks like a busy June ahead.

Click here for photos from the accident

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Rose Festival

Posted on May 17, 2015 by Granger Meador

May 16, 2015

Regular readers may wonder what is going on offline, since I haven’t posted at MEADOR.ORG for over a month, and my hiking spreadsheet reveals that Wendy and I haven’t been out of town for a hike in weeks. Frequent rains are part of the reason; Oklahoma has enjoyed drought relief as of late. Compare the state drought map of a year ago, three months ago, and how it appeared this week:

: Oklahoma Drought Map, 5/14/2014

: Oklahoma Drought Map, 2/5/2015

: Oklahoma Drought Map, 5/5/2015

That’s a most welcome improvement even though it has dampened (pun intended) our enthusiasm for day hikes as of late.

The other reason is that both Wendy and I have had a lot of school work. In my case, I have spent a great deal of time working through the selection and quoting of furnishings and technology for the new Phillips 66 Innovations Labs at the high school, funded by part of a $1.7 million grant to provide improved facilities and equipment for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) in our secondary schools.

But on a Saturday in mid-May we finally ventured out of town for a stroll. The draw was the Broken Arrow Rose Festival. Wendy loves growing roses; she currently is growing a Social Climber at her apartment, and tends for a Perfume Delight and a Dream Come True planted by my patio. Her Social Climber gets daily attention and has been putting on a show. To make it easier for her to tend the roses at my place, this weekend we put together a storage bench for the patio where she can stow her implements.

Dream Come True (click image for slideshow)

Several weeks ago I was perusing the Tulsa area events calendar and learned about the Rose Festival in Broken Arrow. I’ve never spent any time in the old downtown of Broken Arrow, a town which has evolved into a large bedroom community southeast of Tulsa. So I had no idea that they had planted roses all along Main Street as part of their Rose District initiative, along with improved sidewalks and a growing arts and entertainment scene.

Given her love of roses, there was no question that Wendy and I would be at the rose festival this year. We first went into the Historical Museum to view some rose paintings and photographs, but the somewhat creepy dolls with their long eyelashes were more memorable than those works. We strolled over to the adjacent Farmers Market to see the various prize winning blooms, arranged by color.

But the most fun was to be had strolling in a long loop along Main Street, stopping at each planter for Wendy to admire, identify, and often sniff the blooms.

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This coming week we wrap up the school year. Then we’ll spend a week recovering our wits before heading out to spend the first part of June in Arkansas at Mount Magazine and Mount Nebo, getting in some hiking before the heat and humidity make Arkansas hikes too miserable to contemplate.

Click here for a slideshow for this post

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Fishing for Photos on Sparrow Hawk Mountain

Posted on April 12, 2015 by Granger Meador

April 11, 2015

What a view (click map below for slideshow)

Day Trip Map (click map for slideshow)

A Saturday forecast for sunny skies with a high in the low 70s meant that Wendy and I were eager for a hike. We considered various known trails and the drive to get there and back, finally deciding to opt for trails untrodden by either of us near Tahlequah. We first visited the town as a couple in November 2014 and found a couple of trails to hike on nearby Tenkiller Ferry Lake in February 2015. Initially we were thinking of trying for the short and primitive Gum Springs Trail and short Buzzard’s Roost Trail on Lake Tenkiller. But some online research made Sparrow Hawk Mountain a far more promising destination…if we were willing to go hunt or fish.

The Sparrow Hawk Mountain trail is in the eponymous Wildlife Management Area. Online and media reports showed that the game wardens were enforcing state regulations requiring one to have a hunting, fishing, or Oklahoma Wildlife Conservation Passport to take this trail, since it is in a hunting area. Several hikers reported receiving $206 fines for ignoring license requirements. At first that put me off since I’m no hunter. But mid April is Spring Turkey season, the Sparrow Hawk area has only low numbers of Rio Grande turkeys, and clearly most of the trail visitors would be day hikers. So I decided to buy licenses for Wendy and me so we could do our part to support the area and hopefully enjoy a good trail. It turned out to be a rewarding investment: we both greatly enjoyed a five mile hike with a beautiful overlook 200 feet above the Illinois River, steep elevation changes, spring wildflowers, and nice mix of pines and other forest trees.

Fishing for Photos

My Fishing License

I went online to buy a suitable license, discovering that the Wildlife Conservation Passports were $26, which was $1 more than a 2015 general hunting or fishing license, and the latter allow the state to access more federal funds. I have absolutely no interest in hunting for things other than trails and photo opportunities, and I’ve only been fishing a few times. As with sporting events, I’m much more interested in the scenery and fellowship than the game. So I opted to buy each of us a state fishing license, but we’d be fishing for photos. Each of us had to cough up enough information for someone to thoroughly steal our identity, plus we had to pay an additional $3 fee for the “convenience” of printing out our own licenses (what a crock!). We laminated them and stowed them in our hiking packs, to be prepared for any game wardens, and headed south to Tulsa for lunch.

Nelson’s Buffeteria

For years I ran across mentions of Nelson’s Buffeteria, a downtown Tulsa icon from 1929 until 2004. Nelson Rogers, Sr. opened the original one in 1929 at 13 West 4th Street, and in 1949 it moved to 514 South Boston Avenue with Suzanne and Nelson Rogers, Jr. in charge. It offered generations of Tulsans traditional Southern comfort food of chicken fried steak or chicken with traditional fixin’s such as mashed potatoes, corn, or green beans, and a roll. When it closed in 2004, I reckoned I’d missed my chance to sample this tradition. So I was surprised to find Nelson’s listed in TripAdvisor’s top 20 Tulsa restaurants in 2015, 11 years after it had closed. Huh?

Nelson’s Buffeteria

It turns out that Suzanne Rogers and her son Steven, plus now her daughter Jody, re-started the Buffeteria at 4401 South Memorial Drive in January 2013. (Suzanne’s son Nelson Barry Rogers III operated a Nelson’s Ranch House for a couple of years, and later Nelson’s Grill, but both locations have closed.) So Wendy and I pulled up to a strip mall at 44th and Memorial and walked beneath the restored iconic neon sign for a feast.

The operation is very old-fashioned. You walk up to a cafeteria counter, tell a server which of the few options you want (chicken fried steak and chicken, pan steak, and drip beef are available, plus a different special each day of the week), pick out a couple of traditional sides, decide whether you want a roll or corn bread, and pick a seat. A waitress comes over and takes your drink order and later asks if you’d like some pie. We both had chicken fried chicken and mashed potatoes, and I added corn while Wendy had goulash. Our chicken was delicious, and the mashed potatoes were heavenly. My green beans were fine, and the rolls were heavy. Sadly, we were both too stuffed on the old-fashioned buffeteria food to sample the pie. It was a good thing we had a hike planned for the afternoon!

Escape to Sparrow Hawk Mountain

We then drove 40 miles east on 412 before turning off just south of Locust Grove. The weather forecast was off a bit, with light rain along the drive instead of sunny skies, but we traded water drops for overcast skies along the 25 mile drive southeast through Peggs and Steely Hollow to reach Sparrow Hawk Mountain. The redbuds and dogwoods were especially beautiful on the drive through Steely Hollow just west of the mountain.

The primitive area’s turnoff off Highway 10 is just south of the No Head Hollow access point on the Illinois River which Wendy and I visited last November. Sparrow Hawk Mountain rises over 400 feet above the east side of a horseshoe bend in the Illinois River, just south across the river from Goat’s Bluff or Houston’s Point. Goat’s Bluff is a rock shelf overhang above the river which was a hideout for outlaws “Pretty Boy” Floyd and George Birdwell for a couple of months in 1932.

Our hike at Sparrow Hawk Mountain

We found a few cars at the large parking area at the trailhead. There are three trails leading up the mountain. The leftmost one climbs directly up the hillside, the middle one makes a more roundabout climb, and we didn’t follow the third one on this trip. Signs were clearly posted to warn us that we needed a license from the state department of wildlife conservation to proceed.

Dogwoods

The initial steep ascent climbed 150 feet at about an 18% grade. I had to turn about only partway up, since I realized I’d left my Tilley hat in the car to protect my bald head from the sun and to repel insects whenever I spray it with DEET. Wendy would complain of a bothersome horsefly and other pests later in the hike, and I sprayed her hair and neck with DEET to convince them to leave her alone. It is already the time of year for me to head to K-Mart and pick up some Cutter for our hikes. I much prefer it to the stinkier OFF! repellent.

We passed pretty dogwoods and violets on our climb. The trail was very well maintained and fairly wide for a single-track; there were nice signs put up by the Green Country Cyclists Club of Tahlequah. Along with mileage along the main trail, they designated a couple of side trails which are mapped somewhat online. Faded blue trail blazes could be spotted occasionally.

About a half mile from the trailhead, it was clear we were about to reach the broad valley of the Illinois River. Wendy didn’t want to be in the shots on this trip, but she did want a shot of me in front of the first valley viewpoint. We passed through a saddle dip in the trail to climb to the popular Lookout Point.

First view of the Illinois River

We could see the Illinois River both to the south and to the north from this point quite high above the river. A steep descent of about 75 feet led to two lower lookouts 200 feet above the river. I led the way down to the northern one, getting a nice perspective on the tremendous view courtesy of a couple of fellow hikers who had ventured out onto another point farther north. That photo leads off this blog post, while below is the view south.

The view south

Turkey Vulture

Wendy joined me, and then we made our way up and over to the south lookout, watching turkey vultures wheeling about in the sky as the sun finally broke through the cloud cover. My attempts to photograph the birds were fruitless, but Wendy got a good shot of one above the river. Then we climbed the 36% grade up 75 feet back onto the trail and proceeded north.

Spring Beauty

We passed fallen logs thick with fungi and lichen. Wendy captured nice shots of a violet and Spring Beauty wildflowers, and we reached a spot along the trail with a profusion of Spring Beauties. Wendy pointed out a big pretty butterfly posing for me nearby, along with some interesting fungi nibbling away at the base of a tree.

Butterfly

We popped out of the woods at Sparrow Hawk Village, a community founded on the mountain top in 1981. The Light of Christ Community Church operated the Sancta Sophia Seminary on the mountain from 1991 until 2012 when the declining number of seminarians led to its closure. The seminary was briefly operated as The Center at Sparrow Hawk Mountain, but it is now closed and for sale. We saw one happy resident who was merrily singing a song as she walked along the road past us, not breaking stride as she chirped a greeting and then resumed her song.

Trail near Sparrow Hawk Village

There are a number of interconnecting trails south of the village, and I took us down one path which turned out to be a great one mile loop which led down past an intersection of waterways, with occasional nice rock trail curbs and mossy trail segments. The trail had forked once; the one we chose eventually circled us back around to the village. We passed lots with signs and rocks marking private property and found ourselves in a nest of overlapping trails. I know at least one trail is shown online to form a nice southeastward loop, but I had no idea which trail that would be. There are evidently some blue and very faded yellow blazes to offer some limited guidance, but we just bushwhacked back onto the main trail for our return to the trailhead. This fall I’d like to return to hike here and map out a couple of marked side trails.

Precarious perch

When we reached Lookout Point, I ventured 85 feet down to the northernmost point, where the other hikers had perched earlier. The hillside here was the steepest on the trail, and it was intimidating to see how precarious our perch on the other lookout appeared from this vantage point. This one at least terminated in a flat rock to stand on, rather than a slippery rocky slope. In the photograph of the view northward, Goat’s Bluff is a dark horizontal line amidst the trees in the upper center.

We took a side trail at the south end for an alternate route back to the car. We were both tired but happy as we completed our five mile trek, with Wendy noticing her boots had been collecting pollen. She had asked for a hike with hills and flowers, and both were provided. She makes nice pressings of her trail pickings.

Our journey back to Tulsa again had light showers. We had a tasty dinner at Five Guys Burger & Fries before returning to Bartlesville. Our fishing trip to a mountaintop yielded a nice catch of photos; we certainly hope to return to Sparrow Hawk Mountain before our licenses expire.

Click here for a slideshow from this day hike