Black Mesa State Park

Boise City, Oklahoma. The locals pronounce it Boys City. Now you’re in the know.

Black Mesa Park is truly in the middle of nowhere. Large black rocks from lava flow in the days of dinosaurs form the mesas.

My strongest impression of the park is the cockaburs.  They-are-everywhere.  On the dogs, on our shoes, their paws, our rugs, all the floors. It is overwhelming. We ended up buying baby socks to put on the dogs to protect their paws. We carry the dogs from the camper to the cement street to walk, etc.



The picture above gives you an idea of what the wee mangy mongrels have had to deal with.  The burrs in the pic are sandburs. They’re small and pesky, unpleasant to deal with, and hard to find in dog fur. Consort says the nasty, prickly ones are called goat’s head burrs. They are a nightmare.

We left the camper parked one day and headed out for an adventure. We are close to both New Mexico and Colorado and decided to explore. I programmed a destination into the Waze app and off we went.

There is a cell tower near our campsite and it turns out to be our carrier. We have excellent cell signal and strong WiFi, but zero TV — I wasn’t able to watch the debate, frustrating! I finally found it on NPR via iPhone. But once again, I digress.

Waze took us what it calculated to be the most direct route to Colorado. It entailed driving some very narrow backroads with landscapes that reminded me of the Painted Desert National Park in New Mexico, and it was every bit as remote. About 30 miles into the trip, there was a sign: Rough road ahead, gravel. We didn’t think it could be too bad, after all, these are directions from Waze.. and we are naïve and trusting.

Twenty miles farther down a gravel road and a time zone change, we knew we were committed to seeing these directions through. The views were once in a lifetime. And we did pass an antelope ranch.  We successfully reached our planned destination in the time Waze projected.  On the way home, however, we decided to navigate ourselves and took a different route.

The weather out here in The Panhandle is perfect. The stargazing is the best I’ve ever experienced. But the cockaburs, they are intolerable. There has to be a solution.

We move on tomorrow.  We will be backtracking whilst still progressing.

It’s really colorful in here. I invite you in. ~Marty Stuart