Amazing Race Part 2 - Oklahoma

We first headed to the PopEye Statue in Alma, Arkansas. We had collected coins and wishes from family before we left so we threw those in. The little kids had all kinds of questions at first about the race but I think Goober caught on pretty early that we were on our own (no other teams were actually racing us). Therefore we brought him into the secret and asked him to help us make it exciting and play along. I think he felt honored and has been doing a great job at getting the kids riled up and searching for clues!

From there we headed to Sallisaw, OK for our first pit stop. The staff there was so warm and friendly and gladly handed us our next clue which was a detour of either cannonballs in the pool or free throws on the basketball court. We did both- along with kayaking, tetherball, and a candy scavenger hunt put on by KOA. My favorite part of the night was watching the kids collect lightning bugs….they were thrilled.

The owners wanted us to take this picture.

Everyone took a turn out on the lake.

The boys got brave and went down into the stream a little more.

Hot dogs and smores....MUST HAVE CAMP FOOD!

My version of camp smores....banana with a mini twix roasted over the fire....YUM

She loves her amores!

They were exhausted at 9:45 when we finally laid down in our tent. We are a big podcast family—I kinda got hooked on them from running and so we listened to a modern day twist on Rapunzel while we fell asleep. In fact, only 2 of us made it through the whole 30 minute story J….Ribbit and Adam.

 

Every place we stopped became a Ninja Warrior training course!

He made some friends and played basketball and football while the little ones played gaga ball.

Candy Scavenger HUNT.....this candy lasted us the whole trip....and then some!

Our sweet campsite...Adam put up lights for us at every site!

The next morning I woke up and had a picturesque gym in front of me…complete with a sunrise, gravel roads and other early risers who were out drinking their coffee. I got in a good workout using my bands and jump rope I had brought. Then I added in some fast ½ mile runs and used the benches around the campsite to do step ups, leg, arm and core exercises. I just kept watching our tent for signs of life and finally everyone woke up J. We ate breakfast and packed up as we commented on the awesome weather and beautiful campsite.

A beautiful outdoor gym!

Our first clue that day took us to Pops Soda Ranch in Arcadia, OK. On the way there we had our own church service in the car as it was Sunday. We read our daily chapter from the bible as we do every morning and then begin to worship along with Pentatonix. Then Adam and I listened to a podcast of one of Matt Chandler’s sermons on marriage.

We got to Pops Soda Ranch and the staff there was a little puzzled…..I think the two teenage girls up front really thought we were on the show and kept saying “ woah, really?, as they looked around for our film crew .....haha. Our waiter was awesome at playing along and was very talkative. To get our next clue we had to try bacon soda…and let me tell you not a one of us thought it was good or tasted anything like bacon. It was actually revolting. We let the kids pick out some other fun flavors to try and Goober settled on a rootbeer-but only because of the souvenir bottle it came in and the littles wanted to share a Vanilla Dream-they thought it tasted just like vanilla ice cream. We had GREAT FOOD, ate outside in perfect weather and  when our waiter had made sure we had all tried our sodas he handed Goober the next clue, along with the receipt.(***** Now that we are home, every kid has said that the bacon soda drink was their least favorite part of the whole trip...hehe, it was that awful)

This child peed on the side of every Hwy, every national monument and in every state park!!!

Ribbit described it as tasting like poop, Little Man said it tasted like socks and Goober said "cleaning solution or mouth wash"

They both enjoyed this root beer!

The haven't stopped talking about how good their Vanilla Dream was!

I was IN LOVE with this wrap...turkey, avocado, salsa, lettuce...YES PLEASE

I think there were over 500 soda flavors to try!

I kept trying to like it....but it had an awful smell, taste and after taste....and BACON is supposed to be good!

Even though our next clue was for the Oklahoma City Memorial we had seen a Red Circle Barn about ½ mile before we got to the Soda Ranch and our waiter encouraged us to stop there too. We felt like we had a big enough lead on other teams so we stopped and checked it out. The upstairs of the barn was incredible. You could see how they constructed it in the round and honestly to look at the domed roof made me dizzy. It was beautiful and a true historic landmark. The kids of course were more intrigued by the outhouse.

 

See the weave work of the ceiling of the barn behind us?

Look close, you will see 4 Harvells hanging out of the windows!

Completely intrigued by the outhouse!

I must mention that I had given each kid a clipboard filled with age appropriate travel games, trivia and coloring pages in their camelbaks. Four of the games were ones that they must complete together to get prizes at home. One of those is a map where they have to color in each state as they find a corresponding license tag. (*****Now that we are home, we found all but a few NE state tags...we even got Alaska, Hawaii and 4 Candaian provinces....but not a Deleware, Rhode Island or New Hampshire in sight!!!)As we walked back to our car from the Red Barn the kids spotted several different license plates and interest in that game picked up heavily!!! Even Adam is really getting into it!!!