Day 11: Tulsa, OK to McLean, TX (314 miles)
Monday, 24 October 2005
Last updated 27 Oct 2005

1. Karenna & Mark	2. Leo's Original BBQ	3. And their delicious food	4. Check out the cattle	5. In all shapes and sizes
6. Before you buy	7. At the cattle auction	8. At Oklahoma City Stockyards	9. Get your kicks ...	10. RS&K Railroad Museum
11. Is the garage of this couple!

Said goodbye to [1] Karenna and Mark (after giving them a private Tango lesson), and then took Route 66 all the way to Oklahoma City. [2] Delicious barbecued beef sandwich at Leo's Original BBQ (3631 N. Kelly St), which looks like a hole-in-the-wall, but has real character and friendly people. [3] Everything made from scratch except the bread (which unfortunately and surprisingly was Wonder Bread ...).

If you've never been to a cattle auction before, you really should. You first get to walk on a catwalk above the stalls to [4,5] check out the merchandise and then [6] compete with your fellow cattle ranchers for your favourites. They [7] bring the cattle (one or more in the sale lot) into a pen where the bidders can see them as the auctioneer rattles off his undecipherable bids. It doesn't look too big from the number of people bidding but the auction at the [8] Oklahoma City Stockyards (2500 Exchange Av) is supposed to be the largest in the world.

[9] Route 66 (this neon sign is at Elk City, where there is also a Route 66 Museum) has all sorts of unusual attractions. One particularly offbeat one is the [10] RS&K Railroad Museum in the little town of Sayre (411 N. 6th Street). What makes it particularly unusual is that as you find that address you realize you are in a completely residential area, and in fact the museum is in the [11] garage of xxx and xxx, for whom this is a hobby of many years! A word of caution. xxx will go through at least 100 of the 10,000 or so items in this collection and tell you what each one is, without waiting for you to ask. So make sure you have at least an hour to spare because you will likely feel too guilty to interrupt the monologue and leave after having made the nice couple open up their garage just for you at 9 o'clock at night!

If you spend the night in McLean, Texas, as I did, either avoid the Cactus Inn for accommodation (right on the roadside), or be prepared to deal with the crusty and rude owner Gordon Sheplor. But his wife Jane is very nice (she apologized for her husband the next morning of her own volition).

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