A Lap of America – Quirky Looks in Oklahoma and Arkansas

Any road trip will include amazing places, as well as some quirky, off beat venues. Chickasha, Oklahoma has not one, but two of those type of places.

Muscle Car Ranch. Didn’t really see much in terms of true muscle cars, but it was a collection of ‘stuff’ scattered over a large area that serves as a campground and casual amphitheater.

Also in Chickasha is a 40′ Leg Lamp, made famous in the movie Christmas Story. Why is there a giant statue for a movie that was filmed in Cleveland and set in Indiana?

It turns out that the person who first made a leg lamp was from Chickasha, long before the movie made it famous. They tried a couple of inflatable leg lamps that blew away before finally building this impressive statue.

In a bizarre approach to project management the Oklahoma Department of Transportation built the supports for roads that they knew they wouldn’t have the money to complete for years. So now, there are a series of supports seeming standing there as art installations.

They now say they have come into the needed money and should have the ramps completed in the next few years, so hurry if you want to see Traffic Henge before they are covered with bridges and roadways.

It was is known as one of the largest ‘augmented reality’ murals in the world, the mural on the side of a parking garage on the site of what was once a theater is known as the Majestic (the name of the theater) in Tulsa.

As you look at the mural from different angles, it appears to have different objects.

When you make billions of dollars by selling cheap stuff, the Walton family of Walmart fame has graced their hometown of Bentonville with lots of great parks and museums, as well as a sculpture garden.

Personally I like Traffic Henge better, but that is me.

A bicycle art sculpture in Eureka Springs, Arkansas

Walnut Ridge, Arkansas has a tribute the the great artists from the area with a park featuring a guitar shaped walkway, and large guitar and amp.

Walnut Ridge also celebrates the fact that the only time all 4 people were in Arkansas at the same time was when they flew into their airport to go to a lodge in southern Missouri for a vacation.