Category Archives: Camping

Chickasaw National Recreation Area ~Sulpher, OK

03/25/2021 Danielle Huddleston Leave a comment

The Chickasaw National Recreation Area was once Platt National Park and is a beautiful little area in South Central Oklahoma.There are beautiful springs and waterfalls on an easy trail by the nature center.

We only stayed one night there because our plan was to stay at a Wildlife Management Area for most of the trip.

So we did not have much time to explore but I would like to go back, preferably when it is not the week of spring break. My kids want to go back in the summer to swim! The sites are nice and not too close together.

It was nice to have power and water in the new rig also! We did not run water into our tanks still though, we tend to wait until all danger of freezing is over for that.

We basically stayed here because we needed to dump our tanks and it seemed a better value to pay for a night of camping then to just dump our tanks at most places.

We left right after our walk around the springs and headed to a spot called Blue River.

It was a beautiful area but very popular and pretty full so we checked out another spot and hit the jackpot!

Our tire also shredded on the way to the blue river spot!

Thankfully there was enough room to pull over and fix it!

I will share pics of where we ended up staying next!

Camping, Wildlife Preserve/Reserve

Boondocking in South Western Oklahoma

01/20/2021 Danielle Huddleston Leave a comment

We decided to boondock (or disperse camp) at a Wildlife Management Area in between Quartz Mountain and Witchita Mountains on our most recent trip. The road in was pretty nail biting(especially in the dark) but we made it to our spot okay.

I was really hoping my camping choice would not cause damage to the camper so I was really relieved that we made it.

The kids loved the spot and found lots of pretty shells.

The spots seclusion and beautiful sunsets were just what I needed.

You will notice the boys are not in many of these pics, I barely see them at the campgrounds. Unless it is time to eat…

They are usually playing games in their tent or playing on tablets.

Guess they are too old for bubbles and singing.

These girls took full advantage of having no one around and sang as loud as they could.

Caught him.

We had a perfect evening for kite flying! I loved this beautiful field at sunset. I don’t know what this face was about but it made me laugh.

Thankful for this spot with nature as far as the eye could see.

And for this man driving a big trailer on crazy roads in the dark.

Camping, Hiking, Parks

Alabaster Caverns State Park ~Freedom, OK

12/31/2020 Danielle Huddleston Leave a comment

On the way to Alabaster Caverns State Park from Pawnee just happened to be Gloss Mountain!

This is one of my favorite spots in Oklahoma so of course I decided that we needed to get out and stretch our legs there!

Quick stair climb to the top and you can see for miles!

That is my idea of a great travel break!

When we got to our spot at the park I was a bit worried.

Although it was nice and close to the bathrooms and playgrounds (a really nice thing for 6 kids), it was also right next to the main park road and visitor center.

This is a very small park so there are not many options but this time it worked out okay since we were the ONLY PEOPLE STAYING AT THE PARK!

Thankfully their were very few visitors also because I felt a bit like we were in a fishbowl when anyone else was there.

I would not want to stay in this spot in the summer when it is filled with people.
Because we were right next to the visitor center it was really easy to go on the first cave tour of the day!

Which means it was only 5 kiddos and me(Nick stayed back with our youngest) with the tour guide.

I was not sure how interesting the tour would be(especially since I DO NOT like caves) but it was actually really fun!

We saw hundreds of bats!

A lot of them were super close also!

One entrance is not open right now so instead of going through the whole cave you go part way and turn back.

But the kids did not seem to mind because we got to see the bats again!

They were definitely the star of the show.

They got more snow than we did so there was still a lot of snow on the trails! There is not very much hiking available here because it is such a small park so keep that in mind.

And some of the trails might be short but they have steep drop offs, which are even more interesting when it is covered in snow and mud.

We had trouble finding one or two of the trails and I am not sure if that is due to poor trail markings or just being harder to see in the snow. These views were worth all the extra work though!