I am so very impressed with Natural Falls State Park. It is small, more like a large city park, but wow, is it ever well-kept, peaceful (on this Thursday morning in April), and scenic! I've decided it will be fun to start keeping notes about our various camping and biking locations, and here's what I wrote about this park this morning - even before seeing the falls or walking the wonderful accessible paths around them.
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Natural Falls State Park
West Siloam Springs, OK
2024, April 3-6
Drive time from home was 3 hours. The drive on 412 from Alpena to Huntsville is so lovely and one of my favorites.
This is a very small state park, but quite nice. We camped in RV 013. There are 45 RV sites and 17 tent sites. The best RV sites are those around the edges. 14, 15, 16 are prime, but 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 would also be good.
Park map
Amenities include…
Paved walking/biking paths (short)
Disc golf
Small waterfall
Volleyball court
2 playgrounds
Large pavilion (paid reservation only)
Short hiking trails
Views from the bluff for some RV sites
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We arrived at 5:45 PM and the office was closed. This was no problem as we had a reservation. All RV sites are reserve-only. Oklahoma has instituted a fund-raising plan of charging $10 per vehicle for entrance to its state parks, whether you are coming for ten minutes to use the bathroom or fill your water bottle, a couple hours to picnic and hike, or a couple days or a week to camp. And they are adamant about the every vehicle thing. Evidently fines will be issued. Fortunately for us, whenever you reserve and pay for a campsite your parking pass charge is included.
RVs (campers that have water going to and from them) have to be winterized so that water in the lines and equipment doesn't freeze and expand, potentially damaging things. The first year we had the camper, 2022, one of our expert camping friends helped Scott winterize the camper by thoroughly draining and drying it. I didn't witness that process, so I can't describe it for you.
Unfortunately - and probably unrelated to that winterization - when we took the camper out in early 2023, the water pump didn't work. Aarrggh. I think it had to be replaced, and again, I am thankful that someone else did that repair with/for Scott, and I was spared!
This past winter (2023), our friend helped Scott winterize it with hot pink, marine/RV antifreeze. I know it's hot pink because when I went in there to inventory and re-stock items, there was a small, circular hot pink stain on the counter where the faucet had evidently dripped. = { Scott had been instructed that we should take the camper to a dump station first thing this season and run water through it, opening all the taps till the pink water ran clear. We did when we pulled into the park, and everything worked fine. The water heater worked, and the heat heater worked, which was wonderful because the forecast low was 33 degrees.
Our campsite, #13, has a nice, long concrete pad. Using just one set of orange levelers we got our Grey Wolf right on the nose level side-to-side, and then also front-to-back. Being perfectly level all the way around is rare, and I like it because it lets the doors close correctly without slamming, which is nice.
We had already decided that this trip would be our shake-down 2024 maiden voyage and that we'd use the Asch Principle whenever possible. That meant eating out our first night because there was a chance we'd get in late (we didn't), there might be issues with the flushing of the antifreeze (there weren't), something might malfunction in set-up (nothing did), or some essential item could be damaged or missing (nothing was), and any of those situations could result in humans who were hungry, frustrated, and/or tired, and who'd want to try to cook a meal then? Not me!
Scott had found a Mexican restaurant with good ratings, but when we left our fully set-up campsite at 7:21 PM to drive there, they were closed. BUMMER. So we ended up going to a different Mexican restaurant all of five miles away that was open till 9:00, and La Hacienda #2 De Los Reyes was SUPERB! Great service, great atmosphere, great food, great prices. I ate too much (chips and salsa, grilled chicken chimichanga, rice, beans, guacamole, pico de gallo) and it was all delicious. Reminded me of Brownings in the Heights in Little Rock in the early days of our marriage. So good.
This morning, Scott and I took a short walk on one of the boardwalks up around the waterfall. It comes from nowhere and falls in a ribbon to a pool that's in front of one of those "Indian cave" looking landforms. The scenery, the walkways, the bridges, the cliffs, the stream, they are all very lovely and peaceful. We will do more exploring later.
I'm sitting outside in jeans, t-shirt, hoodie, and beanie cap at our concrete picnic table while Scott holds a Zoom meeting with his TTC Kenya leadership team at the table in the camper. Because of his back issues, at home he usually works at a standing desk and stands for these meetings. In the camper, he was looking around for places he could put his computer up high enough to stand at it. He tried the kitchen cabinet above the sink where all our dry food is stored (a little too high) and the cabinet above the toilet where the toilet tissue and paper towels are stored (not quite deep enough to balance his laptop well). Since neither of those would work well, he ended up standing two rolls of paper towels on the kitchen table (I say "kitchen" table, but it's actually our game table, work table, AND kitchen table) and setting his computer on top of them.
My KY3 weather app now says it's 59 degrees with a wind speed of 13 mph, which explains why I'm getting chilly. I just put on my magic gloves; I'm surprised that I can actually type fairly well in them. But the weather is beautiful: sunny with an absolutely clear blue sky.
A couple of bigger RVs just circled around, landed in sites across the way, and are now getting themselves set up. Birds are singing, and I think I'll stop here, drink some water, and go find a bathroom is that is not 2.5 feet from Scott's Zoom meeting. = )
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