Mount Scott glowing red in low sun beyond a road across the Wichita Mountains grassland.
duggar11 / CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
A Road Trip Guide

Oklahoma

From the Panhandle mesas to the Ouachita pines: Route 66 and the Chisholm Trail, the Wichita Mountains, the Washita and Fort Reno, Greenwood in Tulsa, the Osage Hills, and the capitals of the Cherokee, Muscogee, Choctaw, Chickasaw and Seminole nations, in a state that is home to thirty-nine tribal nations.

58 places · 9 regions · 9 stories · 3 drives · 190 markers

All of Oklahoma, One Map

Tap any dot to discover what makes a place worth the stop.

Architectural
Cultural
Geological
Historical
Natural
Recreational

Scenic Drives

The roads themselves — traced end to end, with the stops worth making along the way.

Scenic Byway

Route 66 Across Oklahoma: Quapaw to Texola

About 376 miles of Route 66 from the Kansas line at Quapaw through Miami, Claremore, Tulsa, Chandler, Oklahoma City, Clinton, Elk City and Sayre to Texola.

Distance
376 mi
Drive
8.5 hrs
Best
Spring · Summer · Fall
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Scenic Byway

The Chisholm Trail on US-81: Red River to Caldwell

About 233 miles of US-81 along the Chisholm Trail from the Red River below Terral through Duncan, Chickasha, El Reno, Kingfisher and Enid to Caldwell, Kansas.

Distance
233 mi
Drive
5 hrs
Best
Spring · Summer · Fall
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Scenic Byway

The Talimena Scenic Drive: Tuskahoma to Mena

About 81 miles from the Choctaw Nation's Tvshkahomma capitol up the Kiamichi Valley to Talihina, then OK-1 and AR-88 along Winding Stair and Rich mountains to Mena, Arkansas.

Distance
81 mi
Drive
2.25 hrs
Best
Spring · Summer · Fall
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Regions of Oklahoma

Each region gathers the parks, towns, drives, and roadside stops that define one corner of the state.

Region

Green Country & the Ozark Hills

Tahlequah's Cherokee capitol and court, the Saline courthouse, Sequoyah's 1829 cabin, Fort Gibson at Three Forks, Honey Springs and Route 66 at Miami.

7 places to explore
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Region

No Man's Land & the Northwest

Black Mesa and the state high point, the Panhandle's own museum, an alabaster cavern, the Glass Mountains, selenite digging and a homesteader's sod house.

7 places to explore
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Region

Oklahoma City & the Cross Timbers

The First Americans Museum, the National Memorial, Fort Reno, the Potawatomi heritage center in Shawnee, Seminole Wewoka and Boley in the post-oak Cross Timbers.

8 places to explore
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Region

Route 66 West & the Washita

Old 66 from Clinton to Texola, two road museums, Sayre's domed courthouse, the Washita where Black Kettle's village was attacked, and Roman Nose canyon.

5 places to explore
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Region

The Arbuckles & Chickasaw Country

The Chickasaw Cultural Center and the Tishomingo capitol, Sulphur's springs and CCC stonework, Turner Falls on Honey Creek and Lake Murray's Tucker Tower.

5 places to explore
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Region

The Cherokee Outlet & the Osage Hills

The 1893 Outlet run at Enid, Ponca City's oil mansion, the Kaw and Ponca nations' own places, Osage Pawhuska, and bison on the tallgrass.

8 places to explore
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Region

The Kiamichi & Choctaw Country

The Choctaw Cultural Center at Calera, the Tvshkahomma capitol, Fort Towson on the Red River, Beavers Bend on the Mountain Fork and the Spiro mounds.

6 places to explore
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Region

The Wichita Mountains & the Southwest

Mount Scott and the Wichita bison range, the Comanche Nation's museum, Anadarko's Plains art, Quartz Mountain, Old Greer County and the Chisholm Trail at Duncan.

6 places to explore
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Region

Tulsa & Bartlesville

The Lochapoka council oak where Tulsa began, Greenwood and the 1921 massacre, Philbrook and the Phillips house, Okmulgee's capitol and Will Rogers.

6 places to explore
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Stories from Oklahoma

The histories behind the places — the people, the disasters, the inventions, and the long memory of the land.

The red brick St. Joseph Catholic Church in Krebs, built in 1907, with its square bell tower under a grey sky.
History

Mine Number Eleven

The worst coal-mine disaster of the Indian Territory years killed about a hundred men at Krebs in 1892, in a field leased from the Choctaw Nation and worked by immigrants who stayed and made it Little Italy.

Open Road Guide · Oct 25, 2026 · 3 min read
A stone-walled spring pool among bare winter trees in Chickasaw National Recreation Area at Sulphur.
Geology

The Water Under the Arbuckles

The springs at Sulphur and the city of Ada's water come out of one block of folded limestone, and a 2002 plan to pipe that water to Canadian County made the state measure it first.

Open Road Guide · Oct 25, 2026 · 3 min read
The Cherokee Nation tribal complex in Tahlequah behind a brick sign that carries the Nation name in Cherokee syllabary and English beside its seal.
History

Eighty-Five Characters

Sequoyah's syllabary went from hand-set type in 1828 to the phones of Tahlequah, and the Cherokee Nation has spent two centuries teaching each new machine to write it.

Open Road Guide · Oct 25, 2026 · 3 min read
A row of two-story brick storefronts on North Greenwood Avenue in Tulsa, with cars parked along the street.
History

The Law Office in a Tent

Five days after Greenwood burned, B. C. Franklin was seeing clients in a Red Cross tent, and the suit he and his partners brought kept Tulsa from zoning the district out of Black hands.

Open Road Guide · Oct 25, 2026 · 3 min read
Steps climbing to the columned front of the 1914 Osage County Courthouse in Pawhuska.
History

Proof of Competency

In the Osage oil boom, county courts handed the money of Osage citizens to white guardians, and the system turned the deaths of the 1920s into estates.

Open Road Guide · Oct 25, 2026 · 3 min read
A fallen brick chimney heaped beside a house in central Oklahoma after the November 2011 earthquake.
Geology

The Fault Under Prague

A magnitude 5.7 earthquake in Lincoln County in 2011 told Oklahomans that salt water from the oil fields was waking faults in one of the quietest parts of the continent.

Open Road Guide · Oct 25, 2026 · 3 min read
All 9 stories from Oklahoma →

Historical Markers

Roadside history, plaque by plaque — every marker in Oklahoma, grouped by county and searchable.

Roadside History

Markers of Oklahoma

Browse every historical marker across Oklahoma — organized by county, each with its full plaque text.

190
markers
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