Where the buffalo rolled (Chickasaw National Recreation Area)

Buffalo Spring, Chickasaw NRA

Indian Country brought me the last flourishes of fall I didn’t know I needed. On the bluffs above Sulphur, fall was tenacious, leaves of many colors still clinging to their trees. I enjoyed the sharp reds and dull oranges of trees I knew from home in Ohio. 

A place of peace rested within the rolling hills of south-central Oklahoma governed by the Chickasaw Nation. The former Platt National Park, Chickasaw National Recreation Area marks a change in ecology from eastern deciduous forest to western prairie. Yucca sprout next to oak, and other species mingle in the dense canopy of trees. A spot on the central flyway means dozens of bird species inhabit the lakes and forests or stop on their migrations with the seasons. 

Before Oklahoma became a state, the Chickasaw Nation proactively ceded the land as a federal reservation. Considered sacred and rumored to sport healing waters, the tribe sought protections before exploitation could ruin the springs. They received it. For seven decades it operated as Platt National Park, named for a Connecticut senator who died while leading the Congressional effort to turn the reservation into a national park. 

When the nearby Lake of the Arbuckles opened with the damming of Rock Cree, Congress rescinded the national park designation, then rolled the Travertine Historic District into the much larger Chickasaw National Recreation Area, renamed to honor the tribe that pushed for preservation. We never saw Lake of the Arbuckles, but didn't feel like we missed out, as the former national park offers plenty to see. 

It's important to remember that the Native peoples who settled here once lived elsewhere. The Chickasaw once ran ferries across the Tennessee River during the heyday of the Natchez Trace. They lost their homelands in Alabama, Mississippi and western Tennessee with the southeast’s other tribes and came to Oklahoma via the Trail of Tears, their removal another stain on the nation’s dealings with the continent’s Native peoples. This tribe had the foresight to save these springs before they could be overused into extinction. 

The Travertine Historic District might not meet the eye-popping standards of many western national park sites, but it does not have to. The Arbuckles are more hills than mountains, but rise above the rumpled ground in this part of Oklahoma. 

Bromide Hill overlook

Hillside Spring

Pavilion Spring (under the pavilion)

Hills can still offer fresh perspective. Bromide Hill gives some great overlooks of the park and the city of Sulphur (a previous park headquarters is the only remnant of the original spa town). Some late fall leaves still stayed on the trees, leaving a few bursts of red and orange to brighten the afternoon. 

I had no luck spotting their park bison herd. The pasture closest to the bison overlook was all poop, no bison. Local deer lurked in the forests, often close to the creeks. A doe and two yearlings approached as we took our last loop through the park. 

The nature center offered easier marks. Housed in a Depression-area stone building, the center has some smaller animals found around the park. 

I found myself watching a three-toed box turtle, its face decked out in orange highlights. He stood on a little wooden cutting board with spinach leaves and sliced blueberry. Blueberry was the clear favorite. As if to tell me I watched enough, the turtle grabbed a blueberry slice and turned away from me. 

A short, wooded path along Travertine Creek leads to Buffalo Spring, the frequently photographed pool deep in the Arbuckle woods. Turn a corner along the creek, and there it sits. 

 A garden of Civilian Conservation Corps architecture surrounds Buffalo Spring, which still reaches Travertine Creek. At one time, bison were known to wallow in the spring, an impossibility now that it resembles the centerpiece of a stone garden. The recreation area’s bison graze behind a security fence and don’t come anywhere near the much-changed springs along the creek. 

Unlike Buffalo Spring, Antelope Spring was not modified with stone landscaping or a deeper course into Travertine Creek. The unaltered spring sat dry as it often did during drought years. One could picture it flush with water even as its bed lied cluttered with rocks and twigs. A ranger said it had been dry for less than a month, and rains had begun to saturate the ground, so Antelope Spring would run again. 

Little Niagara with low water

Little Niagara swimming hole

Seasonally dry Antelope Spring

Travertine Creek still boasted some small flows over the rocks at Little Niagara, a small cataract in no way reminiscent of the falls between lakes Erie and Ontario. By that measure, Little Niagara offered a trickle, but a trickle that fed into a clear, manmade swimming hole constructed on the creek during the Great Depression. 

Travertine Island, an oblong bit of land between two creek branches, is actually composed mostly of travertine carried by the creeks and coated the rocks through floods and many millennia. 

 Black Sulphur Spring had gone dry, but its little pavilion still stood. Many of the Chickasaw springs had dried up or merged during the 20th century. But those still active often put on a show. 

 No spring revealed its presence as clearly as Pavilion Spring. The anonymous name does not give away the spring, but it cannot hide its sulfuric smell or the strong travertine deposits on the rocks where it forms a creek. 

Hillside Spring’s name told no lies, as the clear water bubbled from a small tap at the center of a stone garden, then took a thin canal toward the creek. 

Original park HQ

A century ago, Hillside was known for the impact its arsenic-laden water had on improving skin condition – fortunately our attitudes toward water rich with arsenic have evolved and contact with Hillside’s water is prohibited. At the edge of flower park, where early 20th century spa visitors would walk among the gardens, a creek moved over small terraces to meet Travertine Creek. 

Nearby Lincoln Bridge appeared on Oklahoma’s U.S quarter during the National Park series of the 2010s. Tree branches and creek currents made it impossible to replicate that image, but 1909 bridge shows little wear of the past century. 

I asked the park rangers about maintenance, and they said all the stone structures required little, as the early 20th century stone bridges and pavilions tend to be sturdy. Even the stone bathrooms and pavilions seemed built for the ages.

Travertine Island

Lincoln Bridge