February 21, 2023 the wife tells me not to make any plans for Friday - Sunday, "me" Yes Ma'am. what are we doing? "Her" it doesn't matter just do not make any plans!
( Saturday the 25th was our 28th wedding anniversary)
Friday am we load up her car and we are off to where I have no clue? Wife says head north on hwy 75 then exit on 121 in Mellissa. When we got to Bonham she said turn right (east) on 82, At that point I was pretty sure I knew where we were going = Broken Bow lake/Beavers Bend State Park..

The wife rented a luxury cabin about 8 miles north of Hochatown, when we pulled up in front of the house I asked the wife, do we have the whole house to ourselves?
The place was fricking awesome. Identical master bedrooms on each side of the house, outside fireplace on one side, big outdoor seating area on the other side all under the covered wrap around the house porch, outback jacuzzi Foosball table, nice Cornhole boards & bags. People this place was way nice for this White boy!.

We did not go back the same crazy way back that the wifes Waze mapping direction took us. We took 259 to Idabel, then 37 to Mt Vernon and I 30 to 190 and home, so much easier!

Link to the cabin.

https://www.dancingmoonluxurycabin.com/


If you have never been or thinking about going again, you need to hurry it up. The city of Hochatown is about to become the next Branson and they do not have the infrastructure to handle what's going on now much less huge future growth.
We were there off season on a cold, drizzling rainy weekend and it was busy, the locals told us when spring break hits, it will be a zoo and that it can sometimes take you 45 minutes to go 500 yards in town.
Factor in they will be opening a huge new Casino resort on the east side of town and Disney recently bought 500 acres, the place will be fricking nutz up there.




Beavers Bend State Park






These Crystals were all around Crystal Point, the side of the banks were just line with them.



Ferns were growing out of the trees??

Pot is legal up there now and what was really interesting in Hochatown was all of the Corny Dog places and Sasquatch everywhere.




Did the Hochatown Distillery tour it was kind of boring if you know anything about Bourbon/Whiskey. However I like the company they keep


Huge metal statues of a lot of things, that Indian has to be 15" feet tall.


Mingling with the locals

Did you get me one of them hats

Surprised they don't have a meth dispensary

Happy anniversary and thanks for sharing. I had no idea about that place.

Congrats on the milestone and glad you had fun. That lake is my favorite Crappie lake to fish, we hit it annually.

We love it there, go 2-3 times a year for the last 20+ years. Taking about missing an opportunity not investing there 20 years ago. The growth does take away from what used to be a hidden gem. But we still love it! The Saloon is a good time when they turn from restaurant to dance hall later in the night

I would like to check out the distillery

Some really nice cabins around that area with private outside hot tubs. I would not even think about going after this week until late fall as the crowds and traffic will be absolutely terrible. Winter is good time to go and just enjoy nature the natural way.

No but I did think about you while I was looking at them


Thanks!


Another thanks!
Not sure if they had a tournament going on but the boat ramps were jammed packed, wish I would have taken a picture of how the trucks & trailers were crammed in there, could barely drive my wifes car between them and no clue how a lot of them could get out unless they were parked on the end.


Learning the process of how it is actually made and seeing the equipment and stored barrels was interesting.. The down side of the tour is it takes way to long and way to much personal BS Bravado from the presenter .

God's country.

Looks nice Stub, ballpark what would rent run on that lakehouse if you know?

we were there the same weekend,
my wife and I for the first time along
with one daughter and family.
Thought the weather might clear so took
a chance and drove up to The Winding Stair
area in the Ouachita Mountains. Didn’t happen.
Still enjoyed a lot of the area.

Happy Anniversary! I like that lake because the shoreline is kept clean and natural

Saturday night was tough driving with the heavy fog!





Again Thanks, poor woman has survived 28 years

We have been every year or every other year for as long as I can rembember, since the late 70's-80's. We only went for the water sports. All we did was ski and tube. No matter what direction the wind was from there were so few people we could always find smooth water somewhere. Here is a photo of the depth finder very close to the dam.

I'm just so glad we made all those trips and memories because it will never again be like it was.

My family and the Beez family will be if there this coming weekend. Looking forward to the kids playing and putting some miles on the SxS’s.

If you decide to do a kayak trip, just for grins let the meth monkey van driver of the 20 year-old, heavily overloaded, van that wouldn't pass a Mexican safety inspection you are a LEO. It might make your trip from the check-in to the the river drop-off point either safer or interesting.

That was not a lakeside house so no clue what that would cost, as a matter of fact it is a Corp of engineers lake so I do not believe there are any Lakeside houses.
The house we stayed in was very affordable, I think off season price per night is regularly $250 plus all of the fees. Wife got a 10% discount for?? so it was $225.00 a night plus all of the fees they charge which added up to $300.00 a night total which I think is way cheap for that nice of a place.



Back in 1995 we lived in the Glen Lake apts, our neighbor cool dude was a forestry/parks type employee who decided to buy 20 acres up in that general area for $150.00 per acre, dang I wish we would have done the same!



Have a great time, hope the weather co-operates.

When we first arrived in Broken Bow we stopped at Walmart, it s a small old store, right past it is a real nice grocery store called Pruetts Food.
We ate at two places in Hochatown, one was a Seafood place by the distillery named "Shuck Me" it was just okay, the other was Shady Oaks restaurant had breakfast there twice..
First morning I had bacon, eggs, biscuits and gravy were very good, wife had ham & cheese omelet she liked a lot, second morning Chicken fried steak and eggs, Chicken fried steak had good flavor but was too chewy.

If you do go into Hochatown Janet's Treasure Chest is where all of the big statues are and they have a ton of souvenir stuff inside, it is worth the stop just to check out all of the huge statues the adults and kids will enjoy them I promise ya! Google Janets Treasure Chest then go to the right side of the page and click on the photos, do not click on the website for there are no pictures there,

OK, so not a lakehouse, is the lake close by, walking distance or do you have to bike or drive to it?

Place looks awesome. I need to take the wife somewhere nice pretty soon.

(DQ) "OK, so not a lakehouse, is the lake close by, walking distance or do you have to bike or drive to it?"

Depends upon what you call close? Our Cabin was about 8 miles north of the park/lake entrances, have no clue what is available close to the lake, you will have to do your own research or maybe one of the veterans of the lake can tell you.

My next door neighbors rented a killer house on the river below the lake a couple of times, if you have a lot of $ or a couple of friends to split the cost with ya, that would be a blast.

How close to any fishing spot? (Even a pond...something for the little ones)

There are no "lake houses" there- yet. A lot of the land is national forest land. Some is state land and some is indian lands around the lake at least. There are some cabins on the mountain fork (above the lake).

It has gotten ruined by the growth and tourist stuff - mildly depressed about it because it was one of my favorite places. We go up multiple times per year (usually stay a week in the fall also) since it's close - usually for a day trip to the lake - but you can't do that anymore...there is literally no where to park that's easy access to take the dogs swimming in the summer. They also changed the trout regs (dumb since they're stocked) which makes it not worthwhile for me to run up for an early AM fishing trip anymore.

You guys missed it in it's true heyday. Now it's a tourist trap that appeals more to true city folk demographic.

We'll be up there on Friday to meet some friends from Houston for lunch and a few beers at the brewery.

congratulations! sounds like a fun weekend