Tulsa's Gathering Place Sees First Visitors

For the first time, children are getting a look inside the Gathering Place.

34,000 Tulsa kids will get to go on field trips to the park and the first one was Friday. 

The road isn't open and won't be until all of the Gathering Place opens, but the first group of children got on the playground Friday afternoon.

The sounds of children playing briefly drowned out the noise of construction at Gathering Place.

After a decade of planning and building, 200 children from Eugene Field Elementary were the first to explore the Chapman Adventure Playground.

"I love the castle, I love everything," the kids could be heard saying. 

The children visiting today kicked off the field trips that run the seven 7 weeks.

"They are going everywhere their feet will take them and that's awesome it's a sense of exploration," said Tony Moore with the Gathering Place.

While the work continues all around the playground, kids from pre-k to third grade will be running over the five acres that's now open for these scheduled trips.

Kids were climbing on towers, and going down slides, running through a maze of mirrors and playing music.

It's just the beginning of what's ahead.

"A lot more activities to be done from restaurants to be finished, the lodge to be finished, a lot more trees to be put in, the boathouse, where we'll have canoeing and kayaking, there's just a lot more to be done," Moore said. 

Because of that work still ahead - the park will close after the field trips end.

The next milestone will be the grand opening in the summer with the latest prediction now being late summer for the public to see what these children saw Friday.

Riverside Drive will open when the rest of the park does and that's now estimated to be late summer.