Arkansas

Leaving Land Between the Lakes we came across the Mississippi river into Arkansas. Coming into Maumelle campground near Little Rock Arkansas, we were greeted with a wonderful view of the lake there. This is a lovely campground, clean, well kept, excellent showers and bathrooms situated on the water. Facebook has many groups for RV folks and this park had been highly recommended – they were right on and a big thank you goes out to them! We stayed but one night on the way to Hot Springs. Once again we were the smallest RV in the park parked along side big rigs. $13 night. Please enjoy the pictures of Maumelle campground near Little Rock. This is in the Maumelle state park there.

Arriving in Hot Springs, the smallest National Park, we sought a campground and found it in Catherine Landing. This is a park not suited for children. We pick parks not suited for children on purpose. We do not need jungle gyms, playgrounds or teeter totters. We need a good bathhouse and quiet. This is a nice RV place for that – except when we arrived there were ill behaved children. It is not that I do not like kids – I do not like ill behaved noisy ones. Once I discussed this loudly enough with my spouse such that the unruly family could hear it, they were better behaved. I just do not understand what would possess someone to bring their children to a park not suited for children – it is unfair to the kids and unfair to the park guests. There are parks geared to and meant for children – this is not so geared. It is riverfront, small, and nice. It has Wifi, cable television hook up and complete water and sewer hookup. It was $35 a night with Good Sam discount. Enjoy a few of the park and the RVs there. Some RVs are so big they must be pulled by a semi. Wow.

Please enjoy these pictures of Hot Springs. The Springs come out of the ground at 145 degrees – little to hot to take a bath in without it cooling. There is a place to stick your feet in if you so choose – otherwise it is completely commercial and the Springs themselves have been covered over and impounded, you cannot see them, you can see only the steam from them in places. The official word on what makes them hot is “we don't know” Really? It seems a no brainer to me. Pick one – volcanic or radioactive – once flowing it posses little threat to the citizens but no one wants to be the one who alarms anyone. The Hot Springs activity (whatever it may be) also accounts for the quartz crystals in the area – do not go to Coleman Rocks as this is a tourist trap and the place wants double or more what a quartz cluster is worth and the “mine” is quite possibly bogus salted with rocks and crystals from out of the country. I hate places like that. It takes all of 10 minutes to see Hot Springs National Park. There is a busy downtown part and lots of dining that looks great - as for us, it is eating back at camp with Dog!

Taking scenic route 7 out of the park north, there is a lovely canyon to explore or just to look upon.

We found Arkansas to be very much like Virginia and if you dropped me most anywhere in Arkansas and said where are you, I could not differentiate between the two. There are places in Arkansas that are identical to Virginia in every way. The people keep their property tidy, are seemingly well educated, there is no road trash a plus is there are trailheads everywhere and I did not see issues with obesity we have in Virginia. Nice state. There are blue laws such that no alcohol is sold on Sunday – other than that, the land looks much the same. It is not until one comes to the canyon things look a bit different and one says – oh yes, I am not in Virginia anymore. Please enjoy these pictures of scenic Route 7 between Hot Springs and Marble Falls (now a ghost town and quite odd).

Buffalo River National River - lovely.

It was a long day – about 10 hours. We hit up Petit Jean State Park on the way back and saw a few things, hiked a few miles. We were both sore from riding so much but we wanted to fit it all in so we could leave sooner. We are ahead of most campers and want to keep it that way! This is Petit Jean. Please enjoy.

This is Marble Falls, now a ghost town. I thought this very odd as there is still a big blue mailbox outside the obviously derelict post office. There is an old abandoned defunct amusement park formally known as Dogpatch that is near here. You can google it or even look it up on Wikipedia. It is - was - an extensive park and the waterslide, lift, and water attractions are still very visible from the road but a no trespass is strictly enforced so there are no pictures - there are many online. These are of the ghost town and of the small historical marker nearby on the road marking the place where the marble was taken for the addition of marble to the Washington Monument. This pictured area consisted of the main drag through town that had a post office, businesses and a church. 

For anyone thinking of doing a roadtrip, couple personal pointers – download the goodsam app. It will tell you where all the campgrounds are not just the goodsam ones. I made the mistake of taking the advice of folks who said not to bring this or that – if you use it at home extensively, bring it. Toaster, crockpot, breadmaker – whatever it is you use at home, bring it. And, contrary to any information you may have found, wifi that is usable (bandwidth) is rare so don't count on it – up your current data plan on your phone and if need be make sure you can make a hotspot. If blogging or sharing pictures, make sure you have the ability to crop and resize the picture so that it does not take a lot of bandwidth to upload. Don't make a real plan – just go!

I leave you with a sunset of the view from Rt 7 north scenic route.

We are off to cross Oklahoma to get to Colorado. There is no good way west without crossing one of the states that has no National Park. We picked Oklahoma to cross – this will take a couple days! What's in Oklahoma? We have no idea.

Added: Forgot to mention this was in the Ozarks, the Ouachita and Boston Moutains which is in the Ozark National Forest. This includes the Ouachita and Arkansas rivers. Great places.