June 15: I’m currently sitting in a Starbucks in Amarillo, TX. One reason is because I’ve been driving for the last six hours and still have another three and needed a break, but also I am not sure when I will have WiFi again and wanted to update everybody.
The last few days have seen me move from Hot Springs to Little Rock to Devil’s Den State Park to Broken Arrow, OK. I have crossed off two states off my bucket list in Arkansas and Oklahoma and I soon will be able to cross off New Mexico as I will be heading to just outside Santa Fe after I leave Amarillo.
I left Hot Springs last Saturday after making a trip up the observation tower in the park to overlook the city of Hot Springs and the surrounding Ouachita National Forest to head to the Kincannons in Little Rock. I met Andrew at the Flying Fish in downtown Little Rock where I enjoyed 2 shrimp skewers and a Lost 40 IPA. After meeting up with Christina, Alex and Rainey we headed back to their beautiful home before heading back downtown for dinner and drinks.
We ate and drank at the local Lost 40 Brewery where I “sampled” the Rockhound IPA and Love Honey Bock. I highly recommend stopping by the brewery if you are in Little Rock. Later we walked through downtown where we were able to hear Bell Biv DeVoe belt out the their famous “Poison” as we walked by the Funkfest at the downtown amphitheater. We hung out at Stickyz for a little bit before turning in. Thank you to Andrew and Christina for your hospitality.
Sunday, I moved out of Little Rock to tag Mount Magazine, the high point of Arkansas. You can almost drive all the way to the summit so I drove as far as I could then hiked the last half mile.
Devil’s Den State Park was my next destination which is about 20 minutes south of Fayetteville, Arkansas. I arrived around 4:30 in the afternoon on Sunday and spent the next few hours getting ready for my two day hike which was to start on Monday and eat dinner. I used my new camp stove to cook myself rice and chickpeas with teriyaki sauce. It wasn’t half bad. It wasn’t really that good either though but it had carbs and proteins. This was probably the roughest night for me so far. Car camping by myself was a lot more difficult than I imagined. Between trying to prepare myself for my hike (which was stressful to make sure I didn’t forget anything), deciding what I wanted to eat, making dinner, then cleaning up from dinner I felt like I was getting very little done but it was taking forever. All the while, I was missing the USA vs Mexico soccer match which was killing me. Car camping is something I definitely need to get better and more efficient at. That night I slept for the second time in my car bed and it was way more successful then the first time. A lot of this trip, will just take conditioning myself. Probably the biggest thing I miss is not having prolonged access to air conditioning.
Monday morning I started my first solo, overnight hike on the Butterfield Hiking Trail. This hike is a 14.7 mile loop starting in the Devil’s Den State Park and traveling into the Ozark National Forest then back to the trailhead. The first day I hiked 9.5 miles and got to my campsite around 2PM. The hike was well marked so trail finding was very easy. The scenery was pretty similiar to what I described for the Music Mountain Hike. The trail was lined with oak and maple trees and it was unbelievably green. I’ve heard how beautiful this forest is in the fall and after seeing all this green I can only imagine how wonderful it must look with all the autumn colors (Not something I got a lot of for the last 5 years in Houston).
My campsite was at the intersection of the Blackburn Creek and Lee Creek. When I arrived there, I “washed” my clothes in the Lee Creek and went for a “swim”. I setup my tent, filtered water, built a fire for later then… relaxed, which was challenging because it was very buggy. I read for a couple hours on my new kindle, A Handmaid’s Tale, went for another swim then ate dinner. Right before dusk I worked on getting my fire lit. I attempted to take some night pictures with my new camera lens but none of them came out great so that is why there are none in the “Photos” page. I turned in for the night and quickly found out that sleeping by yourself in the wilderness is more unsettling than I thought it would be. Between the nerves of sleeping outside by myself, the moon shining a spotlight on me and finding out that my sleeping pad had sprung a leak, I really struggled to sleep that night. I got up early since I wasn’t sleeping anyone and made my way back to my car. After a 5.5 mile hike back to my car, a shower and re-packing my car I got on the road to the Boyd’s.
I stopped at Grubs near Dickson street in Fayetteville, AR for lunch (thanks for the suggestion Robert) then drove to Robert and Leah’s in Broken Arrow, OK. I got to meet their two children, Archer and Lydia, finally and see Robert and Leah for the first time in what felt like forever. Last night Robert and I went to Bricktown Brewery for $2 beers, can’t beat that. Check off the “Three Guardsman IPA” and the “Old King Kolsch”. Thank you to Robert and Leah for putting up with me for two nights. I really needed that extra day to get some things in order for my trip and catch up on some sleep from that terrible night sleep on my hike. Hope to see you guys again soon.
From here, I’m heading to NM, Southern Colorado then cutting over to the southeastern corner of Utah and travelling up to Salt Lake City.
I’m going to start working on some posts revolving around things I did to get ready for my trip and things I use on my backpacking trips. If there are other things you guys are looking for please let me know.
Matthew