Road Trip Part 2 - The Ozarks

Second phase of the trip was through northern Arkansas and southern Missouri.

The Ozarks

The Ozarks are a very pretty drive, even in late winter/early spring, before everything is coming to bud.  Be prepared, though.  There are a lot of little towns marked on the map which are really just crossroads, no gas station, restaurants, stores, barely more than 4 houses...  Make sure you have a full tank gas in the car and have hit the rest stop before heading too far into the national forest!  There was a very friendly little shop near the junction of AR-16 and AR-21, on the north side of the forest.  Perfectly timed pit stop, and a friendly hiking suggestion from the store owner too!

We ended up taking her advice and stopping to stretch our legs at Glory Hole, a hiking spot just up the road from her store off AR-16/21.  It's a little hour-long hike (give or take) and pretty relaxed (kids could do it).  Perfect for a pair of people who had had a long day sitting in the car and needed to get out and stretch their legs before it got dark.

 

The trail follows a stream down the hill into a small valley, to where it makes a little waterfall through the rocks.  Well, relatively little.  It's not Niagra or anything, but it's still a sizable hole in the rock (Zach is about 6 ft tall, for a sense of scale in the picture below).

To make things extra fun, by continuing on down the trail, you come around to the other side of the rocks and can stand underneath the waterfall too.  Too cool!

 

And even without the highlight of the waterfall, it's still a very pretty hike along the stream.  Especially for a little water-baby who's been living in The Dry too long :)

 

Turning north from the mountains after our little walk, we came down into the Buffalo River Valley, very understandably a popular recreation area.  Pretty valley so a nice drive; two rivers join there, so opportunity for some water sports and paddling; hiking through some gorgeous woodland.  And the wildlife: ELK!

The elk are actually a reintroduced animal in the valley.  The original species was hunted out, so they have reintroduced a similar variety of elk, which has taken hold very healthily.  Lots of elk, as you can see!  Very laid back animals, it seems, completely not disturbed by the cars passing on the road nearby.  But, they are HUGE!  Would definitely do a lot more damage than the average deer, should you have an unfortunate vehicular encounter with one!  Thankfully, they just hung out and let us proceed along our merry way.  Big ol' fellas, though.  One of the ones closest to the fence line had a sneeze, and we could hear it distinctly from the car!  Line from the evening:  "Elk sneezes are very wheezy."

 

Once we passed through the Ozarks and Missouri started flattening out, it honestly wasn't as exciting.  Nothing rolling, and no small towns to speak of.  Just the occasional tiny, tired little crossroads of a town: a gas station, a church, and a restaurant where "they serve everything you could want.  Like burgers."  We actually heard that in more than one town.  We were very excited to cross the Mississippi and be back on the right side of the river (emotionally and geographically!).