Collins Creek

Collins Creek is a great place to visit, the creek tumbles over many waterfalls and cascades, and flows past tons of moss-covered rocks. The added benefit is that the creek will always have a nice steady flow of water, thanks to a pipeline from the nearby Greers Ferry Lake. A few years ago, the US Army Corps of Engineers and the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission decided that there needed to be an extra habitat for trout in the area, and decided to divert water from the lake so that it flows through the creek. The benefit is that little baby trout have a place to hang out, and that photographers can enjoy the several waterfalls along the creek.


The weather people predicted it would be a sunny day, so I hesitated going out for waterfall pictures. I thought I'd head up there anyways, but wait till the end of the day and get pictures when the sun was setting.

But that Saturday was a bit cloudy, so it gave me hope. It was still cloudy in the afternoon, so I grabbed the camera gear and started heading up north to Greers Ferry. As usual, the clouds disappeared when I got halfway through the trip, so I knew I couldn't take many waterfalls shots for awhile. I wasted some time by having a look at some areas around the lake, stopping by an access point along the Little Red River. I was surprised to see the river was running very high, apparently the dam was generating electricity that day and was sending a lot of water through.

Still needing to waste time I went to find something to eat, stopping at a Subway. The dinner was disappointing, and a reminder as to why I prefer Firehouse Subs to Subway. But anyways, after that I headed up to Collins Creek to just have a look around, and was pleased to see that most of the creek was already in shadow. It was time to start hunting waterfalls.


These falls are along the first part of the falls you see after hiking in the short trail there.


I followed the trail down the course of the creek, then doubled back up looking for interesting stuff in the water. The creek has a lot of small waterfalls like this along the way.


And also, there is a lot of poison ivy out there.


And more from the creek, which is a great place to spend some time with the camera:






One not-so-bright idea I had was to just wear flip flops up to the creek instead of shoes. The thinking was that I could get into the creek and take pictures from a different angle. It worked, and I strolled into the water a few times. It wasn't that great of an idea any other time. Flip flops aren't the best hiking shoes, especially in and around the creek. The wackiest moment came after I was in the creek taking pictures and was walking back to shore. One of the flip flops fell off and went off downstream. I stumbled down the creek and managed to snare the floating flip flop with my tripod before it sailed on down the Little Red River. I couldn't imagine walking back to the car with just one flip flop.





Then I made it back up to the top of the trail where the taller waterfalls were located. These were taken while standing in the creek (the water was really cold).





There were even a few people fishing just downstream from where this was taken. I didn't think that there would be much fish in this area, but one of them managed to catch a small fish while I was there taking pictures. He also managed to fall right into the creek after catching the fish. I laughed, but then felt bad since I was standing in the creek taking pictures and was more than likely to stumble and fall into the water as well.





There are lots of great places to get pictures here, this is the third time I've been up to Collins Creek in the past year, and although it is a small creek there area lots of different angles to get of it.







By now it was starting to get a bit dark, so I called it a night and started heading home, but first getting just one more shot:


I felt pretty good, seemed like a good little trip out there. That feeling ended on the drive home when I got caught speeding, but hopefully I'll sell some of these shots to make up for the cost of the ticket.