Mount Magazine Waterfalls

It was pouring down rain last Saturday morning, which definitely was enough to get some waterfalls flowing.  And luckily for me, I was set to drive off on Saturday to western Arkansas, in order to visit the family for Easter.  I had time to hit up a few waterfalls along the way, and planned a course that would take me by Mount Magazine, which is not only the tallest spot in Arkansas but is home to a few waterfalls as well.

So I headed out of town, driving west on Highway 10.  While it would make for a slower drive, it's much more scenic than the freeway.  I drove out by Pinnacle Mountain and Lake Maumelle, as a steady rain fell.  But as I drove further west, the rain slacked off.  And eventually, the clouds began to break up.  So of course, luck would have it that by the time I reached Mt. Magazine, the sun was starting to come out.

Sunny weather is, of course, the one thing you don't want for waterfall pictures.  So I was dismayed to see the clouds disappearing as I started up the curvy road up to Mt. Magazine.  Luckily there are a few waterfalls that are easy to reach along the road, in fact you can see them from the car.  Two creeks tumble down the mountain, cross under the road, and then meet up in a series of waterfalls down hill.   


I slid down the hill and tried to get a few pictures while there was still some fleeting cloud cover. The creeks created several nice waterfalls, which were filled with water after the recent rains.



While road culverts aren't usually something you'd try to include in a landscape photo, the culverts under the road were interesting. The road to the top of Mount Magazine was carved out of the woods in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps. They created some great old stone culverts, which perfectly match the environment around them. This small waterfall poured out below a stone culvert that, according to the marker, was built in 1936. The work on the rock culverts is amazing, especially since you can't even see it from the road.



The clouds had finally drifted away, so it was way too sunny for any pictures. I abandoned my quest for photos and just drove on to see the family. It was supposed to rain on Sunday as well, which I hoped would mean more time for picture taking. But the storm clouds drifted away early in the morning, so again there wasn't good light for taking pictures. Oh well.

But on the way home I did stop to take pictures in the small town of Paris, Arkansas. This was on the window of a restaurant in town, which looked like it had recently closed down. Why did it close? I assume it's because this was the epicenter of the bird flu epidemic...