Having a grape time in Altus

After heading to the top of Mount Magazine, there was one last place I wanted to check out before heading home. I drove by these fields filled with some wildflowers (or weeds?) along the side of the road.


Easy to see why the flowers were thriving, seems like they've gotten lots of natural fertilizer...


My next stop was the town of Altus, Arkansas. Altus is probably one of the coolest small towns in Arkansas. You might remember Altus as being the location where Nicole Richie and Paris Hilton embarrassed themselves in the first season of "The Simple Life" a few years back. Going to college just twenty miles away, we used to make many trips to Altus, for several reasons:

1) Food. For being a small town (population 817), there are some great places to eat. The Swiss Family Bistro at Wiederkehr Village is a must. And I'm craving the chicken béarnaise from Kelts right now.
2). Wine. Altus is home to four wineries, including Wiederkehr, which was founded in 1880.
3). Liquor. I went to college in a dry county, so we made a few trips out here for some other types of liquid refreshments. And now Altus is one of only two cities in the state that sells alcohol on Sunday (Eureka Springs being the other).

This was taken along the side of the road north of Wiederkehr Village.

Looking back, I probably should have taken the price tag off before taking the picture.


Another cool thing about Altus is the really neat old Catholic Church. St. Mary's Catholic Church, built in 1902, is filled with lots of neat murals and stained-glass windows. It was late afternoon and the light was pouring into the church.


And a shot of some of the stained-glass windows:


And a shot of the outside of the church, which sits on a hill with a commanding view of the valley and Altus below.


My plan was to get a shot of the church lit up at night, and I sat out there for awhile waiting for it to get dark. It was actually a bit cold up on the hilltop, and it seemed like the church really wasn't lit up all that much. There was a spotlight that shined on the steeple, but the rest looked like it was dark. Tired of sitting alone in the parking lot, I gave up and headed on. At least I got some wine out of it...

Cherokee Prairie and Mount Magazine

I headed out to western Arkansas last weekend, to do some family stuff. I was in the town of Charleston, and on Sunday decided to take the scenic drive back home. My first stop was a prairie area just a few miles north of town. The Cherokee Prairie Natural Area is the largest tract of tallgrass prairie land in the state, at 566 acres. There you can find all sorts of wildflowers in bloom, and even a few prairie mounds there.

These flowers are called "Indian Paintbrushes," and were all over the prairie.

There is another prairie area nearby, just a few miles to the east. Called the Flanagan Prairie Natural Area, it was filled with the same type of flowers. Since it looked the same I won't bother with posting another shot of the same type of flowers. But driving back from Flanagan Prairie I did stop to get this shot of some other type of flowers growing near an old building.

I decided to take Hwy. 217 south from Charleston, which runs alongside Lake Charleston for a bit. The lake provides some neat views of Tater Hill, a small mountain that sits in Fort Chaffee. I had gotten a shot of Tater Hill once with the lake in the foreground, and looked to do a newer version of it. But it seems as if all the turn-offs to the lake were closed off, so no luck there. Following the road south, I saw this old barn and stopped to get a shot.

The barn's days might be numbered though. There was a sign there advertising this area for a future housing development, which will probably result in this barn being torn down. A shame, really.

From there I continued on to the east, with Mount Magazine as my next destination.

The first stop on the way there was Cove Lake, in the National Forest at the foot of the mountain. There is a trail that runs along the edge of the lake and I got out and went to explore it a bit.

I didn't stay out there too long, turning back when I got a shot of the lake that I liked. I stopped to take a shot of this lichen-covered rock, which might have been a mistake since I had to stumble through a lot of poison oak to get to it.

From there I headed uphill and went to the top of Mount Magazine, the highest point in the state at 2,753 feet. Arkansas has the 34th highest state point in the country. If you're curious about it (I was since I just looked this up), the state with the highest point is, of course, Alaska with Mt. McKinley (20,320 feet). The state with the lowest high-point is Florida (Britton Hill at 345 feet).

Mount Magazine isn't among the biggest mountains, but it does have some nice views. There is a road that visits a few overlooks (the road is helpfully named Overlook Road, in case you get confused). This was taken from one of the overlooks, looking down into the Arkansas River Valley.

The road also accommodates bike riders, with this little bike path. I didn't see anyone out there riding, though it would have been a good day for it. Good thing there weren't any bike riders out that day since I was blocking the path taking this shot:

From there I went to find the Mount Magazine Cascade, a 100 foot cascade that tumbles down the side of the mountain. Since there hasn't been all that much rain here lately, I didn't think it would have much water in it. But the cascade is fed partly by spring water, so I thought it might be worth checking out. The cascade is along a short half-mile trail, which runs right to the top of the cascade. There really wasn't much water there after all, but I got this shot of a small waterfall along part of the cascade.

After visiting the cascade I went back and did the short hike to the summit of Mount Magazine, which would take me to the top of the state. The hike up there is easy. It is all uphill but it isn't very steep. Along the way there were lots of mayapples in bloom.

And then I made it to the top. The highest point in Arkansas is a bit anti-climatic. There isn't any grand sweeping view of the scenery up there, just a view of trees. They do have a rock outline of the state there, and a sign, so you do know you made it to the top.

There weren't any other hikers out on the trail, so I had a few fun minutes of being the highest person in the state. Wait, that doesn't sound right. OK, I was the highest person up in terms of elevation. Which was pretty exciting, I guess.

Crazy times at the Junction Bridge

Little Rock seems to love pedestrian bridges. Along with the Big Dam Bridge, a new pedestrian bridge will be opening up in the next few weeks. The Junction Bridge, a railroad bridge built in the 1880's, is nearly finished being rennovated. It will be a great place when opened, the views of the skyline should be awesome from there.

The new lights on the bridge were recently turned on, so I headed downtown one night last week to get a shot of the bridge with the city skyline in the background. There were just a few flaws to my plan, one being that the bridge is still a construction site so that a large black safety net was hung on the bridge. The other was that I was target for a crazy person.


I got there early and had to wait for it to get dark. I scouted the area, looking for a good place to get a shot, then set everything up and waited.

While I stood out there next to the camera, a car drove up and parked about 30 feet away. The car just sat there, and I could see that the driver was just sitting there. This got me a bit worried.

After sitting there for awhile, the guy in the car got out and started walking towards me. Oh crap, I thought. What now?

The guy walked up and asked what I was taking a picture of. I thought that he was just smoking a cigarette when he walked up, but realized I was wrong. He was smoking a joint.

He said he was curious as to what I was doing, taking pictures out there. He wondered if I was taking pictures of the "May" sign on the bridge. The May sign is there because the company doing the rennovation is named May. He said that he thought the sign was there to promote Memphis In May. I wasn't sure what to say. Of course, it seems obvious that there wouldn't be a sign on a bridge in Little Rock that would promote Memphis In May, since that is held in Memphis and not Little Rock. I lied and told him I didn't know what the sign was there for, and he looked at me like I was an idiot.

"Then why are you taking a picture of it?" he asked.

I tried to explain that I was trying to take a picture of the bridge and the skyline at sunset. He then asked if I spent a lot of time studying when the sunset occurred.

No, I could honestly say, I don't normally look at that. I admitted that I thought it might set earlier, since I had gone out there only to wait longer than I expected. He said that Channel 7 News said it would set at this time, as if I was ignorant for not knowing that.

I said I didn't watch the news today, so I missed that. He then added, "well I don't watch the f--ken news anways, f--k them."

Which made me wonder how he'd know when Channel 7 would know when the sunset would be, if he didn't watch the news. But I figured asking that might make him mad, which might make him stab me or something, so I didn't say anything.

At this point I should have walked to my car and driven away.

But the crazy guy began to ask me all sorts of crazy questions. He asked about the crane above the new building being built in Little Rock. "Where did they get that crane?" Not knowing where cranes arrive from, I told him I didn't know.

He said, "well it probably didn't come from Arkansas! They must have brought it in from Memphis or St. Louis."

"Or Dallas?" I added, for some odd reason, adding on the nearest large city. I don't know why I was trying to make conversation with him.

"Dallas!" he said, "F--k Dallas!" He then railed on how Dallas sucks and that Texas is filled with horrible towns filled with "cultural centers" and that the only good places in Texas were Austin and San Antonio. I was glad I wasn't wearing a FC Dallas t-shirt that day.

Then he asked me if I smoked pot, since apparently his joint was gone. When I said no, he looked a bit dissapointed. Then he asked me if I had any beer on me.

"No, I don't have any on me." Which was truthful, I don't usually carry a keg with me everywhere I go. He gave me another look like I was the craziest person in the world, and asked "why not? There are plenty of places nearby that sell beer!" and motioned his hand towards the bars on Main Street in Argenta.

He said that he wanted a beer, so he was going to head across the river to a bar in the River Market area. I was more than welcome to join him. He even asked what kind of beer I'd like. I told him that I had plans tonight and couldn't make it out there.

"No, f--k those plans, get a beer. You're young, grab a beer!" I told him that I'd meet him for a beer after I finished taking pictures, so he'd leave. Which he did, after asking me what kind of beer I'd like, either in a pitcher or in a glass.

I, of course, didn't head down there. But did wonder if he sat watching a glass of beer get warm while he waited for me to show up.

Sadly, I didn't make this up...But this was really a bizarre encounter, the only time in many trips to downtown that anything like this has happened.

But being left alone I was able to take more pictures. The bridge will be awesome when it's done (it will be open for Riverfest on Memorial Day weekend).





After looking around the bridge one last time, I went over to Riverfront Park to get a shot of the skyline reflected in the river. I was too late to get any color in the sky, but luckily there were no crazy people out bothering people. Just a few people walking the trail and enjoying the view...

Catching up with the Travs

Went to an Arkansas Travelers game last weekend at Dickey-Stephens Field. It was a good game, and a nice night out.


The game was nearly sold-out, the only seating left by the time we got there was on the grassy bern. They announced that there were over 7,000 people at the game. The game was against the Northwest Arkansas Naturals, so maybe lots of people came out to see the new Arkie team. The Travs won, 3-1.

Dickey-Stephens is a great ballpark, but one thing that I don't like is how they are starting to use more music during the game. Everytime a Travs player's name would be announced before he went to bat, they would blare out 30 seconds of some random song. It got on my nerves after a few innings. Say what you will about soccer games, but at least they trust that people can pay attention to the game without playing music every few minutes...




This was taken right before I went to stand in line to get something to eat and missed the Travs scoring a few runs.


A Travs player (sorry, I don't follow the team that closely to know their names, and I can't read his jersey number, it's 1-something!)..


Our seats had good views of third base, so I hope I could get a good shot of something happening, but this was just about all I got. Dickey-Stephens is a neat stadium, so we'll probably head back to another game. Maybe on one of those $3 ticket nights...

Flatside Pinnacle

The other day I took the short drive out to Flatside Pinnacle, just under an hour from Little Rock. It is probably one of the best views in the state, but isn't all that well known. It is similar to Pinnacle Mountain, except maybe it hasn't been "loved" too much, there are hardly many other visitors there, and the views are spectacular. Unlike Pinnacle, there are hardly any traces of civilization out there, just miles upon miles of forested hills. The only man-made things that can be seen is the dirt road leading up there, and sadly, some clear-cutting on a hill.

But the views there, are just great. It's also a great place to catch a sunset. The day I was up there it was cloudy, so there wasn't a sunset to catch. Here is part of the view:


And a shot with some of the lichen-covered rocks on top of the Pinnacle:


And a panoramic shot, which is an autostitch of seven shots...


Flatside Pinnacle is located in the Flatside Wilderness of the Ouachita National Forest, and is west of Little Rock. To get there, take Hwy. 10 west from Pinnacle Mountain until you reach the junction with Hwy. 9. Turn left (south) for 3.2 mile and then turn right onto a dirt road, which is the Winona Scenic Drive. Follow this dirt road for about 11 miles, and you'll come to a small parking area. From there just take a short trail that heads a bit steeply up the hill to the Pinnacle. It's well worth the effort.