Category Archives: Arkansas Hiking

Spring Hiking in the Ozarks

The dogwoods are in bloom; the redbuds are still flowering; and wildflowers are beginning to dot the landscape in violets and yellows as things green up in the Ozark Mountains of northwest Arkansas. Bill and I spent the last couple of days with my parents, Jane and Jack Morgan, at their home on Beaver LakeContinue reading “Spring Hiking in the Ozarks”

Waiting for Daylight: The Lost Girls Tackle the Ozark Highlands Trail

“Girls, it’s 5:35!” “Thank God,” I think as I hear Mary’s words. Nights are long on the trail in late October. The sun sets early and there we are in camp, 13 hours of darkness ahead. Even a camp fire provides amusement for only so long. The four of us have been together all dayContinue reading “Waiting for Daylight: The Lost Girls Tackle the Ozark Highlands Trail”

Curves and Hollows

We call the Ozarks “mountains,” and so they seem. But the area – covering northwest and north central Arkansas and much of southern Missouri — is really a high plateau deeply cut by rivers and creeks. This world of hollows and knobs is traversed on twisting roads and trails edged by sheer drops and breathtakingContinue reading “Curves and Hollows”

Ozark Highlands Trail Association Presentation

Last weekend I had the opportunity to attend the monthly meeting of the Ozark Highlands Trail Association in Fayetteville, Arkansas to share a presentation/slide show about our 2012 Mount Everest Base Camp trek. I really enjoyed getting to do the talk and the OHTA was kind enough to give me an honorary membership patch, OHTAContinue reading “Ozark Highlands Trail Association Presentation”

Bushwhacker Bluff Shelter

Last week we visited one of the bluff shelters along the White River excavated in the 1920s by archaeologist Mark Harrington. From this work, Harrington concluded that there had been a distinct native American culture he called the Ozark Bluff Dwellers. While that notion is no longer considered valid — these were Caddoan people usingContinue reading “Bushwhacker Bluff Shelter”