Day 3 – Arkansas

Monday, July 1, 2019

After a very nice hot breakfast in the morning at the hotel, I completed my journal entry for the previous day and then I called my out-of-province insurance broker to extend my health insurance for 10 more days, so that I would be covered until I returned home in August.

I then spent some time arranging meetings with my friends.   None of them were available on Monday, so I had to co-ordinate my visits for Tuesday.   This required several texts and a few phone calls.

After completing most of the arrangements, I made plans to hike Hawksbill Crag, upon Daniel’s recommendation.   I found its location on google maps and headed out just after noon.

The drive was going very well, until I lost cellular service near my turn on highway 5 and I drove 15 minutes out of my way before I realized what had happened.    I eventually figured out my mistake and backtracked to highway 5 which was an unpaved road next to the Buffalo river.   This mud and gravel road went straight up for 2 km ( 1 mile ) as the elevation increased by 300 m ( 1000 ft ).   The picture below doesn’t capture the steepness of the climb but I was glad that I had all-wheel drive and I found that it was best to use first gear on the steepest areas.

By the time I reached the trailhead it was just after 3 pm.  There were several cars already parked there and some people had just completed the hike and were leaving.  Anyone who has hiked the Bruce Trail in Ontario would find this trail very similar.

There were several warnings to stay away from the cliff edges, however, some people have been careless and a few lives have been lost; the latest incident occurred a few weeks ago.

There were a lot of rocks and tree roots along the path which was helpful for getting a foothold when climbing.

I reached a smaller version of the crag and had a picture of me taken out on the ledge.

The actual hike takes approximately 45 minutes ( each way ) depending on how much time is taken along the way.   When I reached Hawksbill Crag, I sat on the rock and  took a picture of the view down into the valley below.

Hawksbill crag was impressive and I could see how people could slip and fall from it if they were careless.

I met a couple of graduate students, who had attended the same college and had just completed their PHD programs in Economics.   She and her nine year old dog, lived in Fayetteville, AR and he was from Ohio.   I took a picture of them on the Crag to give a perspective of its size.

I talked with the couple for almost 30 minutes before heading back to the car and driving to the hotel.   By 6:30 I was back at the hotel.  Shortly afterwards I drove to the car wash to clean off the dust and then stopped at an Applebee’s for dinner.

The exercise was very good after all the driving the previous 2 days.