Day Sixteen of the Ouachita Trail

I was not looking forward to today. The hiking would take me out of the national forest, out of the mountains, and down into the flood planes of the Maumelle River Valley. In my mind, these last two days were to be the swamp days of the trip. I even spent quite a bit of time last night scheming on how I could avoid most of this last 30 miles of the trail. In the end, I decided to just suck it up and do it. And I’m glad I did.

I had 17 miles to go today and it seemed a good idea to get started early, so I was on the trail by 7 AM about 45 minutes before I usually get going. I was treated to a rather amazing sunrise through the trees, which I took as a good omen.

According to the trail guide, I would work my way down out of the mountains over the first few miles, crossing some small streams, then have to ford a couple of streams in a row and then I would finally get to the Maumelle River proper about 5 miles on. I imagined this area to be a muddy swampy quagmire of a trail. Kind of a slow Bayou with alligators and water moccasins waiting for me at the fords.

The first real stream I came to I rock hopped across and likewise with the second. Then I checked my map to see when I would get to the fords. It turned out those were the fords. Well maybe this wouldn’t be so bad.

When I arrived at the Maumelle, there certainly were some slow water channels, and cypress trees, and a little mud, but not on the trail. In fact, it was very picturesque and lacked alligators and water moccasins. I traveled on through low lying pine forest for five more miles along side what turned out to be a rather beautiful river.

After passing the 200 mile marker, I did have about a mile of leaf covered mud to traverse. But by walking carefully, the leaves kind of floated me on top of the soft mud underneath. It was a bit tricky, but I ended up not getting bogged down. I think this part of the trail should not be done while it’s raining or after recent heavy rains. There was debris from floods easily 15 feet above me when I was by the river. I also was able to rock hop 3 more fords.

The river has a dam across it, it forms a sizable lake. The trail comes in at the north west corner inlet and the trail ends at the south east corner of this largely east west lake. When I finally reached the lake, I stopped at the overlook vista and had lunch. That’s where I met Bob and Tom, two birders, checking out the lake. Roughly my age, we had a nice chat and they even offered me a ride to the end of the trail. But I had resolved to finish it walking, so I refused and pushed on to do the last 7 miles to my campsite.

The Penny Campsite is the only legal campsite between the National Forest and the end of the trail. Unfortunately, it is 9/10 of a mile off trail, at the top of a large hill, and has no water. This does make it a rather unappealing campsite. Although I am not above doing some “stealth camping“ I thought it best to follow the rules and hike up the mountain to camp. It is a pretty site, and has some great views, and I imagine later in the season gets you out of the mosquitoes down lower.

So in spite of my fears, it was actually a pretty great day. Being able to explore the riparian area following the river was different from the mountain experience. It has given me a nice change of scene. Tomorrow I have 15 more miles to go around the lake to get to the finish of the Ouachita Trail down near the dam. There are a couple of fords involved, but maybe I can rock hop, which will disappoint the alligators and water moccasins I’m sure.

Until tomorrow, happy trails…