Meador Manor

Second Day at Petit Jean: Looping Cedar Creek

Posted on March 14, 2010 by Granger Meador

Click image for a slideshow

My second day at Petit Jean State Park in Arkansas was spent hiking about eight or nine miles on a variety of trails, primarily along beautiful Cedar Creek, which bisects the park.

After a continental breakfast at the Microtel in Conway, I drove back to Petit Jean Mountain, ascended past Stouts Point, and parked at the cabin built by John Walker back in 1845. It serves as the trailhead for the Cedar Creek Trail, which had only a few hikers on this serene and overcast Sunday morning. The trail meandered down the steep side of the canyon to the creek below, crossing it on a wooden bridge that provides a great view of one set of the many small falls along the creek. As the trail headed back south along the west side of the creek, it passed a portion of the creek bed strewn with massive boulders, and passed under one which had tumbled onto the side of the streambed. I posed under the stone, noting how weathering had altered the appearance of its opposing face.

I clambered out into the creek now and then to photograph some of the falls, with the trail sometimes veering up against the bluff. The trail linked to Rock House Cave Trail, which ascended the canyon wall above Cedar Falls. Along the way I posed by some boulders to give a sense of their scale. Soon I found myself looking down upon Cedar Falls, opposite the overlook I visited the day before.

It was a short walk uphill to the Rock House Cave, a huge bluff overhang which Native Americans used over half a millennium ago, leaving a few pictographs. Or at least I was told there were pictographs – I couldn’t make them out against the stained and streaked rock ceiling of the shelter. A couple with two small boys were in the shelter, with one of the lads repeatedly grunting and falling down on the sandy floor. The father explained that his son was fighting monsters, and I speculated that he might be losing.

Moving on westward, I passed over more Turtle Rocks like those adorning the Seven Hollows Trail. A short side trail led to a secluded spot with a great westward view of the canyon, with the cabins near Mather Lodge perched atop the rocky bluff to the south. It was half past noon, so I plopped down and enjoyed a drink and some trail mix, photographing the adjacent bluff and a nearby pine tree. With my camera at full 12x zoom, a car and cabin across the canyon appear in the background of the latter photo as if they were only a few yards away.

I was following the entire north part of the Boy Scout Trail, the entire loop of which wraps 12 miles around the canyon. It crossed Red Bluff Drive twice, which my father and I had driven years before and I would revisit in my car in the late afternoon of this day. Then it slowly descended the northwest edge of the mountain, looking like an old forest road with occasional stone culverts under the old roadbed. I had this entire section of trail all to myself, never encountering nor hearing another soul for a couple of miles.

Finally I reached the canyon floor at the Blue Hole Area, the old swimming hole for the CCC guys who improved the park in the 1930s. Crossing Cedar Creek on a series of boulders, I reached some stone remains and realized I was on the south side of the Scout Trail, having missed the turnoff for the Canyon Trail which my father and I had hiked on our previous visit. I was confused since the map showed the Canyon Trail crossing to the south side of the creek to reach the Blue Hole Area, but there was clearly no Canyon trailhead.

So I backtracked across Cedar Creek, managing to fully immerse one boot in the cold waters of the creek. Soon I found the Canyon trail heading eastward, but contrary to the map, it ran entirely along the north bank of Cedar Creek. Squishing my way onward, I enjoyed the peaceful riparian zone, frequently pausing to photograph one set of small falls after another, and posing on a stone seat beside the creek.

Soon I spied a stone ridge perched atop the canyon across the creek and, spotting a chain link fence along its top, realized it was the Palisades Overlook I had visited the day before. The serenity of the trails ended when I reached the Cedar Falls Trail, the highlight of the park for most visitors. That trail approached Cedar Falls along the creek bed and was swarming with hikers of all ages. When I reached the falls, I noticed it was hard to grasp their scale even when I knew they dropped 95 feet. But then a couple of girls scrambled around the slick walls to pose near the falls, giving one a true sense of their scale.

Backtracking to a bridge across the creek, I made a strenuous ascent up to Mather Lodge. Having recently watched Ken Burns’ National Parks series on PBS, I knew Stephen Mather was one of the great leaders of the Park Service, and he had suggested that Petit Jean be made the first state park in Arkansas. I had tracked up and down the sides of the canyon multiple times this day, but this stretch of trail was by far the most challenging. When I reached the summit at 3 pm I took a quick shot of the view and hurried inside. I was more than ready for a restroom break and planned to enjoy one of the hamburgers the lodge restaurant brags about in its advertising. My bacon cheeseburger and fries were all the more delicious after 4.5 hours of hiking, and I happily topped the late lunch off with a decadent slice of chocolate cake, which was about as much frosting as cake.

I then took a section of the Scout Trail back toward the Walker Cabin. It passed the Cedar Falls overlook, offering a view of the area above the falls. The trail continued along the canyonside upstream of the falls, and repeated signs warned it was unlawful to head off trail and descend to the creek area just above the falls. Soon the trail began a descent to the creek bed some distance upstream of the falls. At a bridge leading back north across the creek, a wet eroded bluff wall had vivid mineral coloration. I had expected to be able to ascend to the Walker Cabin from here, but no such luck. So I retraced the entirety of the Cedar Creek Trail which began the day hike, passing once again by a shallow section of the creek bed where the sandstone bottom jutted out here and there.

Finally reaching the car after 5 pm, I drove over to the Red Bluff Drive, a gravel road that loops atop the northwestern section of the mountain, with two splendid overlooks. The M.A. Richter Memorial Lookout was built by the Young Adult Conservation Corps (YACC) in the early 1980s and on this overcast day sun rays were poking through the clouds above the landscape laid out before me. The nearby CCC overlook was built in the 1930s and rebuilt a half-century later by the YACC. One can view vultures regularly flying by these spots, as they roost on the windy bluffs on this side of the mountain.

A trio of camera enthusiasts were snapping shots at the CCC overlook, and I couldn’t resist snapping a shot of one of them perched on the edge of the mountain and another adorned in a Captain Morgan tricorner hat. Then I zipped back east to one of the campgrounds by Lake Bailey, where I viewed a statue commemorating the CCC workers who built so many of the park’s structures we still enjoy today.

The day ended with me showering at the Microtel in Conway and having a tasty Carne Asada at La Hacienda to get me through a few hours of photo editing and blogging. In addition to today’s Flickr slideshow there is a video I made of the many waterfalls and other features along today’s hike. Tomorrow I conclude my first trip of Spring Break with a day of hiking at Mount Nebo south of Russellville followed by a 4.5 hour drive home.

Click here for a slideshow of this day hike

Here’s the video…

[Next Hike: Circling Mount Nebo ]

[ Previous Hike: First Day at Petit Jean: Seven Hollows and Cedar Falls ]

Posted in day hike, photos, travel, video | 3 Comments

First Day at Petit Jean: Seven Hollows and Cedar Falls

Posted on March 13, 2010 by Granger Meador

Click image for slideshow

Although my allergies were giving me fits, I was determined to begin Spring Break with several days of great hiking. So I decided to drive to Petit Jean State Park in Arkansas, which my father and I briefly visited years ago. I mostly recalled it was a high plateau jutting above the surrounding countryside with a long deep canyon through it.

I’ve been contemplating cheaper ways to travel, so I considered yet discarded tent camping and then opted to rent a ‘KOA Kabin’ in nearby Morrilton, which was about $30/night with me in a sleeping bag and using a communal bath house. But that plan would curl up its toes and die by the end of the long day.

The day began with a breakfast biscuit at a Bartlesville McDonalds and then an easy drive over to downtown Russellville, Arkansas for a delicious chicken alfredo and salad lunch at its Italian Gardens restaurant. A short drive from there found me ascending Petit Jean Mountain and at the Seven Hollows trailhead by 1 pm.

Petit Jean was a French girl whose lover would not let her come with him to America, so she disguised herself as a cabin boy and came along anyway. Her true identity was only discovered when she fell ill and died at this mountain above the Arkansas River. Of course all of that is hogwash. And although it is a splendid hiking trail, Seven Hollows is also a lie. One actually tramps down, through, and around four hollows, not seven. But no matter, as the 4.5 mile hike is quite beautiful even with the bare trees of a Spring Break that doesn’t actually occur in the spring. (A theme is building here.)

As the trail descended into the first hollow, I was surrounded by craggy sandstone bluffs carved by millions of years of stream erosion. There were frequent shallow ‘caves’ whose interiors showed the orange and yellow streaks of mineral deposits. A natural bridge towered overhead to one side, and as I cut back and forth across a creek I encountered a pair of tiny waterfalls, one of which was stairstepped. I shot a video clip of the two little falls.

Ascending to the top of a hollow, I encountered an area cleared by fire some years back and opened up to the overcast sky which loomed over the tiny cedar trees that were repopulating the area. A frustration with my new camera is that it won’t let me shoot manually, but I pulled off one depth of field shot by backing away from my subject and going to a full 12x zoom on it.

Rock formations along here are said to resemble turtles, and one lump did look like a turtle if I took off my glasses. A side trail led back into a box canyon called the Grotto, with a large pool at the end in a natural cistern. It was so large that it was best captured with a video clip. Then the hike ended with a trek through a wide and fairly flat hollow with impressive side walls, which also got the video treatment.

I drove over to the Palisades Overlook on the side of the road, where I shot another panorama despite the overcast. The next stop was the short Bear Cave Trail, which winds amongst many rock formations that clamor to be climbed. The Seven Hollows Trail was too strenuous for children, but they were scrambling all over the Bear Cave area.

My next stop was an overlook for what is perhaps the most photographed scenery in Arkansas: Cedar Falls. It was beautiful even with the overcast, and the sky followed suit with a few punctures in the cloud cover allowing sunshine to beam down upon the countryside off in the distance. I shot a video clip to capture the surroundings, and I’ll be returning to this area of the park on my second day when I hike the Cedar Creek and Cedar Falls Trails, which share the same National Recreation Trail designation that adorns the Seven Hollows Trail. (Other National Recreation Trails I have hiked recently include the Table Mound and Elk River Trails much closer to home at Elk City Lake near Independence, Kansas.)

By then it was 5 pm and that prompted me to drove on east out of the park towards Morrilton and the KOA. But I took the time to stop at the eastern edge of the mountain for its splendid view of the Arkansas River and photograph Petit Jean’s fake grave site.

I then sped down the mountain’s steep eastern flank and drove to the KOA. But lo and behold the office was shut and the night deposit only let one pick out regular RV slots – the two ‘Kabins’ were locked up tight. I took that as a sign that I was not meant to suffer and drove on east to Conway, where I secured a room at a Microtel. A real bed, a private bath, and a continental breakfast are more my style.

Running low on steam, I drove to the closest restaurant, a Ruby Tuesdays where I had a mediocre steak. But a dipped cone at the Dairy Queen fortified me for a few hours of photo editing and blogging. As I close this post, I haven’t slept in over 48 hours, so it is quite rude of Daylight Savings Time to be starting up and robbing me of an hour of sleep! On the morrow I’ll sleep in a bit and then drive back to Petit Jean for what should be a somewhat sunnier day of hiking.

Click here for a slideshow of today’s day hikes

[ Next Hike: Second Day at Petit Jean: Looping Cedar Creek ]

Posted in day hike, photos, travel | 2 Comments

Digital Age Downsizing

Posted on February 27, 2010 by Granger Meador

My office isn’t quite this bad

The digital age is here, with physical media dying a slow death. I’m an avid reader, so my office was crammed with 33 bookshelves holding over 1,000 books. But since I bought my first Kindle in June 2008 and replaced it with the Kindle 2 a year ago, I’ve only bought a few physical books. The electronic ones are so much more convenient, especially since I can also read them on my iPhone in a pinch. I look forward to experimenting with reading on an iPad in a few months.

So I decided to use Digital Age Downsizing to help pay for that expensive new toy. I culled 190 books for disposal. I mainly wanted to get rid of them with minimal effort on my part and make a little money at the same time. So eBay or its half.com or selling books on Amazon was out – I didn’t want to trouble with listing each book, tracking sales, and finding oodles of boxes and tape to ship them out piecemeal.

Instead I tried out a few online services and settled on Powell’s Books. I loved visiting their enormous bookstore in Portland, Oregon a few years back, and they made getting rid of my books very easy. I just had to type in the ISBN numbers above the barcode on the back of each book and Powell’s told me which ones they would take and how much they would pay. I split my selling up into three shipments so that I could pack about 25 books in each box, print out the free Media Mail shipping label Powell’s provided for it, and haul the boxes to the post office.

Powell’s will pay me $180 for 66 of the 190 books I offered to them. As for the remaining 124, I put a few into other online buyers and got few offers, so I plan to pack them up and donate them to my local public library. They will route them to book selectors for review and the accepted ones go on the shelves and the others go to the local Friends of the Library for sale in their bookstore.

So I’m partway to paying for that iPad. What next? I went through my closets and gathered up a bunch of old electronics: a bunch of old telephones, two answering machines, a clock radio, and a cheap MP3 player. I tried using Gazelle.com to sell them, but the service wouldn’t complete my registration. So I tried some other services. Unfortunately, old electronics are not worth much, if anything. I did manage to sell an old GPS unit to MyBoneYard.com and sent that off, but I took the rest of the stuff to Goodwill.

The next big prospect is the collection of 450 CDs in my living room. I haven’t touched them since I ripped them into MP3 format years back. Looks like SecondSpin.com will take them off my hands for anywhere from 10 cents to $10 each depending on demand, with an average of perhaps a dollar or two a disc. I’ll first want to re-rip a bunch of them in a higher-quality bitrate. Back when I ripped my collection the software I was using could only do 128 kbps, but now I can have iTunes re-import them into the 256 kbps variable-bit-rate MP3 format I now prefer. Then I can price them out, put about 25 in each box so that the shipping cost is properly covered, and sell ’em off. And soon I may have much of that iPad paid for and far less clutter around the house. I love the Digital Age.

Posted in books, music, technology | 1 Comment

The Big Zoom

Posted on February 13, 2010 by Granger Meador

While it lacks the instructive power of the classic Powers of Ten, which I show each year at the start of my courses, this much newer video provides a more accurate and up-to-date zoom outward to the edge of what we can see.