I headed a couple of hours up the road to Compton, Arkansas and stayed at JB Trading Company. It's like a one-stop-shop for everything in the the Buffalo National River area. They rent kayaks/canoes, have a store, restaurant, and gas station as well as a small campground with platform tents (kind of like a yurt), cabins, RV and tent campsites. They even have a "hammock grove" if you want to break out the hammock.
Three RV sites, platform tents and cabins, hammock grove and tent campsites.
The RV sites were $40 and only had electric but they do have a water fill and dump station. For the first time at a campground, the wifi was wicked fast. Usually it's unusable. Well done
JBTC 👏🏻👏🏻. And did I mention the bathrooms? Cleanest and nicest I've ever seen. Of course showers were 25 cents a minute. Yes, a minute. That's ridiculous if you ask me. Glad I have a shower in my rig!
There are so many hiking trails and river trips you can do but as luck would have it, the weather did not cooperate. In fact, it stormed so bad one night the power went out! Of course, I was the only one in the campground that night and it was pitch black outside. It was a little scary!
The one hike I did get to go on was spectacular. It's call Glory Hole Falls and is about a 2-mile round trip hike. I went the morning after the big storm so I knew the falls would be flowing well.
No, this isn't a stream bed, that's the trail.
The first of two stream crossings. I'm glad I had my trekking poles and waterproof boots.
The top of Glory Hole Falls. The water flows through the hole into the cavern below.
The way down to the bottom of the falls is kind of sketchy. I ended up sliding down the rock at the bottom of this picture. It was quite difficult to climb back up. There was no place to get a good grip on the rock. I'm glad no one was there to witness my ungracefulness!
Is this not spectacular? I've never seen anything like it. Of course pictures don't do it justice.
Everything was so green and lush. Arkansas does not disappoint.
Like I said, I'm obsessed with this waterfall. I spent at least 30 minutes here and somehow lucked out and had the place all to myself!
I walked behind the falls to get this shot. Just gorgeous!
What is it about Arkansas? It's so rocky! Even though the trail was wet it really wasn't a bad hike.
I found these two mud puddles with tadpoles in them. I can't tell you the last time I saw tadpoles. They're so cute! I used to play with them when I was a kid.
The next day I was going to try to hike the Lost Valley Trail even though it was going to rain in the afternoon. I had no sooner gotten on the trail and it started thundering and lightening. Nope, turned around real quick and made it back to the truck just in time.
I'd love to come back again when it's a little drier and explore the river and more of the trails. The Buffalo National River area of Arkansas is just incredible.