Nature, Outdoors, Road trip, Sailing, Smithville Lake, Uncategorized, Wildlife

Finally on the water

Leave a comment

About year after we visited Smithville Lake to look at sailboats for Father’s Day, we finally have one of our own. On Thursday, we launched our 1981 Tanzer 26 on Lake Jacomo, spent the night on it, and moored it Friday.

I’d say our first time out on the water in some 15 years a success, even though we didn’t actually sail. Fuel line problems kept us in Sailboat Cove but our stay was pleasant and the people who helped us launch and provide advice as we moored for the first time ever  were a big help. The Jacomo Yacht Club family is the greatest. We look forward to potlucks, sailing, and making more new friends.

 

Beach, Camping, Children, Fishing, Nature, Outdoors, Road trip, Sailing, Smithville Lake, Uncategorized, Wildlife

Father’s Day at Smithville Lake

1 Comment

Once you’re children are old enough to drive, Father’s Day changes forever. With a daughter working at the pool and another at Missouri Scholars Academy in Columbia, my wife and I had our pick at what we wanted to do this holiday. Let’s just say that the empty nest is fast approaching and my dream of owning a sailboat again is growing stronger. That’s why we took a road trip to Smithville Lake just north of Kansas City, Mo.

There’s fishing, there’s camping, there’s hiking, there’s swimming beaches but — best of all — there’s sailing. I’m still several months away from sailing my own boat again but I got to keep the dream alive, at least a little bit on this hot, windy Father’s Day.

Bella Vista, Ark., Children, Dogs, Hiking, Nature, Northwest Arkansas, Outdoors, Road trip, Snow, Spring, Tanyard Creek, Trails, Uncategorized, Waterfall, Wildlife

Easter weekend hike

Leave a comment

So much can happen from day to day, especially in the spring. On March 30 we headed south to Bella Vista, Ark., to spend Easter weekend with family. That evening we visited Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville too look at the newest displays there. The next day, with temperatures near 70 degrees, we decided to visit Tanyard Creek Nature Trail to see how much water was coming from Lake Windsor over the falls of Tanyard Creek.

Northwest Arkansas and Southwest Missouri had been inundated with rain so the creeks, rivers, and lakes there were higher than usual. That, combined with the pleasant weekend weather, made Tanyard Creek Trail a popular place to visit. The 2.2 mile, easy trail is dog friendly and has several features other than the falls. There are identifying markers throughout, such as at an Indian bluff shelter and another at an old homestead, as well those identifying native plants and trees along the trail. There are also a static bridge and a swinging bridge over the creek as well as plenty of rock to rock crossings for the more daring.

The mayapples were coming up and the redbuds were in bloom when we were there but we found no morels. We did, however, find icy roads and about a dozen traffic accidents as we headed north through Kansas City to our home some 300 miles away. Remember: Spring if fickle, especially when you live in Missouri.

Children, Dogs, Elam Bend, Hiking, Nature, Outdoors, Road trip, Snow, Uncategorized, Whitetail, Wildlife, Winter

Christmas Eve Hike

2 Comments

 

Yes, we’re going to have a white Christmas this year. So, with a bit of snow on the ground and shining sun, we decided to take a little Christmas Eve hike, let the dogs run, and get in a bit of exercise before hitting the eggnog. Surprisingly, we were the first and maybe even the only ones to visit Elam Bend Conservation Area.

 

Our youngest got to try her hand at driving on snow for the first time, we saw four young  bald eagles feeding on a road-kill coyote, and the dogs spooked a deer ahead of us on the trail. Now the dogs are tired, the Christmas cookies are baking, and we’re patiently awaiting Santa’s arrival. Merry Christmas.

Bella Vista, Ark., Caves, Children, Fall, Geocaching, Hiking, Nature, Northwest Arkansas, Outdoors, Road trip, Trails, Uncategorized, Waterfall, Wildlife

Thanksgiving Geocaching

Leave a comment

When November weather nears 70 degrees you have no excuse to stay inside, not even with a belly full of turkey, dressing, and cranberry relish. And if the weather is that nice the day before Thanksgiving, you definitely need to get outdoors for a hike to earn the next day’s dinner.

Thanksgiving took us to my in-laws in Bella Vista, Ark., so when the afternoon before Thanksgiving turned more than pleasant I told my two youngest daughters we’d better take advantage of it. We decided to hit a couple nearby trails for some easy hiking and a bit of geocaching, both of which are plentiful in Northwest Arkansas.

We found several geocaches. We also found waterfalls, caves, old homesites, and much more. We barely scratched the surface in the number of geocaches and trails to visit and will explore more next time we visit, just as we did when our daughters were toddlers when we lived in nearby Gravette, Ark., and Rogers, Ark., where the youngest was born.

 

Camping, Dogs, Grand Trace Conservation Area, Hiking, Nature, Outdoors, Ticks, Uncategorized, Wildlife

Grand Trace Conservation Area

Leave a comment

The camping bug had been nibbling away at me for quite some time. The problem was we were tight on funds. And I didn’t really want to spend a weekend in a state campground, hearing loud music I cared nothing about, and having car lights swing through the tent in the middle of the night. And we had recently added a dog, a clumsy puppy that we weren’t sure how he would react camping. So with that in mind I set up camp at Grand Trace Conservation Area near Bethany, Mo., for free camping and no neighbors and waited for my wife to get home from work.

Grand Trace is a 1,562-acre conservation area with a primitive camping area. There’s no water, no vault toilets, no actual hiking trails — nothing but a few fire rings, a gravel road, a couple of ponds, lots of timber, and more peace and quiet I had experienced in quite a while. One car came down the road Friday. Three came Saturday, one was a Missouri Department of Conservation agent, but not a single one came by after about 5 p.m. It was like having your very own campground.

Actually there were a couple of other visitors. Each morning and evening a cottontail would come by camp to nibble at clover. And each day, all day long, a bird — a mockingbird, perhaps? — tweeted a variety of songs from atop a pine over our heads. There were only a couple of drawbacks. One was that tick season was in full swing but we treat the dogs each summer for ticks and fleas so that wasn’t a major problem. The second was we became hot and dirty at times and came to the conclusion we need to invest in a camp shower. A pleasant breeze kept us comfortable most of the time. And as for the new puppy, well except for trying to get into the tent when it was zipped and awakening us at 6 a.m. each morning by jumping onto to our bed, he did great. Both dogs got all the exercise they needed. In fact so much so that after we got home they didn’t even want to go outside and explore the yard like they usually do. All they wanted to do was just lie around and nap.

Fishing, Nature, Outdoors, Seat Memorial Conservation Area, Spring, Uncategorized, Wildlife

Spring Fishing

Leave a comment

After getting a new fishing license for the first time in a couple of years, this morning seemed like a good time to, uh, test the water.

I grabbed a rod and reel, a tackle box, my camera, a water bottle, a boiled egg, an apple, and, just in case I felt really lucky, my fly rod and some flies. It’s a good thing I took the egg and apple because not a single strike was to be had on the ponds at Emmett and Leah Seat Memorial Conservation Area. All I caught was morning solitude, the smell of blackened earth left from the Missouri Department of Conservation’s controlled burns this spring, and the sound of birds.

In fact except for a half dozen swallows sweeping insects above a pond and two turkey vultures having a road kill squirrel for brunch there were few bites of any kind. I did, however, lose two lures. But I’m happy to say I lost them to submerged logs and not to a tree limb like the one pictured above.

Children, Dogs, Elam Bend, Hiking, Nature, Outdoors, Uncategorized, Wild turkey, Wildlife, Winter

A New Cheap Daypack

Leave a comment

The old free Sierra Club daypack had served its purpose. It had carried water bottles, oranges, apples, sandwiches, M&Ms, peanuts, deer sheds, assorted rocks, a wide variety of feathers and more treasures my two youngest girls discovered on our explorations over the last twelve years or so.

Because of that, I had been watching the price of a cheap daypack at Walmart for weeks. As soon as the fall deer season was over and the pack was marked down from about $50 to $25, I bought it.

This morning the dog and I tried it out with a windy almost warm hike at Elam Bend. I wasn’t sure I was going to like the pack — a Mossy Oak Highland Internal Frame — when I bought it but I knew it would certainly be better than the old flimsy Sierra Club pack. So when the hiking bug wouldn’t let loose I thought it would be dumb to waste a relatively warm February day and filled the Mossy Oak with some water, a few treats, warm clothes and a bit of gear and tried it out.

The pack, weighing about 20 pounds loaded, did all right. In fact is was much better than the old Sierra Club, which had no waste belt. The Mossy Oak was fit snug and comfortable during our two-mile or so hike. The pack turned out to be much larger than I first expected — 64 liters. There’s a couple of storage compartments, another small one on top, plenty of zippered internal storage pockets, a couple of side pockets perfect for water bottles or tent poles, and a place for water bladder. In fact the pack is large enough I plan to try it out as a weekend pack later this year.

And as far as discoveries this hike, I didn’t come across any I needed to bring back with me. It’s more fun when my girls make their own discoveries. The only thing is that now that they’re both in high school our explorations are fewer and fewer. That’s just the way it is, though. We’ve still got three granddaughters and a grandson who I’m sure would enjoy scaring up a flock of wild turkey, finding an abandoned bird’s nest, wondering if a coyote or hawk or something else that scattered bluejay feathers as leftovers and marveling at the dozens of Canada geese fly overhead toward their summer homes.

Camping, Children, Crowder State Park, Dogs, Fall, Fishing, Hiking, Nature, Outdoors, Road trip, Uncategorized

Crowder State Park

Leave a comment

The first Saturday in November, temperatures near 70 degrees and a wearisome presidential election nearing its end meant it was time to enjoy autumn before the weather and Election Day turned worse. With that in mind we stopped at the courthouse, cast our ballots early and headed out of town to Crowder State Park about 50 miles east of here.

Even with the constant crunch of leaves underfoot there was still plenty of fall colors. With more than 15 miles of hiking trails to choose from, we parked at Crowder Lake, walked across the dam and headed off on Tall Oaks Trail. The three-mile trail takes hikers along the lake through the old woods up a ridge through an old field and back down to the trailhead along river bottoms.

We had hiked another trail, River Forks, a few years earlier. Our plan — as soon as we get a few days free — is to set up the tent at the campsite and explore the eight-and-a-half mile Thompson River Trail, get in some fishing and relax in between. The 1,912-acre park includes basic, family and electric camping, an equestrian trail, canoe rentals, Red Bud Trail for those wishing a shorter hike and a quiet setting near Trenton, Mo.

Butterflies, Camping, Children, Dogs, Fishing, Float trip, Grand River, Hiking, Nature, Outdoors, Road trip, Seat Memorial Conservation Area, Ticks, Uncategorized

Butterflies and Ticks

Leave a comment

A bit of cooler August weather had us revisiting Emmett and Leah Seat Memorial Conservation Area today. Pollinators, mainly butterflies, were as busy as, well, bees on the wildflowers. They were common along our walk along a wooded access road but we discovered hundreds of them flittering around a south facing mudbank when we crossed a small stream.

One small butterfly even hitched a ride on my leg for several yards before getting its fill of sweat. After our little hike, we drove a few miles west to Denver, Mo., to visit Sowards Ford Access, a primitive camping area on the East Fork of the Grand River. Denver itself is worth a trip if you enjoy visiting old small towns. The name F.C. Grace remains prominent in Denver even though his sale of furniture there have long been gone but the old Denver Schoolhouse has undergone a restoration.

DSC_1108

We picked up a few things along the Grand River at Sowards Ford. Part of an old Coca Cola bottle and a few more modern pieces of trash that had either been left there or had washed down the river. While we did a small part in cleaning up the river, we also brought a few other things home we wish we hadn’t. Seed ticks, dozens of them, discovered during our hike at Seat so here’s a tip for anyone planning a summer hike in Missouri: Don’t forget the DEET as we did.