I'm at it again out on a trip, riding, fishing, camping, this time riding 2-up.
Since I enjoyed Arkansas so much on my last trip a few weeks ago I figured I'd just start this one by heading that way again.
We left Chicago on Tuesday morning.
Lovely Traffic
The first night, at Lake Wappapello, MO. 469 miles.
The first fish, and by far the largest still, caught by my trusty fishing partner, Lindsay.
Mmmm, dinner.
The next day, we continue to heading south.
Mammoth Spring, AR
We ended up at Sylamore Creek campground, it was perfect.
It was a great spot, I payed for two nights wanting to explore the area with a base camp. Little did I know, just before dark a couple in a car came and set up their tent right next to mine! In a empty frikin' campground! Of course they had a little barking dog, and young child. I couldn't believe it, so I turned up the speakers, set the bottle of Jack on the table, and just tried to be annoying, but they payed no attention and set up anyway.
Some fukin people.
After I was over the butt crevice next to me, and was relaxing next to the fire, maybe 11PM, a massive RV bus, pulling a massive trailer, with a car following pull's up, and takes 15 minutes to park. After finally shutting down the big diesel engine, my blood pressure starts to go down, but oh no they have to have AC, so the generator starts, 2 dogs, 2 kids, 4 adults get out and the mega 10,000 watt light goes on.
hoot. I HATE them.
By this time I had no Jack left, so instead of getting myself in trouble I went to my tent.
Back on the road, it only took a few minutes of this to forget about the camp site episode.
Somewhere around Mountain View, AR.
This guy came over to say hello.
We searched 3 or 4 campgrounds, and ended up at the Delaware Recreation site on Lake Dardanelle.
A Corps of Engineer's park, and the price was right. Free!
Off the beaten path, on the water, no camp sites to the left, the one on the right a good 70 yards or so away, with tree's blocking. Now this is good.
After a dreadful trip to Wal-Mart we had some fresh foods, a side case will keep something cold overnight with a bag of ice. :1drink
The weather held true to it's promise of isolated thunderstorms. Yeah, isolated over us for about 2 hours, but the new tent also hold true to it's promise of being 100% waterproof.
After the rain, the fishing really picked up. We caught plenty of fish all evening, keeping what we were going to eat. A few Blue Gill, a Small-mouth, and another catfish. Sorry no fish pics, didn't take any during the fishing.
Some fish with some fire-baked potatoes
The next day I dropped the bags to head out and explore the area.
Mt. Nebo State Park
We were able to watch a thundercloud move over the mountains, very cool to watch, from a distance.
Fun!
She made me do it. Ohhh take a pic of the Pony! Take one!
Time to hit the dirt. This time I was armed with a Arkansas Atlas & Gazetteer.
Let the water crossing's begin! OK, it's really just a puddle..
This is no puddle, though she walked across this one.:1drink
More great "roads"
Um, yeah.
After a day of riding we head back to camp, picking up some bait on the way. Great fishing on Lake Dardanelle I say. We caught dinner again, a mix of blue gill and catfish.
This time we had red beans and rice, along with some corn bread I made in the pan with the fish.
This morning we packed up and head out to the Ozark National Forest to locate a backwoods camp-spot I had marked on a previous trip. The plan was to camp in the backwoods over the weekend to avoid the holiday crowds.
After going about 12 miles down this road, we found out it doesn't go through, like the map says.
No really, the road just dumped me into this. Riding through thorn bushes sucks!
Nice to be back on a "road"!
And what a great road.
I had to find another route, this wasn't going to work for me....
Success! Here's the spot, we took a nice swim, then I did a little fly fishing.
I wish I'd have taken a picture of the 2 fish I caught with my fly-rod. They were the smallest blue gill ever. Maybe 3 inches. :rofl
The trout could be seen, but wanted nothing to do with me. The water was pretty low.
Basically we were in a perfect spot, at least we thought so until the sky started turning dark and there was thunder.
I might be a little crazy, but I have no delusions as to how much I can do with my R1200R with Coni-Attack tires. We were at least 10 miles from any
pavement, and most of the ground was packed dirt that would turn to impassable red mud. We jumped on and starting making our way to pavement, quickly. I didn't want to get stuck here since I only had 1.5 days of food for 2.
On the way out my bike needed a nap. :eek1 Low speed, no damage.
I actually thought I did pretty good today, considering the terrain, this was just me loosing my footing while turning around.... dumb-ass....
We were lucky, as soon as we got to the paved road it started to pour. Raining hard for about an hour, we continued to ride, heading East.
Since all the normal campgrounds are full, and we hadn't showered in days ( just a river swim, no services at the Delaware Rec Area ), so we're at a hotel in Searcy AR.
On the way here we met a guy at a gas station who was talking about how he has a '82 BMW that he rode 215,000 miles without doing anything to it but change the oil and put gas in it. He said that a dealer bought it back from him for what he paid for it and put it on display. Was a cool story, maybe you had to be there...
Tomorrow we're heading into Tennessee, heading north-east.
Will continue soon....
