Day 41 - Hot Springs, AR

We headed to Hot Springs National Park and arrived just before lunchtime. It was a good thing we arrived early as the campsite was FCFS (first come, first served) and it was a Saturday so it was very full. We managed to get one of the last campsites available and we were lucky enough to get one next to a little stream rather than one of the ones in the middle of the campsite.

We pitched the tent, lazed in the sun and then headed off to the town of Hot Springs to do some exploring.

Hot Springs reminded me of Bath Spa in the UK. It is small town but has a huge number of people visiting each year. It seems to have everything a good holiday destination needs - the relaxing spas, the outdoor activities, nightlife and an interesting history to learn about. We met a couple in a bar from Oklahoma who come every year 1-2 nights and it's easy to see why.

Our first trip was to Hot Springs Mountain Tower. You can either hike to it, which is quite an uphill trek or you can drive to it, which we did. The tower is 65.8 meters high and at the top is an observation deck to look out at Hot Springs National Park and the town of Hot Springs. There is a small fee to get up the tower but it was worth it.

We enjoyed walking up and down Bathhouse Row where all the old bathhouses are. Only two of them are in use as bathhouses, a couple are empty and the rest have been turned into shops, a visitors center and a restaurant / bar. The visitors center was really good. It is an old bathhouse that they have turned into a museum. You can walk around the old equipment and the information stations explain what it was used for and why. It is the only place in Hot Springs where you can see this equipment other than in the Buckstaff (more on this in a bit). We also walked behind the bathhouses along The Grande Promenade. This is where people would go after their bathing experience to exercise back in the day when men were wearing top hat and tails and women had huge over sized dresses. At the back of the bathhouses are some of the springs themselves. There are some simply coming out of the ground and others covered by green metal covers; these are the ones that have been redirected to the bath houses.

There are two working spas left on Bathhouse Row - the Quapaw Bath & Spa and the Buckstaff Bath House. The Quapaw is like one of the spas in Budapest. You sit with people in ornate swimming pool style baths at different temperatures and there are shared steam rooms and saunas. We have visited Budapest a couple of times and visited two different baths there so decided the Quapaw wasn't different enough. The Buckstaff on the other hand is like a bath house that neither of us had experience and probably will never experience again. There were no photos or videos in the bath house but the visitors center had the same equipment so its easier to explain the experience using these photos (some of these are in the video too so you will see a couple of photos multiple times).

We both had the Traditional Bathing Package. We checked in at reception and then Lee was asked to go to the men's area on the ground floor and I was taken up an old fashioned lift to the women's area.

You go into a cubical with a locker and strip naked. Your given a bed sheet to put over yourself as you move around the equipment to save your modesty. You are then lead to a huge bath filled with hot spring water and a bubble machine. You sit in this for 15-20 minutes relaxing and letting the world soak away. The attendant comes in at the end and before helping you out the bath, scrubs you with a loofa mitt. Everyone is given on of their own (so there is no sharing) and you get to take it home with you at the end.

Next I was taken to a bed where I was covered in really hot towels soaked in the spring water with a cold towel on my face and a cup full of ice to hold and I was told to lie there for another 15 minutes. I was really thankful for the cold towel on my face, it did make a huge difference.

Then it was off for a steam. For Lee, he went into a little steam cubicle to sit whereas I had to go into this thing:

It steams your body but leaves your head in the open. It actually wasn't as hot or as scary as I thought it would be, it was like being in a normal steam room but I actually felt less claustrophobic as my head was out.

Next was a treatment they used for treating lower back pain, a sitz bath. You basically sit in a sink on the floor with your legs out of the front. It was surprisingly comfortable and the hot water did feel good on our lower backs.

Next was the needles shower to invigorate your skin and wash off all the sweat! You stand in the middle over the shower and lots of little sprays of water hit you. It did feel like little needles on the skin.

Finally, we both had a massage. Mine was lovely and relaxing where as Lee said his was more vigorous, but still very good indeed.

We both finished are spa experience clean, relaxed and with our muscles feeling like jelly. The equipment in the Buckstaff was original so it was identical to the equipment in the visitors center including the water marks and rust but that added to the charm and didn't put us off at all. You end up ignoring the nakedness, the sheet helps with walking around in front of other guests but in front of the attendants, you just forget about it as they are so professional. You can see why people used the treatments in the spa as medical treatments as you feel so good when you come out, maybe they do help your body in some way.

We went to The Ohio Club for dinner after our spa experience. It was built in 1905 as a bar and casino and was a place the gangsters would visit when they visited Hot Springs including Al Capone. Hot Springs was a regular hangout for gangsters and was seen as neutral ground where they could come and relax regardless of their grievances against each other. During Prohibition, it continued as a bar and a casino although secret walls were put up to hide these from the authorities so it looked like just a genuine law abiding cigar store. You can see the marks for these walls on the floor of the bar. The bar itself is one huge piece of mahogany which was shipped, then sent on the railway to Hot Springs. To get it in the building, part of the front of the building had to be taken down. The food was awesome - we had fried pickles and then a burger each.

As you drive around Hot Springs, there are filling up stations where you can take your own bottles along and fill up from either the hot or the cold springs. We had a couple of empty water bottles so filled up from a hot spring before heading off.

Day 40 - Little Rock, AR

Little Rock is a firebreak and we made it on time! Firebreaks are places we have to be on certain days to make sure we finish the trip all the way around, we don't want to get to the end of the 6 months only be a third of the way through the states! Its also an opportunity for us to catch up on any admin.

We stayed in the Comfort Inn and Suites Presidential which was a very comfortable hotel with a free shuttle around town, free wifi, free breakfast, a pool area and laundry facilities.

The hotel front desk gave us a top 10 tourist attractions in Little Rock leaflet so we decided to try to see some of them today. First was the number one attraction, The Clinton Presidential Center. It was about a 20 minute walk from the hotel in an industrial area (I expect this will become a trendy part of town in a few years time if Little Rock follows what other cities are doing!).

The Clinton Presidential Center is made up of a number of buildings including the Presidential Library and Museum. We paid $10 each to enter and it was actually really good. It contains documents from Clinton's time as President including his daily schedule, letters, speeches as well as gifts and memorabilia from his time in the White House. You could do one of the guided tours for free or what Lee and I did, was our own self guided tour at our own pace. Our favourite parts were the replicate White House Cabinet Room where I got to sit in the seat of the president and a replica of the Oval Office decorated the same way as when Bill Clinton was in office (it changes with each President).

Next to the Library and Museum was the Clinton Presidential Park Bridge. This used to be a railroad bridge called Rock Island Railroad Bridge; it closed when the rail road no longer used it and was due to be torn down but it was saved by the city and changed into a pedestrian pathway. As you'll see from our pictures, there are a few of these bridges across the city but this is the only one we decided to cross.

Before leaving the Presidential Center, we walked around the park we could see from the bridge. This was called the William E. “Bill” Clark Presidential Park Wetlands (I hope the locals have a shorter name as a bit of a mouth full!) and included walkways over the wetlands at the edge of the river with information stations on the plants and animals that live there. There was also the biggest bat box in Arkansas so the walk along the wetlands for free from horrible biting insects!

We then walked a short distance to the Rock Town Distillery, located in an old paint factory only to find out it had moved to the other side of town. We weren’t far from a Little Rock Historic Trolley stop so decided to grab a ride on that to get us to the new location. The Trolley was a real surprise. Unlike the other trolleys we had been on, this one had a fantastic driver who was full of interesting facts, advice and commentary during the drive. We decided not to get off the trolley but instead stayed on all the way around the loop, it was a tour of Little Rock and only cost $1 each! The trolley went over the river to North Little Rock. We didn’t have time to visit this city so was glad the Trolley could give us a ‘taste’ of what it was like.

We finally got off the trolley at River Market, another top 10 attraction. The market itself is a number of indoor privately owned food stalls. We were too late to try any of them but the food looked good and a neat idea to support local businesses.

River Market is right next to the riverfront which is well kept, felt safe and contains a number of points of interest to keep everyone entertained including a sculpture garden, water park, river walk, and a bridge you can climb up on.

We were hot, it was reaching 98F so we headed for a quick drink in the Flying Saucer, a German themed bar with hundreds of beers on tap before walking to the new location of the Rock Town Distillery.

We were really surprised when we entered the distillery as it wasn’t like other ones we have visited in the US or the UK. You walk into a bar and it’s a really nice bar. The bar serves all the drinks any normal bar would serve including spirits made by the distillery, beers, wines and cocktails. Lee had a peated beer which had been brewed locally in an old whiskey barrel from the distillery. I had a frozen Mint Julip which was just what I needed after all the walking in the heat.

The tour was small and personal, taking us around the barrel room, the distillery and the bottling room. There was a lot of care and attention going into the products and it was great to see experimenting for future products. Our guide was really knowledgeable and you could tell she wasn’t just employed to walk people around, she did the work on the ground too which really showed through when she was explaining the process or answering questions.

The tour ended with a tasting!! We tasted 11 products!! It included a vodka, a watermelon vodka, a gin, 3 whiskeys, a coffee liquor, a bourbon cream, an apple pie moonshine, a peach moonshine and a double proof apple pie moonshine which we ended up buying a bottle of. I love Fireball (cinnamon whiskey) and the double proof apple pie moonshine tasted like fireball but with more apple.

I liked the gin too although Lee was less keen (but he’s a beer drinker so his opinion doesn’t count!). It was a softer gin flavour with a slight strawberry taste, it would be lovely with some lemonade (Sprite).

Apparently they sell to the UK and across a number of states so watch out for them!

After all the tasting, I needed a sleep!! We headed back to the hotel for a power nap!

Our dinner recommendation came from Bradley the barman in the hotel. We went to the Flying Fish for dinner and had an Arkansas favourite, fried catfish! It was good and we were glad we found a local hangout rather than hitting a tourist or chain restaurant! Then we headed a little way down the road to finish the evening off with some dueling pianos.

We enjoyed Little Rock and found more to do than we expected, a cute little city to spend a couple of nights between destinations.

Day 39 - Blanchard Springs Caverns, AR

It rained last night whilst we were camping but we're getting used to it now! The very hot days seem to mean that every night we get a downpour of rain. On a positive note, at least it is raining at night but it's a pain when we're camping!

We didn't need to rush off this morning as we were only heading to Little Rock so we decided to pack everything up other than the flysheet of the tent and then head off for some exploring whilst it dried in the sun.

Just up the road from our campsite was the Blanchard Springs Caverns. You can only view the caverns by taking a guided tour but it was only $10 each so we decided to go ahead. We took the Dripstone Tour which was an hour long, the shorter of the two tours but it took us through two very large caverns and the formations were incredible. We really were not expecting this place to be so awe-inspiring, it doesn't have the reputation of some of the other caverns but maybe that is what added to its charm.

Our tour guide was Destiny who was amazing - Lee was particularly impressed :| She's a school teacher outside the holidays and kept the tour interesting with fun stories, pointing out funny rock displays (such as Gru walking up the stairs!) and lots of jokes.

We drove over to Blanchard Springs, took a couple of pictures and walked around the lake before heading back to the campsite to pack away our lovely, now dry tent.

On our way to Little Rock we started to get hungry. We had planned to stop at a well known fast food outlet to grab a snack but then we saw a cool looking hut with swings outside that was called Wing Shack and Cheeseburger Grill. We decided to give it a go and I'm glad we did, the food we awesome and it was a lot of fun swinging!

There were a couple of cool things in this restaurant as well if you're a BIG food fan or really, really hungry when you go in. You can buy 500 wings for $399.99:

And they have a food challenge, The Hubcap Challenge! Eat a 36oz burger, large french fries and a large shake within 1 hour and win a free steak dinner. Just what you want after all that food! Lee wasn't up for trying it!

Here is our video:

Day 38 - Buffalo National River & Blanchard Springs, AR

After leaving the comfort of Eureka Springs, we were headed to Blanchard Springs Recreation Area in Mountain View where we would be camping for the night.

The drive was awesome over the Ozark Mountains. Lots of hills, windy roads and it was paved, the type of roads Lee likes driving!

En route, we stopped off a Buffalo National River, the first ever National River.

We didn't really know what to do or see here so we headed to the visitors center where a lovely park ranger gave us a map and told us that give the heat, the best option was two short hikes.

The first hike was to the Collier Homestead where we could view some old buildings and then onto River Overlooks where we could look at the river from above.

The next hike was more of a drive than a hike, we drove down to the bottom of the river where you could paddle or canoe or just sit in the sun and enjoy the really calm waters.

After Buffalo River, we headed back into the car towards our campsite.

Half the campsite was closed due to flood damage but after going over a ford, we found an area that was open.

It was a First Come First Served campsite but we didn't need to worry about not finding a pitch, even with half the campsite closed there were only 4 other campers in the entire site which must have had room for about 30.

We chose a campsite away from the water edge, up on a hill. I think subconciously we were thinking about the flood damaged area and wanting to be on higher ground, we also wanted to be away from the frogs at the waters edge just to get a decent nights sleep!

Lee said find firewood so I brought him an entire tree!

With the tent pitched, we took our chairs and a couple of cold drinks down to the little river that runs through the campsite. There were a number of families and couples here playing in the water which was really clear and warm. The water seemed to trickle along making it safe to wade out into although the stones were a little slippery for the person in flip flops!

We had another awesome dinner cooked by Lee on the fire and then as the evening drew in, I thought it was a good idea to go for a run around the campsite. It felt like it had cooled down but the humidity was horrible, after a couple of laps, I looked like I had had a shower already! I think I might save the exercise for airconditioned gyms going forward!