Little Bluff cabin cam, October 31 - 24 degrees down on the river this morning with the first FROST FLOWERS and frosty leaves of the season - HAPPY TUESDAY TO YOU!

Journal updated on the 20th

Our canvas gallery will be OPEN this Saturday for walk-ins, 11/04/23, from 9am-3pm - click here for more details. (also open most any other days and times by appointment)

PRINT OF THE WEEK SPECIAL (above) click here for info

Order 2024 calendar from UA Press HERE. Or pickup a copy at our gallery.

10/02/23 Quite cool and LOVELY early this morning back home - the air so sweet! It was another classic battle with HIGH winds and storms leaving Colorado and trekking 860 miles across "volcano land" in New Mexico, then more high winds and heat across the Oklahoma Dust Bowl area and finally into Arkansas late yesterday and home by 9pm. I don't know who was more excited to reunite with my lovely bride (who had just made the same type of drive home from Denver, arriving home at noon yesterday) - me or the pups! Though the reunion only lasted a few minutes before everyone collapsed into a real bed - first time in six weeks! HOME SWEET HOME - nothing better!

Here's a pic of my lovely bride (on the right) and her friend, Heather, from Canada during their week of painting in the mounntis - I think they both had a fun time - and a few pretty nice aspens to paint...

10/03/23 This happened back in August. Pam was in the shower, heard a large CRASH, then the dogs started to bark and wail, scratching on the bathroom door. Pam knew she was under attack, or at the very least a tornado had appeared out of no where, but when she finally got the pups calmed down she was unable to figure out what had happened. I was up at the gallery for an open house and never realized anything had happened. The next day as I was out for an early morning hike I nearly tripped over this GIANT oak tree that was the cause of the mess. It's more than 60' tall and weights, well, I suspect a ton or more. My large chainsaw was in Colorado so all I could do was marvel at this tree while hiking past it several tmies a day - sometimes I didn't even notice it since the leaves were still all fresh and green, and would remain that way until I left a couple of weeks later. YESTERDAY, it was quite a shock when I got up early and slipped out the door before sunrise to have a cup of my Iceland Coffee - LOOK HONEY, THERE'S A GIANT TREE DOWN IN THE YARD! All those leaves of course died and turned bown. While I did bring my big chainsaw back with me from Colorado, my chain is pretty dull and almost worn out - time for a new chain!

One other note from this morning. There wasn't a single spider web across the trail this morning - where have all the spiders gone? That got me to thinking that I've not seen a single Orb Weaver spider in a very long time - the spiders here are something else. Orb weavers are those giant, colorful spiders about the size of your thumbnail - kind of scary and beautiful at the same time. Perhaps they are found mostly in overgrown fields and not so much in the woods - I'll keep an eye out in the coming weeks and report back.

10/05/23 The bird bath is full and overflowing after more than 4" of rainfall yesterday and overnight - YIPPIE COYOTE! It was such a lovely day to be in the woods hiking - I got almost four miles in- about half of it while raining, and about a mile it was POURING! Actually I was thankful it started to pour. Have you ever been hiking before a rain, and then when those first few individual drops fall they are SO COLD! (I was just wearing a single layer thin shirt, and it was like each drop froze my skin where they hit.) I had to stop and pull my shirt tight a time or two to rub away the chill. Thankfully only a few minutes of this and then the clouds opened up and it was a proper rain so I was soaked evenly through and through. And as the volume and strength picked up so did my pace - although once you are soaked it doesn't make all that much difference how much wetter you get. But I did have to lean into the trail and hike as fast as I could to keep warm. Of course, all I really had to do was duck into either the gallery or the cabin to get out of the rain (I was doinig laps through the woods on our property), but you know me, I'm kind of weird, and hiking in the rain is often a great pleasure for me.

10/06/23 A GLORIOUS crisp and clear early fall day, with a pure-blue sky and such SWEETNESS in the air. Only tiny hints of fall color here and there, but I just have a feeling we'll have a nice run of color by the end of the month. My goal is to get out and photograph as much of it as I can statewide, so prepare your eyeballs. In the meantime, hope you can get outdoors and roam around now.

One "Cloudland Moment" note from yesterday. I was out late taking pictures of the Milky Way (in the back yard) - a SPECTACULAR clear night sky since the storms swept the atmosphere clean. As I stood there in AWE of my surroundings, the silence was broken by the music of geese - no doubt flying in formation through the night, headed south to spend the winter. A few hours before, my lovely bride and I had a simple meal in the yard as dozens of monarch butterflies fluttered about - many of them stopping to refuel in Pam's butterfly flower garden. It was a golden day and night to remember and cherish...

10/09/23 I hit the trail at dawn and entered a woods that was still filled with the night - just light enough to see but still kind of eerie, mysterious, or BEAUTIFUL depending on your mental state. I love moving slowly through a dark forest - somehow your mind can shift into neutral since there is so much less detail all around you to process. It’s sort of a moving nap.

And then BOOM, POP, I tucked my shoulder, hit the ground, and rolled a couple of times ‘till I came to rest against the base of an old hickory tree. My ankle - it had landed wrong or on a rock or something and I was down. In my younger days I’d lay there in agony and pain as intense burning would work it’s way up my ankle and begin to swell until it was so painful I could not even get up.

But now I know the best thing is to hop right up and start moving, putting weight on that ankle and walk as normal as possible. The burning kept moving upwards for a few steps, then began to settle on back down. Within a couple hundred yards I could hardly feel any pain. WHEW. That was a bad one. One of these days I won’t be able to get up and walk when this happens, and I’m happy not to be there yet.

The rest of my hike to work was quite delightful as brilliant orange sunshine filled the forest and surrounding pasture.

Speaking of that pasture, a neighbor stopped by the gallery on Saturday and said another neighbor had disposed of more than 50 armadillos this summer already - it was certainly a banner year for them - we kept seeing them on our security camera though the dogs never chased one into the ground that I know of - most must have kept over on the neighbor’s pasture land.

There are three active dens along out trail though - a couple have been there all summer with the third one appearing only this week. A few days ago my lovely bride and I sat and watched a pair of young gray foxes (pups, cubs, or kits they are called). We leave a few feet width of tall native grasses around the edge of our back yard for such critters to play in - plus there’s another 1/2 acre beyond of really tall native grasses, underbrush, and shrubs. I bet those foxes live in one of the larger dens along the trail. ALWAYS great to see foxes in the wild - though they probably ate most of our chickens we had at Cloudland so not always welcome when there are chickens around.

Near the end of my hike to work I came through one of our pine forests and the floor is always covered with a thick layer of needles. Today, after high winds much of the night, the ground was littered with colorful maple leaves. A sign of much more to come. This year - for the first time in several years - I’ll be out chasing color around the state with a camera, and I look forward to an active month to come!

Speaking of cameras, I went out last night after dark in search of a Milky Way scene - right now there’s a window of less than an hour when it’s “core” is visible. After visiting three different locations on my list I gave up since the winds were so high - and so many dogs barking - and/or yard lights in the way. (I’ve been able to shoot the Milky Way here a couple of times since I’ve been home this week.) When I turned around to head back home - at the very first corner - wouldn’t you know it - there as an armadillo in the middle of my lane! My old cargo van only has 4” of ground clearance so I knew I could not simply drive over him, so I swerved as hard as I could but still hit him dead on. OK neighbor, add one to the list!

10/11/23 Cool, calm, with thin clouds early this morning - very nice hiking weather. A couple of nights ago Wilson and I were putting in a late night building stretcher frames for canvas prints - actually I was doing the building - Wilson was outside keep guard - he’s not fond of the loud noises building these frames creates. When it came time to hike back down to the cabin in darkness I found Wilson at attention - something out there was giving him grief.

As we eased on down the hill he sat down right in front of me and just stared into the dark woods. Then I heard what he must have been listening to for a while - the sound of a wolf. That’s right, there is a pet wolf that lives on over yonder at the far end of our neighborwoods - 500 acres of wild and rugged wooded terrain are between us. We almost never hear Mr. Wolf, but on this night he was making sounds in the night. Wilson was not alarmed or excited, he just sat there as if he was dreaming about the wild life of a wolf - probably up in the Alaska wilderness.

Totally unrelated but during the day Pam and I listened to some sort of critter in our nearby woods go on for about 30 minutes. The sound did not register on the Cornell bird sound app, and we could not figure out if it were mammal or fowl or what. Eventually I got up and wandered over into the woods and the sounds stopped. Had the pups with me and they didn’t scent anything - it must have been something up in the trees, perhaps an own with a cold.

Yesterday was a long day at the gallery which started with me trying to get our old forklift started for a five minute job. We’d packed up what will probably be the very last pallet of books headed to the U of A Press warehouse in Chicago, about 1,100 pounds worth of picture books and Missouri guidebooks. We’ve been unable to ship the warehouse all of our stock of books in the past since they charge a monthly fee for each case of books that exceeds a certain - complicated - and rolling sales count for each specific book. So we stagger shipping a pallet of books to them to save the warehousing cost (we have plenty of room at the gallery).

Anyway, getting the pallet of books stacked and wrapped up nice and tight worked out OK - except for the fact that neither of us is supposed to be moving anything more than 10-15 pounds (the cases are 35-45 pounds each OOPS!) The only hard part is getting the half-ton pallet loaded into the back of her dad’s pickup for delivery to the FedX Freight terminal in Harrison. We bought an OLD almost dead forklift years ago and it’s done just fine, but these days we’ve only fired it up once a year to load a pallet. It didn’t want to yesterday.

I ended up making two trips to the propane place in Jasper to fill up the forklift propane tank - I discovered on the first trip that it’s illegal to transport a propane tank INSIDE a vehicle, I had to return home to get a hitch platform to carry it on. It was clear the forklift battery was dead, but even though I had it on a charger all night it would not start. Pulled up my old cargo van close to the building and spent some time hooked up to jumper cables - and YEA the old east finally started up.

I was able to back it out of it’s stall and get the pallet out of the gallery and ready for dumping to Pam’s Dad’s truck, but before I could get him here the forklift died. After a few minutes and another jumper from my van, we got the old girl fired up again and placed in the truck bed - mission accomplished!

Since this was the last pallet load we’ll probably ever do, now we have a SLIGHTLY used forklift for sale (it used to run 24/7 at a warehouse in Springdale so take that “slightly” with a grain of salt) - needs a new battery and eventually tires, and probably a tune up, and a coat of paint. I can only guarantee to get it started and moved onto a trailer. MAKE AN OFFER!

Later in the day as I was stretching some canvas prints - also a very LOUD job - my buddy Wilson remained outside. Then we started to back at something - usually a noisy truck passing on the county road out there. But after a few barking bouts I went outside to see what was up and he was part-way down the road towards the cabin and very irritated at something. We hiked on down to investigate.

I knew what it was as soon as we rounded the corner and the cabin came into view. Bottom line - a bear had been in the garage and Wilson probably had just scared him off. Never a good sign for a wild bear to enter a home. From the looks of the small pile of bear scat the Pam discovered a couple hours later while mowing the years, it was most likely a small yearling bear just out roaming around looking for a snack.

Later in the way Pam and I watched a kestrel (aka sparrow hawk) working from a tall cedar tree in the back yard - he’d spend a few minutes watching, then launch off, glide down, and snatch up a field mouse or other small critter - then return to his perch and consume his snack. First kestrel I think we’ve seen here. Good thing they don’t make them in people-eating size!

Another long night last night for Wilson and I, but this time I went outside the gallery and sat with my boy and we listened to the neighbor wolf again. Stars were out, it was calm and cool, with just a boy and his dog, and a distant wolf, thankful to live in such a beautiful part of the world...

TODAY Im headed out to do some maintenance work on our three-mile section of the Buffalo River Trail (Ozark Highlands Trail) The pups have to stay here since no dogs allowed on the trail at Buffalo National River.

10/12/23 While on a lap before leaving to do trail work yesterday morning, my ankle rolled, popped, and sent me to the ground again. Intense pain, and I figured I’d have to cancel my trail work trip. But I crawled back upright and slowly hiked on back to the cabin. By the time I reached it all that pain was gone. I DON’T understand how this works, but my ankle was fine.

My lovely bride dropped me off at the trailhead on South Maumee Road - she went on down to the Buffalo River access and spent the next several hours painting a lovely scene of the water, bluffs, gravel bar, and sky.

With only a large folding saw for tools I headed on down the trail for what would turn out to be a rather warm day in the woods - temp got up to almost 80 with a bright sun. This three-mile section of the Ozark Highlands/Buffalo River Trail gets almost zero traffic - folks don’t know about it yet, even though it was actually mostly built almost a decade ago. It winds through thick forest and runs along the top of a very steep and bluffy area with a few scattered views several hundred feet DOWN to the Buffalo River. The views through the trees are much better once the leaves drop off.

Turns out there was quite a few blowdowns across the trail - mostly large limbs that had broken off during high-wind events. There were a few whole trees also - some of them I could drag off the trail, others I had to make strategic cuts of limbs to lighten the load and then was able to drag the remaining trunk off the trail, or at least to one side. Hundreds of small limbs that weren’t really in the way but were on the trail and needed to be flipped off. My tool for the day was a large (20” or so) folding saw with a double row of sharp teeth (actually NOT so sharp now - I need a new blade - I don’t think these types of blades can be sharpened).

I get multiple use out of my folding saw since I’m too lazy to carry more than one tool at a time. So it does double purpose as a kind of sling blade - I have to get down low and sweep it across a patch of tall grass/weeds to cut them off with the saw. If I swing it just right, I can also chop down with the saw to remove small limbs at the base of trees that have grown out into the corridor of the trail - this is much quicker than a pair of lopping shears, and usually I can make these chopping cuts without breaking stride.

I’ve developed a method of walking over the decades where I can place my boot next to a rock on the trail and as I pick up that boot I’ll push the rock off the trail - all in one motion without breaking stride. There were a lot of rocks on the trail - as always!

There a couple of larger trees newly across the trail that were just too big for me or my saw to handle, and so they remain as “step overs” - a hiker can easily step over them without too much trouble. These were all noted and will be removed with a larger saw later on.

If I had counted the number of smaller trees/saplings that I had to stop and get down on my knees to saw off at the base, the count would have easily been more than 100. Stuff grows a LOT over the summer in the Ozark Jungle!

I rarely see wildlife on these maintenance hikes - I just make too much noise. My total count for the day was exactly - 0. Not even a squirrel or bird. They had better things to do than hang out on a limb and converse with me I’m sure.

By the time I reached the very end of our section at Little Rocky Creek, I was hot and sweaty and could feel my body aching from all the upper work my arms and twisting torso had been doing. Probably 90% or more of all that I’ve done physically in the past six months has been with my legs - my upper body parts just don’t do much, and I could feel it.

OK, I made it to the end - now just a brisk hike back three miles to meet up with Pam and we’d all it a day. As always, I could not resist getting out my flip folding saw and cleaning up a few dozen more limbs, vines, and assorted other things in the trail corridor. There were two pretty good climbs along the way but there was still enough UMPH left in my tank to lean into the hills and get to the top of each without too much effort - actually it felt pretty good going uphill.

Just as I’d reached the top of the second hill and leveled out I slowed down a bit to enjoy and admire the open trail corridor ahead - if built properly (this section was all built by hand by Jim Liles - mostly by himself), a trail through the forest is a beautiful thing - thanks JIM!

As I continued on I stepped over a loose root that spanned the trail tread. I hardly noticed it but then realized it just might be a trip hazard later on - a hiker in a hurry might get their foot stuck and dump them right on the ground (kind of like I had done at the start of my day, haha). At first I ignored the urge to go back and saw out the small root, but just another step and I was already feeling guilty so I turned around and cut our the root - only took a few seconds.

When I turned around to resume my trek back to my waiting bride I immediately caught some motion ahead of me - a tall dark object - and then BOOM!!!!! Oh my gosh, not ten feet in front of me a large dead oak tree had simply let go of earth and fell across the trail. It literally took my breath away, I gasped. I’ve heard many trees give up and crash to the ground in all my years of being in the woods, but never have I seen one actually happen in real time (except during ice storms). I gasped because I realized that could have been me underneath it - had I not stopped to cut out the little root this big old oak tree would have probably squashed me like a bug.

Somehow the rest of the hike took on new meaning and it seemed effortless to climb the last hill - I was really glad to see my lovely bride!

Moral of the story - if you come across a loose root in the path that could cause harm so someone else, stop and do something about it if you are able to. You just might end up saving your own life...

I'm headed to the dentist this morning. Uggg...

goldenrod and sumac have started putting on a show - especially since we had some light rainfall during the night and this morning - moisture always brings out MORE COLOR in things!. HAPPY SUNDAY TO YOU!

10/15/23 First thing Friday morning as I was getting ready to get some prints done for the open house on Saturday, my big printer gave me the dreaded “I’m about to die” error message. I went through the process of trying to revive it several times, having to “Hardware Error - turn printer off, wait a while, then turn back on again” (this is literally the error message the prints displays). After several failed attempts - changing the “wait a while” time - I was beginning to lose hope. At one point it asked if I wanted to replace the print head? $700. I just happened to have had a brand new $700 print head in the room, but was hesitant to use it because - we’ll what if that didn’t work? Then I would be without a printer. I also happened to have a brand new printer stored in the warehouse (this is where the new printhead was), but I really hated to give up on the current printer. But after several more tries I decided my old faithful printer was indeed dead.

It took me about 30 minutes just to get the top of the box off the new printer - that thing is five layers of stiff cardboard thick and weights about 50 pounds - and it was a pretty tight fit. In fact it wasn’t until my lovely bride - with a wounded shoulder - stepped in to help that we were able to get the top off of the box. Next step was that I needed to get the forklift fired up once again (not sure if it would start or not) because step three of the printer assembly process is to “get SIX men to lift the printer up and onto the printer stand.”

At this point I gave up for the day.

Saturday/yesterday we had a tour group coming by the gallery first thing in the morning. No way I’d be able to get the new printer up and running even we were able to get it put together - I had planned to work on that during slow times. Just for the fun of it, I attempted to turn on the old printer one more time as I passed, then went into the gallery to get the lights on and everything up and running and ready for the tour group.

You guessed it, the printer came to life and asked me if I wanted to “align” the old print head. What? YES!!! That didn’t really mean much and I assumed it might run a bunch of ink through the 18,432 nozzles in the print head, then go back to the error message. But it didn’t. In fact a few minutes later it had printed out a very detailed graph of all 12 colors of ink - and there wasn’t a single spot missing. I held my breath and I leaned over to look the operating screen - and everything was NORMAL - time is a wasting - get printing buddy!

I have no idea how it worked, but it did, and I was able to get ALL the prints printed and packaged before the tour group arrived. WHEW!!! This only meant that the printer worked for a little while - it may die at any moment, but at least I’ve got the cover off of the replacement printer if needed!

It was great to visit with the tour group that was here for about an hour, and we sold a couple of the new prints I’d made just before they arrived. The rest of the day I had a total of three (3) visitors to the gallery. Made a $15 sale. Normally that would go down as not such a good day, but looking at the larger picture I came out about $8,015 ahead - I didn’t need to use the new $8k printer! (I will have to replace the printer eventually - probably in the next week or two, but it was great to see the grand old lady cranking out beautiful prints for at least one more day).

SATURDAY NIGHT was a little more exciting. We have several gifted athletes in our family tree, but one was really rising above all the rest. She’s the sister of a cousin (who is also a gifted female athlete). She’s my age (late 60’s), and was participating in what is usually a once-in-a-lifetime event after nearly a year (several years actually) of events around the country to qualify for the World Championship Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii. I thought I was a big deal by doing the 17-mile hike down to the bottom of the Grand Canyon an back out again last March at my age. Hahaha - that was literally a cake walk in the park compared to what this competition is all about. It’s a triathlon consisting of a 2.4-mile swim in the open ocean, a 112-mile bicycle ride, and a full marathon 26.22-mile run completed in that order, a total of 140.6 miles. There were about 2,500 women from around the world in the event yesterday.

There’s an app that allowed us to track quite literally every stroke, pedal, and step of her way, including all her split times, exactly where she was - literally almost everything except for how many pee stops she made (that was probably also on the app somewhere). We followed her until the beginning of her run, but eventually we faded away into the late night.

I got up at 4am and checked her status - lots of folks never complete this event - it really is one of the most difficult athletic events on the globe. It was REALLY hot during the bike ride through the black lava fields, and this took its toll. Pretty much the same thing for the marathon run part. At my very best when I was a college athlete (a Razorback of course!) I could have maybe done the swim, but I’d be dead by the second mile of the bike part, haha. Well, cousin, she not only MADE IT TO THE END, but she placed 21st in the WORLD in her age group - almost unbelievable! I’m exhausted just trying to follow her on the app. Boy, the miles I hike each day just to keep the pounds off don’t seem like much. We are so proud of her!

Today it was wet outside after some light rain during the night - which really brought out the COLOR of some underbrush things - so much so that I had to stop and turn around to go get my “real” camera and spend some time trying to capture it. After about 30 minutes of trying - and of course the wind and rain picked up - I packed up my soaking camera gear and took a photo with my phone - I think it turned out pretty good!
goldenrod and sumac have started putting on a show - especially since we had some light rainfall during the night and this morning - moisture always brings out MORE COLOR in things!. HAPPY SUNDAY TO YOU!

10/15/23 First thing Friday morning as I was getting ready to get some prints done for the open house on Saturday, my big printer gave me the dreaded “I’m about to die” error message. I went through the process of trying to revive it several times, having to “Hardware Error - turn printer off, wait a while, then turn back on again” (this is literally the error message the prints displays). After several failed attempts - changing the “wait a while” time - I was beginning to lose hope. At one point it asked if I wanted to replace the print head? $700. I just happened to have had a brand new $700 print head in the room, but was hesitant to use it because - we’ll what if that didn’t work? Then I would be without a printer. I also happened to have a brand new printer stored in the warehouse (this is where the new printhead was), but I really hated to give up on the current printer. But after several more tries I decided my old faithful printer was indeed dead.

It took me about 30 minutes just to get the top of the box off the new printer - that thing is five layers of stiff cardboard thick and weights about 50 pounds - and it was a pretty tight fit. In fact it wasn’t until my lovely bride - with a wounded shoulder - stepped in to help that we were able to get the top off of the box. Next step was that I needed to get the forklift fired up once again (not sure if it would start or not) because step three of the printer assembly process is to “get SIX men to lift the printer up and onto the printer stand.”

At this point I gave up for the day.

Saturday/yesterday we had a tour group coming by the gallery first thing in the morning. No way I’d be able to get the new printer up and running even we were able to get it put together - I had planned to work on that during slow times. Just for the fun of it, I attempted to turn on the old printer one more time as I passed, then went into the gallery to get the lights on and everything up and running and ready for the tour group.

You guessed it, the printer came to life and asked me if I wanted to “align” the old print head. What? YES!!! That didn’t really mean much and I assumed it might run a bunch of ink through the 18,432 nozzles in the print head, then go back to the error message. But it didn’t. In fact a few minutes later it had printed out a very detailed graph of all 12 colors of ink - and there wasn’t a single spot missing. I held my breath and I leaned over to look the operating screen - and everything was NORMAL - time is a wasting - get printing buddy!

I have no idea how it worked, but it did, and I was able to get ALL the prints printed and packaged before the tour group arrived. WHEW!!! This only meant that the printer worked for a little while - it may die at any moment, but at least I’ve got the cover off of the replacement printer if needed!

It was great to visit with the tour group that was here for about an hour, and we sold a couple of the new prints I’d made just before they arrived. The rest of the day I had a total of three (3) visitors to the gallery. Made a $15 sale. Normally that would go down as not such a good day, but looking at the larger picture I came out about $8,015 ahead - I didn’t need to use the new $8k printer! (I will have to replace the printer eventually - probably in the next week or two, but it was great to see the grand old lady cranking out beautiful prints for at least one more day).

SATURDAY NIGHT was a little more exciting. We have several gifted athletes in our family tree, but one was really rising above all the rest. She’s the sister of a cousin (who is also a gifted female athlete). She’s my age (late 60’s), and was participating in what is usually a once-in-a-lifetime event after nearly a year (several years actually) of events around the country to qualify for the World Championship Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii. I thought I was a big deal by doing the 17-mile hike down to the bottom of the Grand Canyon an back out again last March at my age. Hahaha - that was literally a cake walk in the park compared to what this competition is all about. It’s a triathlon consisting of a 2.4-mile swim in the open ocean, a 112-mile bicycle ride, and a full marathon 26.22-mile run completed in that order, a total of 140.6 miles. There were about 2,500 women from around the world in the event yesterday.

There’s an app that allowed us to track quite literally every stroke, pedal, and step of her way, including all her split times, exactly where she was - literally almost everything except for how many pee stops she made (that was probably also on the app somewhere). We followed her until the beginning of her run, but eventually we faded away into the late night.

I got up at 4am and checked her status - lots of folks never complete this event - it really is one of the most difficult athletic events on the globe. It was REALLY hot during the bike ride through the black lava fields, and this took its toll. Pretty much the same thing for the marathon run part. At my very best when I was a college athlete (a Razorback of course!) I could have maybe done the swim, but I’d be dead by the second mile of the bike part, haha. Well, cousin, she not only MADE IT TO THE END, but she placed 21st in the WORLD in her age group - almost unbelievable! I’m exhausted just trying to follow her on the app. Boy, the miles I hike each day just to keep the pounds off don’t seem like much. We are so proud of her! Photo - that's IronWoman Terri in the center at the finish line, and her sister, Kathy on her right (she's a marathon runner and sometimes triathlon athlete also):

Today it was wet outside after some light rain during the night - which really brought out the COLOR of some underbrush things - so much so that I had to stop and turn around to go get my “real” camera and spend some time trying to capture it. After about 30 minutes of trying - and of course the wind and rain picked up - I packed up my soaking camera gear and took a photo with my phone - I think it turned out pretty good!

10/17/23 This is what our steps looked like when I ran barefoot out into the yard this morning to try and get a picture to post here (it wasn't very good so I'm not showing it). You can see that we had reached the dew point during the night (and so the grass was very wet) - my bare feet were DRY when I went down the steps but wet when I came runing back up into the cabin! [*compare my footprints to those recently discovered at White Sands National Park in New Mexico in the bottom photo that date back 23,000 years - click here for the park service story about them) - I may be older than you think!]

10/20/23 A $30 sale. That was my goal. A guy who has been a long-time collector of my smaller prints was in the gallery last weekend and wanted a print of Elephant Head Rock on Trimble Bluff down in the Lower Buffalo Wilderness Area - and he needed it by this weekend. I’d floated by it, camped nearby, and hiked past it also, but had never taken a single picture of this famous rock formation. So I knew I’d have to make a special trip into the wilderness, and I’d have to do it this week if I wanted to collect my $30. Perhaps I hadn’t actually thought that through all the way when I agreed. Hum.

It would be a 12-14 mile roundtrip hike, and the photo I wanted would be at sunset so I’d have to hike all the way back out in the dark. Not a really big deal for me - I love hiking in the dark, and all of that hike back out would be UPhill, which I also enjoy. While I was packing up for the trip two things came to mind - first, WHY would I drive all that way (4-6 hours of driving), then hike that much, just to collect $30? (answer - I have no clue, other than it was a challenge, and I probably needed to have a photo of the rock anyway) And secondly, as I was going over my plan I realized there was a SHORTER way into the bluff - in fact a hike of only 4-6 miles total. BUT, I would then have to wade the Buffalo River. Not a big issue though since water levels were so low right now. OK, so I changed my plan and headed out the door, knowing I’d actually arrive an hour or two early, so this trip was turning out to be not such a stretch just for a $30 sale.

Fact was I NEVER arrive anywhere early though, no matter how hard I try! And this trip was no different. In my haste I picked the wrong road and trailhead to drive to for this hike (I literally misread the map), which put me more than an hour and many miles behind schedule. When I finally realized my mistake and got back on track it was an easy drive to the trailhead and the end of the road - but I was WAY late getting started. The hike from this spot would probably be more like 2-3 miles each way - all of it on an old but grown-up road - BUT, the sun was dropping rapidly and there was probably no way I’d make it to the base of the bluff in time for my photo (that’s where I had planned to shoot from).

But I headed out anyway - never been on this route before, and it was mostly grown up and kind of tough to follow. There was one trail intersection on the map - I did not see it - but also a second trail that was not on the map that I did see. Knowing it would be pitch dark for my hike out I placed a marker at this intersection so that I’d see it on my way out and be sure to go the correct way. The way that I mark a spot or intersection like this is to use a stone or branch or something natural and place it in an usual spot or manner - something that I would notice but that no one else would ever see.

My pace quickened as the sun dropped behind the hill way over yonder, and along with that my hopes of getting the sunset photo too. Oh well, I was already there so I kept going, changing the type of photo I wanted to get inside my head (by starlight maybe?). Farther down the hillside there was a glimpse of the bluff I was headed for, and to my surprise it was STILL lit up with colorful sunshine - YEA! But there was no way I’d ever get over there in time - especially since I still had to cross the Buffalo River - but I had to try.

Within minutes I had slid and crashed my way through some extremely thick brush, brambles, and river cane and plopped down at river level. When I stood up I could see a perfectly-calm river upstream, and a nice reflection of a still-sunset bluff. YIKES - it was SPECTACULAR! With literally only seconds of that magical light left I knew there was no time to get my camera out, so I hustled to the upper end of the gravel bar I was on and got a quick snapshot with my phone - then the light was gone just like that (you can slow down a sunset!). At least I got a snapshot though of Trimble Bluff, but only a side view of the famed Elephant!

OK, no $30 scene available, but I still could make the effort to get to the spot and see what I could do. First chore was to hike downstream a couple hundred yards to where I could safely cross the river. I’d packed my “trail-running shoes” that I’d bought back in March to hike the Grand Canyon with and was going to wear those when I crossed the river, but with daylight fading fast I decided just to pull my hiking boots off and go across barefoot. To my surprise the river rocks were not too bad on my tender feet, but I did have to wade a bit farther downstream to find shallower water than I had planned. Once on the other side I dried my feet and put my regular hiking boots back on - thinking it would be an easy stroll upstream to the bluff along the gravel river bank.

Oops, boy was I a little red-faced. I’d soon realized that I’d actually not crossed the river but rather crossed over onto an island in the river, and I had to cross the river again. This time I would do a test of a pair of heavy-duty plastic “oversocks” to see if they would keep my shoes or my socks dry. Not wanting to endanger my dry hiking boots, I dug out the trail running shoes but kept my socks on. I slipped one of the “waterproof” oversocks right over my shoe and sock, and the other foot I put the oversock over my stocking foot and then into one of my shoes, hoping either my sock or shoe and sock on the other foot would remain dry. NOPE, both failed and everything go soaked, haha! Note to self - DON’T rely on the waterproof oversocks!

OK, so I sat down and put my real hiking boots back on again, packed all the wet stuff away, and turned upstream to see if I could salvage anything out of this trip. OOPS - guess what - the gravel bar on this other side of the river ended, in fact there was no river bank of any kind, and no place for me to walk, so I was forced to climb up out of the river and into a JUNGLE that was fully grown up.

Turns out this next part would be the worst of the entire trip - it was so THICK with river cane and saw briers that I literally at times had to get down on all fours and crawl through the jungle. I’d forgot the most important piece of equipment to do this with - a pair of clear safety goggles - so at times the briars were so thick I had to push ahead with one and sometimes both of my hands over my eyes to keep from injury. My hands and face were already bloody from thorns, and that’s when I wondered if the $30 print fee would cover my medical costs? Hum.

I read about a test one time that proved if humans are blindfolded, set down in the middle of an open forest or field, they would walk in circles naturally, veering to one side or the other. That’s exactly what I was doing - the jungle was so thick I could not see more than literally a few feet in any direction. And with the terrain being mostly level, I had no reference points to know if I was going uphill or downhill or sideways. So I had to keep checking the GPS map on my phone to see how I was progressing - I was almost always veering back to my left towards the river - and I didn’t want to go there since I knew there was no river bank.

It was slow going and I was making progress, but of course it was getting dusky dark and more so by the minute. I finally reached a point where I wanted to turn straight on and go towards the river and make it to the edge of the jungle and see if there was anyplace for me to get down and hike - and THERE WAS! It was a bit of a climb/slide down, and a slippery steep slope I made my way across, but it was much better than the jungle. And FINALLY, I arrived at the upper gravel bar that would get me to the point directly across from the famous Elephant Head Rock.

Only one more problem in front of me - there was someone camped on the gravel bar, and he was not a happy camper to see another human (he had a perfect campsite - I hated to spoil his solitude). I apologized and got past him as quickly as I could, and finally found a spot beyond, where I had a clear view of the bluff. In fact it was probably a better view than I was expecting since there also was a reflection of the famous elephant head in the river - and the river was still calm! But of course it was almost dark by this time and not all that much to take a picture of.

When I eventually got my camera and tripod setup I discovered that the electronic viewfinder on my camera WAS NOT WORKING! I could still see an image on the back of the camera for framing, but I was unable to focus the camera, nor tell if it was in focus at all.

One good thing - there were a few high, thin layers of clouds way above the bluff that started to glow from the sunlight that was just hitting them. They were pretty dim, but I was able to capture some of the color since I had to make a really long exposure to get the bluff to light up at all, though I really could not see too much of this on the back of the camera so I just had to cross my fingers and hope the elephant was in focus.

OK, I’d done all I could do so it was time to head back - but I dare not take the gravel bar back past the angry camper, so I plunged into the thick jungle once again - this time it was total darkness. I almost immediately got all tangled up in thorny vines that tossed me right onto the ground - I was trying to go too fast and jungles have a way to getting you to slow down. As I clawed my way back up and started going again I saw a spot on a tree a few feet ahead - it was like a glowing eye - smaller than an animal eye, but larger than a spider eye. Then I saw another, and another - and it hit me - these were reflective thumbtacks that someone had stuck on trees to lead them in the dark. But who, and to where? There was no trail or openings - couldn’t tell that anyone had passed.

At first I ignored them since they seemed to be leading me away from the direction I wanted to go, so I made small corrections and headed away. But then I ended up veering back to far to my right and back towards the river (and the upset camper), so I had to adjust myself to go more to the left. Eventually I came upon the reflective thumbtacks again. But they really didn’t make any sense - there was no road there, and they didn’t seem to be leading anywhere. At one point I wondered if they had been put up by Bigfoot and like a spider web he would lure lost hikers into his den and have me for dinner! Those are not the sort of things one should be thinking about when wandering around through the summer jungle in the dark.

I eventually veered away from the reflective tacks and was making my way back downstream where I eventually curved back to the river and hoping to exit the jungle near the same spot I had entered - in fact I had put a waypoint on the map there. Funny though, as I was about to get to that waypoint on the map I picked up the reflective tacks again - but they were taking me away from my waypoint. I had a decision to make - follow the tacks, or my instinct. It was REALLY dark out there. Something just sort of pulled me in one direction that felt right and I ended up quite literally sliding down and landing at the exact spot where I had left the river and entered the jungle the first time - YIPPIE COYOTE!

WHEW, that was a tough bit of hiking to get through all of that, especially what with Bigfoot and an angry camper after me. I put on my trail running shoes that had served me so well in the Grand Canyon and for more than 600 miles of hiking in Colorado this summer. I found my crossing spot and splashed my way across the river. Funny thing though - and this is a lesson for all who trust your phone apps and GPS maps - mine showed me on the wrong side of the river, and a couple hundred yards downstream from the exact same spot I had been an hour before. At that point I was not able to trust my GPS. And I kind of needed to for the next step. Literally.

When I had originally hiked down to the river I followed a seldom-used horse trail on an old road that was on the map, but had left it to cut down to the river when the sun was disappearing. I decided to make a less dramatic re-connection with that old road/trail and follow it all the way back to my car. Only problem - no matter how hard I tried, I was unable to find where the road/trail came off the hillside to the river - and my GPS was of no use since it had me all over the place. At one point I simply stopped, reset the GPS and my phone, let them settle in, and then tried to find the road/trail - but nope, didn’t work - the GPS was still off.

I will say that the five minutes or so I sat there quietly in the total darkness on the river bank waiting for all of the electronics to reboot (and hoping Bigfoot or the angry camper was not after me), was one of the more peaceful and SPECTACULAR moments I’ve ever had in the wilderness - the sky was just INCREDIBLE!

In the end I finally just picked a route and scrambled straight up a sandy cut bank in the canebrake - about 25-30 feet straight UP the hill until I could grab part of an actual dirt hillside (I had to remove my tripod and camera backpack and push it above me before I would hoist myself up a few feet at a time.) It worked, and at last I was back in normal woods - no jungle, no thick cane break. And all I had to do then was hike uphill and angle over yonder and I’d eventually come across the horsetail/old road.

As I was doing that part there seemed to be a lot of others watching me - many pairs of green eyes out there in the darkness, including some that were moving right along with me. My headlamp was a broad beam so I could see those green eye reflections but the light was not bright enough to see what sort of bodies were attached to the pairs of eyes. At least there were always in PAIRS and not THREE eyes on one head! There were also a few crashes of brush and snapped twigs I heard long the way, but I recon most of the eyes were deer - bears generally won’t stick around very long, but deer are very curious and will watch and sometimes follow you - kind of an eerie feeling out there in the dark all alone when that happens though, sometimes.

OK, back on the old road and time for me to sit down, remove my wet trail running shoes and socks, and put my proper hiking boots back on - no dry socks to wear, but that was fine. I leaned into the hill and made quick tracks back towards the car. Soon I passed the marker I’d placed at the unmarked trail intersection, but that second trail intersection that I had NOT seen on the way in I sure enough took it - and hiked about 1/4 mile in the dark in the wrong direction! By this time my GPS map was working once again and I was able to backtrack and get back on the trail and soon was at the car all safe and sound, with only a little loss of blood and pride along the way.

I curled up in the back of my wife’s Subaru for a few hours of sleep, then drove back home the next morning - stopping along the way to fill up her gas tank. GUESS WHAT - I’d only used $27 of gas so I might still make a profit yet!

FYI the Lower Buffalo Wilderness I was in when combined with the Leatherwood Wilderness that is next to it comprise the largest chunk of wilderness in the central USA - almost 40,000 acres of protected, roadless area of wilderness, with only a couple of semi-resident Bigfoots.

HEY STEVE, I hope you like your photo of the Elephant - that will be $30 please!

10/27/23 I hiked in the dark this morning to reach Hawksbill Crag but never got a good photo. On the wy back out I stoped at my all-time favorite stand of maple trees and shot about 110 photos - THIS one was my favorite so far - it is straight out of the camera - shot while zooming the camera during a two-second exosure.

10/30/23 Roark Bluff this morning - still lots of green and color to come!