Buffalo National River, Arkansas

My June continued to be a whirlwind of trips and activities.  Right after E3 in Los Angeles, I few directly to Dallas and began a seven-hour drive northeast to the Buffalo National River in Arkansas.  This was the site of my Church's 2013 High Adventure trip.  Young men, ages 14-18, look forward to this trip every year.  It's more advanced than Scout Camp, as you're usually in tents and backpacks the entire trip.  Last year, we really pushed our young men on a 30-mile backpacking trip.  This year, we eased-up a little and chose a 30-mile canoe trip...much, much easier.

Because I had to attend the E3 show, I missed the first couple of days of the river trip.  The young men had a blast paddling down one of the last "wild" rivers in the country...where there aren't dams or other man-made controls on the water:

The fishing was really good.  They ended up catching some large fish...

...and ended up with this beast, as well. It's called an Alligator Gar...for good reason. Look at the teeth on this thing:

They even spotted a bald eagle on the river.  I wasn't even aware that bald eagles were found in this area, but it was beautiful to watch:

After spending three days on the water, they young men set-up camp at Buffalo Point, Arkansas, nestled up against the foot of the Ozark Mountains.  That's where I caught-up with them after my drive.  Everyone's clothing was wet, from some rapids and a couple of over-turned boats:

This part of the trip was quite relaxing, after sunburns and paddling for several days.  The boys even set-up a horseshoe game at camp:

The catch from this day on the river was impressive.  Some of the boys wanted to cook their fish, so we had them prepare everything, to learn the process:

For the rest, we were in the good hands of Brother S.  He's created some amazing meals with Dutch Ovens.  Now that we were off the river, we were lucky enough to have him prepare dinner that evening that included sweet potatoes, polish sausage, white potatoes and onions.  It was amazing:

This was the first day that the young men had access to actual bathrooms ; )  I found this creature on the bathroom wall:

...and this was a surprise to find at the campsite.  The sad thing? All the drinks were empty ; )

Next, we packed up and headed to Blanchard Springs.  This is a beautiful part of the Ozark National Forest.  There, we took the young men on two tours of the Blanchard Springs Caverns.  I've been fortunate enough to tour several cave systems.  This was one of the best.  At a comfortable 58 degrees (and 100 percent humidity), this was a welcome rest from the heat of the day.  Here are pictures from both tours that we took that day.  The second tour had us climb down to almost 280 feet below the ground:

The rocks almost look slimy...but this is to to the slow drip of water and the humidity

We went deep enough to actually find an underground river.  The water was amazingly clear....

This rock wall is about 20-feet high

...however, just when you wanted to reach out and take a drink of the refreshing water below, we were told why this wasn't a good idea.  These caverns are home to thousands, if not millions, of bats.  A portion of their droppings go directly into the underground river.  Sounds delicious, doesn't it?

Once we completed the tour, we went to find where the river actually emerged from the mountain, which was Blanchard Springs.  It was a beautiful setting that we explored:

One of the young men wanted to explore a small canyon that fed another portion of the stream...so we climbed several formations of rock and witnessed more of our Lord's amazing creation:

That evening, we were treated to yet another awesome Dutch Oven meal.  This time, it was chicken and dumplings.  We had no problem sleeping with full stomachs that night!

The following day, we rose early and broke camp, to return to Austin.  We took pictures of the crew:

Our last stop on the trip was more of a tradition for the young men.  They love a particular pizza establishment called Cici's Pizza.  The story here is about quantity...not quality.  It's a buffet that allows the young men to consume as much pizza as they can.  You'd be amazed at how much that actually is. Especially the smaller kids ; )

On the ten-hour drive back to Austin, I made a little detour to my son's house outside of Dallas.  I wanted one more chance to see my grandson.  I probably didn't smell or look too good, but hopefully the boy won't remember Grandpa that way ; )