So much seems to be happening all at once right now. We are preparing to leave Missouri and our family and friends for Texas, our eventual home for the winter of ‘20-21. The presidential election is upon us and it seems all hell has broken out over that crossroads. My best intentions are that I not include a lot of political bacchanalia in this journal. Lord knows there is no shortage of that everywhere you turn these days. However, if indeed my descendants end up reading any of this down the line some year they need to understand that this is a time unlike any other in my 68 years of life. The tension over this election is the heaviest I’ve ever encountered. Coupled with the Covid-19 pandemic running absolutely rampant it sometimes feels as if the country’s democratic future itself is hanging by a thread. Folks are scared right now. Try as you might to focus on the positive, you can’t help but get sucked into the whirlpool of worry and doubt sometimes. As for us, Diane and me, we’re preparing to move on...move on south to see our wonderful daughter, Suni, her husband Dane, and their children, Ella and Jack. Just the thought of seeing them again, as it is with our son, Eli’s family, brings delightful anticipation not unlike a child’s on Christmas Eve.
Before we head south we decided to have a little “social-distance” party with our musician friends at Babler State Park. Our campsite there affords us the opportunity to visit and play some music at a distance...safely. These folks are the friends I grew up with playing music. We learned songs together, shared the stage together, and admired each other’s playing for its own true value...collaboration. Diane and I rented two camp sites for the occasion just so that we would have enough space for social distancing. We had two huge fires going all afternoon, courtesy of Dave and Mel Cochran who brought a truckload of wood from down near Steelville, Mo way. Since it was a cool day, the warmth was especially needed and appreciated. The food was awesome as everyone brought a dish or two. We all wore masks and tried to stay the necessary 6 feet apart. We laughed out loud continually as the stories were told, both old and new, some true, some kind of true, and some not so true. It was hard to tell the difference...as it should be. The music was great. No audience except ourselves with just the music we felt like playing at that moment...spontaneous, joyful, unpretentious. Old friends playing old songs on old instruments...Old as the hills that surrounded us, yet expressed as fresh and new as the moment in which we now lived. Thoughts drifted back decades over the notes and the songs and the moments we shared together.
I thought back to a time in the early 1970’s when a group of us, the Road Apples band, holed up in Bob Breidenbach’s family shack on the Cuivre River for a weekend in the winter. We practiced and worked on all new songs all weekend long isolated from family and the outside world. Heat and BTU’s were provided by burning wood we could scavenge in the stove. Food was beyond simple. Herb flowed freely. We got really creative with our music and arrangements. We built new original songs together. We created interesting arrangements of cover tunes we played, sometimes building out medleys of songs. We were “in the moment” as it is often referred to for three days and nights. By Sunday afternoon we left and headed to a local radio station in Warrenton, MO, KWRE, for a live set broadcast on air. I recall that time and place and that radio show with great affection. I think it was good music, but who knows now? It’s floating around the universe somewhere now, part of the larger river of ancient tones that flows from this planet. Whew! I’m getting a little heavy here...back to November 2020.
So, the musician’s party was on November 2. November 3rd was election day and we had decided to move out then and start south. We drove as far as Springfield, MO that day and stopped at an RV park. We specifically picked out an rv park so that we could have a good Internet connection to watch the election results come in. We stayed in Cook’s RV Motor Park just north of Springfield. It’s a small park. There’s nothing truly special about it. The location is almost urban being on the outskirts of town. But, I must say it is very clean and well-maintained, and the staff is the among the friendliest you’ll ever find. If you are passing through Springfield and need a spot to camp for a night or a few, it’s perfect.
The next day we got up and got going fairly early bound for our destination of the Buffalo River in Arkansas. The Buffalo is as sublime a river to float as ever there was one. Similar in some ways to the Current and Jack’s Fork rivers in Missouri it shares the special designation as a National Scenic Riverway. I would say that the Buffalo’s bluffs are higher than those found in Missouri and sometimes it is more remote. I would also say that the rivers in Missouri are mostly spring-fed and so they run fuller longer through the Summer and Fall. The Buffalo can get very low during those drier seasons. That is how we found it this year. Rather than stay in the somewhat wilder upriver sections of the Buffalo we chose to stay at Buffalo Point campground on the lower section of the river. The water there was full enough for good floating. It’s a wide section of the river not far upriver from it’s junction with the White River. Man, what a beautiful place to set up camp it was!
There is a massive bluff on the opposite side of the river from the campground that roughly forms a semi-circle around the bend in the river. There is a rock bar there that curls around the bend which has to be among the largest I’ve ever seen. I stretches for 4 or 5 football fields at least. The river here is broad. Even when it forms into chutes as it runs headlong toward the White River it is easily navigable. This takes nothing away from its beauty, however. The stretches between the chutes and riffles tend to be a quarter to a half mile long. The occasional boulder, fallen down from the bluff above, punctuates the deep stretches as periods and commas give meaning to a paragraph.
Since we haul our own kayaks with us wherever we go we looked for a good outfitter to portage our car so we could float. It being late in the year there wasn’t much activity on the river and most of the conveyance folks were closed. I found Wild Bill, however, who runs a gas station/general store/canoe rental outfit. Wild Bill’s is one of those few places anymore where the local guys from the council of elders hang out and mostly chew the fat all day. I noticed that these guys really were chewing the fat as the empty bags of pork skins lay all over the place. Pictures of big fish were taped up on the walls of the store along with any and every manner of funny sayings printed on cedar plaques for sale, shiny with 50 coats of clear coat poly to make them suitable for hanging in your kitchen back home. Crawdad lures of every color and size dominated the fishing tackle section of the little store. Of course, I bought a couple. A man always needs a few more crawdad lures. I’ve always been told...At the end of the proverbial trail the man with the most lures wins. And, of course, I’m in the race.
Wild Bill’s is the place to go for canoe and kayak rentals if you ask me. The local guys he hires are great folk. Everyone’s cheerful and helpful with getting you into the water. Wild Bill himself is just my kind of character. Helpful to a fault, jolly, and ready to offer free advice, whether you want it or not. One day when this Covid thing is over I think I’ll go back and hang out at Wild Bill’s for a while. Who knows, I might even chew the fat with the boys...literally.
The day we floated was the perfect fall day for just such an activity. It was warm, in the 70’s, and the sky was clear with an an occasional puffy cumulus cloud lazily drifting from west to east. The river itself was in perfect shape. The current was steady...not fast...just perfect. We decided not to fish this time. We just wanted to float like fishing bobbers down the river. I recalled the lines of a John Hartford song, “Comin’ down out of the mystery above...Comin’ down into the mystery below”. I let myself completely go at times and swirled my kayak around so that I would perform 360’s down through the long stretches of straight water just pinwheeling my way. I felt as if I were a leaf newly fallen from a sycamore hovering on top of the crystal clear water riding its way towards the Mississippi and that great Gulf of Mexico.
The trees still had some Autumn color left in them, but by this time of year they were deeper shades of copper and mustard. Accents of auburn and deep Cabernet stood out on the mountainsides. A few turtles who hadn’t yet started hibernating for the Winter clung to flat topped rocks sunning themselves with the their necks outstretched, craning toward the Sun. It was as if they were trying to absorb every single degree of warmth they possibly could before settling into the darkness of the coming season. Here was a Red-eared Slider, there was a Soft-shell, all with the same goal. I could sneak up on them with nary a paddle stroke to break the silence or the water and bid my hello as I passed by these critters. Oh, the games you play when time is not the enemy of your pleasure. Few folks were out on the river that day. I think we saw one family in a raft, mom and dad and their two daughters at a tender age, out on the water for their very first time. Other than that we were alone in God’s great garden for those few hours.
Close at hand to our campground there at Buffalo Point is a ghost town preserved somewhat by the National Park Service. It’s called simply, “Rush”. You drive up to the main road that clings to the ridges of the Ozarks here and head north about 5 miles. At the prescribed point you dive down off the ridge and into a sharp valley. The road quickly turns to gravel and that helps preserve the sites at Rush as it keeps down some of the traffic, being a tad rough at points. Of course, it was child’s play for Tank, our Jeep. As you descend deeper into the riverine valley you begin to come across old stone foundations made up of native rock, the first signs you’re nearing this ghost of a town. Deeper still you find abandoned wooden houses and a storefront. You peer into the windows and you see old patterned wallpaper featuring summer season fruits and vegetables and once optimistically colored paint hanging by threads and shards. The houses themselves are still standing erect with just the slightest bit of lean here and there. We parked the Jeep and started walking amidst the ruins of this miners’ life. All throughout the hills lie the remains of what once was a town, busy, purposeful, and hopeful. An old company store stands in the middle of the place. The Park Service has done a good job of placing interpretive signs around the area describing what most of the buildings once were. A few of the signs feature quotes from the inhabitants, now passed on, relating their day to day lives in Rush as it once was.
We found it just a little bit eerie standing there alone amidst the ruin of so many hopes and dreams tied to the Zinc veins in these mountains. Zinc is what brought these folks here. Needed for shell casings during WW1, there was terrific demand for the ore during the early 20th century. And, although the war’s end diminished the need for shell casings, the town held on somehow until it finally evaporated in the 1940’s. Interestingly, you can climb the hills here and go right up to the mine shaft entrances laced throughout the area. They are fenced off now so you cannot go inside. Dangerous conditions inside as well as large colonies of bats preclude any need for humans to satisfy their curiosities with mine exploring. A scant few have had cave-ins in the recent past. Indeed, the conditions were dangerous even for the miners of the day. Some died in there, some were injured. There were no ambulances out here in the woods. You pretty much had to get over your injury the best way you could and figure out a way to feed your family in the meantime. Some left here still owing the company store for credit given. What struck me about these mine entrances was the fact that they were so small. None I saw was over 4-4 1/2‘ high and not much broader than that to boot. Did these people work hunched over all day in there, in the darkness of the dimly lit mines? I find no romance in the prospect of working in a mine. I know some people I’ve met talk fondly of coal mines and such as if mining were an honor, a family tradition. I guess that is true, but not for me. I hear in my mind’s ear that old coal mining song by Merle Travis, Dark as a Dungeon”…
”Where it’s dark as a dungeon, damp as the dew.
Where the dangers are many, and the pleasures are few.
Where the rain never falls and the sun never shines…
It’s dark as a dungeon way down in the mines.”
No, I prefer the old cowboy tome...“Give me land, lots of land under starry skies above...don’t fence me in”. That old song may as well be my life’s motto.
The time came to pack up and continue south on our 50 Amp Vision Quest. We’re headed south to see our daughter and her family near Austin, TX. Over the ridges and up and down the rocky hills on the two-lane that snakes through northern Arkansas we made our way in our personal Conestoga, Nell, the motor home. This is not easy driving for a 38’ vehicle towing a 4 door Jeep. At times the road will slope so much to one side that I get fearful we’re going to tip over. But, tight hands on the wheel and good ol’ gravity did the job. This was the day the Joe Biden was finally declared the winner of the election. Of course, Mr Trump claimed foul and vowed to fight on. It was, to us, as if a fog had lifted. Finally, after days of wondering who would lead our nation on January 20, 2021 we had the word, though it would be fought for days and weeks to come by the current administration.
We didn’t make any concrete plans as to where we would spend the next night. We thought of heading towards DeGray lake in southern Arkansas on the edge of the Ouachita Mountains. We thought perhaps we might save some dough and stay overnight in a Wal Mart lot. Then, Diane, who was researching places to camp on Alstays, our awesome camping ap, found what sounded like a great place. It was an RV Campground, but it was perched on a small bluff on the Arkansas River in North Little Rock. A great little campground, it gives you access to the city of Little Rock by being right next to a pedestrian bridge that was constructed on the remains of a railroad trestle that spans the river. It takes you from North Little Rock right to the entrance of the Bill Clinton Presidential Library. Presidential Libraries are always cool to visit, but at this time we decided not to gamble with the Virus. We’ll stay outside, thank you, and socially distance ourselves. We are trying diligently to avoid any contagion that we might bring to our kids and grandkids in Texas.
I did ride my bike over the span and into the few blocks of an entertainment district that fronts the river in downtown little Rock. It’s a cool scene, even with the Pandemic raging across the state. Bars and restaurants line the street. There is an outdoor concert area there. An electric trolley car offers rides to and from. Kids of all ages were shooting around on electric scooters that are provided free by the city. Just grab one and go seemed to be the mantra for the young at heart. It reminded me of similar downtown escapes we’ve seen. Washington Avenue in St Louis comes to mind. Downtown Louisville, KY has it’s own rehabbed downtown scene. Portland, OR has a killer market area in its downtown that is a kaleidescope of activity and cool handmade art. I tooled around on my bike and checked the area out pretty good. I imagined the place teeming with people during happier, freer times. It’s a great scene, that little riverfront revitalization. We decided to stay an extra day in North Little Rock. That RV campground comes with our best recommendations. It’s appropriately named, “Downtown Riverside RV Park”.
We packed up once again and headed south, south into the Lone Star State with just a few days left until our rendezvous with the family in Pflugerville. The Texas Hill Country would be our home for the Winter. More adventures and memories await us. That haunting Hartford song is in my mind again, “Coming down out of the mystery above...coming down into the mystery below”.