Canoeing Down the Buffalo River

On Monday. 07-JUN, Rosie and I canoed down part of the Buffalo River with Delma Jensen and her dad, Delmage Pharr. We drove up from HSV to the river access point (about 2.5 hrs) and stayed in a cabin on Sunday night. We started our canoe trip at about 8:30 on Monday morning.

As a bit of background, the Buffalo River is a national river located entirely in northern Arkansas. It was the first national river established by an act of Congress in 1972. The Buffalo is also one of the few remaining rivers in the lower 48 states that is not dammed. Its status as being a national river now protects the river and the surrounding area from destruction.

Now - back to the trip. For Sunday night we had a nice cabin that was really back in the woods. A one-lane road led down to the cabin which was totally surrounded by trees. Delma took a picture of Delmage, Rosie and me in the swing on the front porch. It was so nice and peaceful - very relaxing.Here's the four of us getting ready to canoe down the Buffalo bright and early Monday morning. We had the river to ourselves.Here's another photo of our put in point - Tyler Bend. On Sunday afternoon there were several families swimming in the river at Tyler Bend. The water was rather shallow and very clear at this point.

Next are several photos Rosie took as we canoed down the river.Delma and Delmage are having great fun paddling their canoe.
They seemed to do a better job than Rosie and I did of keeping theirs straight. We drifted sideways a lot - not the preferred technique.

Delmage did get to do a little fishing as we went down the river. He caught one little small mouth bass. However, we did see a lot of fish in the clear river water.Our stopping point was Gilbert; 6 miles from our Tyler Bend starting point. Thankfully, there were some people fishing in the river and we asked them, "Where is Gilbert?" They told us we had arrived; the Gilbert sign was up on the hill. We would likely have missed it if it hadn't been for the fishermen.

It took us about 3 hours to make the trip. Luckily, we reached Gilbert about the time a thunder storm hit - not much lightening but a lot of rain. It passed quickly as we waited for our canoe livery folks to pick us up. It was then back to the car, a quick lunch at a local establishment and then the drive back to HSV. We had a great time and are ready to "float the Buffalo" again!