Lake Fort Smith State Park

Monday, June 10, 2019

It's summer and grandkids are out of school so we took Zoey, Hannah and Brayden to one of our favorite summertime campgrounds. Lake Fort Smith near Mountainburg is just about 90 minutes from home. We love the manicured grounds, but most of all we enjoy the swimming pool.

I spend an inordinate amount of time at home trying to keep squirrels out of my bird feeders. Evidently the word did not get around. This little guy came up to me begging for nuts.

To make sleeping arrangements a little easier we setup the old dome tent. Hannah and Zoey moved in and decorated the inside with lights and girl stuff. Inside it got pretty warm so we took the rainfly off for the night. That night at about 4:00 AM I heard rain hitting on the trailer roof. Remembering that the rainfly was off I ran outside and woke the girls. They were sleeping with the rain hitting them in the face through the roof mesh with all their bedding soaked. They finally realized why I was there and that they were wet and came inside the camper. So much for simplified sleeping arrangements. The next afternoon with everything dried out we put the rainfly back on the tent. An afternoon rain shower came through and we learned that the old tent was incapable of keeping out the rain even with the rainfly installed. It was with some sadness that we trashed the 25+ year old tent when we got home. 

Last Setup of the Dome Tent

Before the Storm

After the Storm

Hannah and Zoey Crated a Toss Game with the Chuck-O Beanbags

Brayden Sleeping on the Foldout Couch with His Shark

Petit Jean State Park

Sunday, May 19, 2019

Only about 30 miles from home we returned to our favorite campground - Petit Jean State Park. Donna and I arrived on Sunday afternoon with a chance of thunderstorms looming for Tuesday. We had reserved site #A22, a pull-through campsite near Lake Bailey. All of the campsites in loop A are full hookup AAA sites. The only drawback to the pull-through sites is that the camper passenger side is just a few feet from the road. This aside, the campground was quiet so there was no real problem being near the road. Just pull the blinds if you don't want walkers seeing in your camper. 

The tent pad was located up steps from the picnic table. Big pine trees made for a good place to hang our hammocks.

 It was chilly in the evenings. Enjoyed a campfire the first two nights.

We did a little fishing in Lake Bailey.  I had some leftover crickets and caught a half dozen bream. No keepers but none the less fun to catch.  Later Donna and I went down to the day use area and drowned a few night crawlers, but didn't get a bite.

Tuesday morning before the storms rolled in I took a hike from Mather Lodge down to Cedar Falls. This was my first time to make this hike and it was well worth the effort.  I took a few pictures and the video below.

Tuesday afternoon we put up all of the outdoor gear and retracted the awning to be ready for storms. Several rain storms blew through early. We went to Mather Lodge for dinner when the strongest of the storms hit. I was glad that we were not in the camper for the last storm of the day. Back at the trailer after storms had ended I noticed the whole area of the campground was turning orange.  I walked down to lake and got several photos of the sunset. I liked this one best.