A New Set of Trails

We’re back in Hot Springs at the National Park Campground, Gulpha Gorge. We have a pretty unlevel site, but we managed to get the trailer level and we have full hookups, so that is nice.

Unfortunately when we arrived the trails on Hot Springs Mountain were inaccessible from the campground because the water in Gulpha Creek was over the stepping stones. Matey might have been willing to wade it, but I wasn’t.

Yesterday afternoon Jamie, Sean and Bria came and got Matey and me and we went to a new set of trails they’d discovered just outside the city. (We left poor Bud at home to prep for his colonoscopy today, ugh!)

These are the Northwoods Trails, and although they are set up for mountain bikers they are open to hikers also. We hiked a bit over three miles and met just two bikes on the trail, though we saw four others go by on an adjacent trail.

They are built mostly on the land around several small reservoirs that are the water supply for Hot Springs. They extend onto some National Park land and into Cedar Glades Park, where we go disc golfing. We had all seen the sign for the trailhead, but had no idea what nice trails they were.

They were particularly pretty yesterday because the recent rains caused waterfalls over the dams that Jamie and Sean said are usually dry.

Some parts of the trails are along the maintenance roads for the reservoirs.

These offered nice views of the impoundment dams.

In other places they were just broad paths through the woods. They weren’t blazed but were easy to see.

And at every junction there were signs and maps and the trails were named. I loved the names. We walked on Funguy trail, Yaupon Yop and Bees Knees. There were dozens to choose from making loops of many lengths.

A lot of money has been invested, like in this bridge whose one approach is a banked curve for the bikes.

That bridge went across the top of a dam and I appreciated the dog safe railings.

We got an up-close look at one set of falls there.

We chose paths that hugged the lakes…

so we had lots of water views.

We found this stone bench and had to stop for pictures.

You only get to see Sean’s shadow because he thought I should be in one of my photos.

Here they had constructed a wooden causeway over a low area…

and across a little creek.

We then walked along the other side of the little lake and got to look back at the falls we’d crossed.

It’s a really pretty area…

and has the promise of many nice future hikes. Just when I thought I had walked all the trails in Hot Springs I have been shown a whole new set!