Hike To Horseshoe Bend & Goat Bluff

What an incredible week of weather we have had! On Friday, March 13 we started to get snow in the evening. By Saturday morning we had 4 to 6 inches on the ground. Sunday morning it warmed up and the snow began to melt. By Tuesday, the weatherman was calling for 70 degrees, a gentle south wind, and clear skies. I called Adventure Bill and asked him if he could come out and play, to my delight he said he could. We decided on a trail hike to a very nice spot, Horseshoe Bend on the Buffalo River.

We finally made it to Horseshoe Bend. The view from this spot is spectacular! We had a great deal of fun exploring the bluff. While we were goofing off, having lunch and just enjoying ourselves, we saw several groups of canoeists making their way around Horseshoe Bend. The Buffalo River was up and it looked like they were having a lot of fun.
The floaters saw us on top of Big Bluff and began hollering and waving, asking us how the heck we got up to where we were. We hollered back that the trail started at the Center Point Trailhead, and waved back. The current swept them around the bend and they moved out of sight.

After spending more than an hour just being lazy, we gathered up our backpacks, made sure we left no trace of our being on the bluff, then began the long, hard hike back up the mountain to the truck. The total miles on this hike was somewhere around 6 miles. We timed the hike, and it took 5 hours to complete. This is not a place to take real young kids, since some of the ledges are quite narrow and dangerous. I hope each of you gets the chance to experience a couple of nice days here in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas.