Buckeye-Caney Creek Trail Trip Video, 2006

This video is of at hiking trip in 2006 that covers the two trails that cross the Caney Creek Wilderness of Southwest Arkansas, the Buckeye and Caney Creek Trails. The wilderness is south of Mena Arkansas in the central Ouachita Mountains. The central range is dominated by east-west trending ridges that are characteristically steep and rugged and underlain by resistant sandstone and novaculite (chert).

There were three of us on this early December trip. Dennis and Jack started at the Buckeye Trailhead on Buckeye Mountain and traveled west to where it dropped off the south flank of the mountain to the main camp in Caney Valley. As a solo hiker, I crossed the Cossatot River and hiked the western section of the Caney Trail to the main camp. We traveled together the next day through the Caney Valley to the eastern trailhead. While I had been onthe loop many times before, this was my first time on the west Caney.

The weather was fairly pleasant. Though not very sunny, it wasn't raining and the temperatures were mild. Since I had a wide but fairly shallow crossing at the Cossatot River, it was nice not to have frozen feet. As with all hiking in this part of Arkansas, I avoid the summer when it can be extremely hot and humid. Fall is often dry but Caney Creek is perenial so there is always water when you get to the valley. Spring is gorgeous in the wilderness: the leaves ware starting to come out and flowering trees like dogwoods, redbuds and various fruit trees are in blosson. In December, it is more browns and green. My favorite green is tha holly tree which it spread through out the valley.