Butterfield Trail Trip Video, 2006

This video is of a hiking trip in 2006 that covers the Butterfield Trail in Devils Den State Park in the Ozark Mountains. The park is about half way between Fayetteville and Fort Smith, Arkansas, west of I-49. The geography is technically the Boston Mountains, characterized as mountainous, forested, and underlain by Pennsylvanian sandstone, shale, and siltstone. Unlike the folded and faulted Ouachita Mountains with its near vertical beds, the rocks in the Ozarks are relatively flat lying. However, they are old mountains deeply incised by the abundant creeks so there are some spectacular bluffs; thought not so much on this hike. The Boston Mountains are also much moister than the Ouachitas in Oklahoma. The vegetation is oak–hickory–pine and oak–hickory forests with shortleaf pine being the dominate pine.

This hike took place on December 30 and 31. The temperatures were mild but it rained most of the first day. The upside of rain in this area is the creeks and pour-offs are really flowing. Little creeks that are normally dry are full of water. Cliffs and bluffs are turned into waterfalls.

It was just two of us, Dennis and me. We managed to get out of town for a quick overnight between Christmas and New Years. We geared up early when it began to sprinkle; gore-tex rain suits and pack ponchos. Just in time, too. That sprinkle turned into a serious rain in no time but we were in good shape. As the video shows, the creeks were full. It also shows Quail Valley that can provide respite from the worse of the rain among its house sized boulders.

Though there are some other campsites, we opted for Junction Camp at the confluence of Lee Creek and Blackburn Creek. Junction Camp it a large area between the bluff to the north and the creeks. There is plenty of room for multiple groups and tents and not be on top of each other. We did have one visitor at camp, Rocky Racoon. This juvenile racoon hung around for several hours coming into camp. No doubt it had been fed by campers before or managed to get into their food. It was cute but its claws can shred your tent like its tissue paper. We finally ran it off and hung our food as if we were in bear country. And we were. There are plenty of black bears in the Ozarks but they are illusive. In all the time I have have spent in the backcountry there, I never saw one and never had one come through camp.

The next day we hiked back up the bluff and followed the trail along a bench. On the way up the bluff is Butterfield Falls. It is not the most dramatic falls but it is in the middle of the trail so it was interesting climbing around it. With in a couple miles of the trailhead and parking lot, the trail drops over the edge of the bluff down to Lee Creek.