02/08/2010 Report on my Lost Valley Hike from early January

With all of the places in Arkansas to hike, it’s hard to pick a favorite. But one place will always be at the top of my list and that is Lost Valley in the Boxley Valley. I have been making trips up to Lost Valley since 1969 and it has changed very little since my first trip. Most of my hikes in Lost Valley are in the Spring or Fall and I rarely make trips up to the area in the winter. But it can be a great place to photograph in the winter, especially when the various waterfalls of the valley freeze. When this occurs you have a chance to catch some rare and unique ice formations. Lost Valley is a box canyon and throughout it’s 1 mile or so length Clark Creek which runs through the valley creates many waterfalls, but the most important ones are towards the back of the valley and these are the Eden Falls complex. Eden Falls is actually a 3 part waterfall, lower Eden Falls, Cave Falls, and Upper Eden Falls. Most of the year, you will find water in Lower Eden Falls and Cave Falls, but the upper which is also the highest and most dramatic only runs after a major rain event and even then it won’t run very long. In the wintertime to maximize the best ice formations, you actually don’t have or want a high flow but instead you just need enough water to bounce off the surrounding rocks. The bouncing water as it freezes is what creates the ice formations.

On this winter day, the conditions were perfect for the ice formations, as the temperature was around 12 degrees and there was no wind blowing. Starting from the visitor center, I hiked up to the Jigsaw Blocks . The ground had a nice covering of old snow that had a hard ice coating. This made for a very bright shooting condition and while working the valley, I had to constantly check to make sure I was not getting blown highlights from the snow. I have always been drawn to the Jigsaw blocks and I have photographed it many times over the years. Most often Clark Creek is dry around the Jigsaw Blocks even in the Spring, so they tend to be a static study for me. In fact in 25 years of hiking up Lost Valley, I have only seen a good flow of water at the Jigsaw blocks 3 or 4 times. The best was in August of 2008 and the entire spring of 2009. You can work the blocks in many ways, I tend to prefer a head on shot like this one.

There was a great play of light and dark on the rocks that create the jigsaw pieces. This time of year, the sun is low in the sky so the shadows are quite dramatic. You can see Clark Creek on the left of the rocks and if you follow it upstream you will see the Natural Bridge. I was pleased to see that no one had walked around the rocks and left footprints. From here I walked on up to the Natural Bridge.

The Natural Bridge in Lost Valley

Once you are above the natural bridge, you have many options in regards to continuing your hike. The trail stays high above the creek and offers many nice views of Clark creek, but you can also work your way back down to the creek and rock hop your way up. In the spring, this is the way I work Clark creek but on this day, with each rock covered with ice, I chose to stay on the trail. As you work your way upstream, your eye will soon start to see parts of the large bluff above Cob Cave. I am not sure of the name of this bluff, but it has to be over 100 feet high, with the opening of Cob Cave at the bottom. The limestone rock that makes up the bluff is very colorful and depending on the light hitting it will show red, yellow and dark blue. On this day with the bright winter sun shining on it, the main color was yellow. The creek hits some bedrock right below the cave and this bedrock runs for about 20 or so yards downstream. I stopped right where the bedrock stops and took a shot looking up at the bluff. Since I was using a 35mm wide angle medium format lens, which is equivalent to a 24mm lens in 35mm the trees are bending towards each other towards the top of the frame. If I had had a shift lens, this effect would have been minimized. It’s a great bluff and has a lot of individual character. If you are lucky to be here after a major rain, then you will be able to see the waterfall that comes off the top of the bluff. If you look to the bottom of the picture you can see the opening of cob cave. Cob cave is more a traditional overhang, but it’s one of the largest of it’s kind in Arkansas. It’s hard to believe that Clark Creek created this, especially when you realize that Clark creek is dry most of the year. One other feature of Lost Valley is the large number of Beech Trees that populate the valley. In this photograph you can see several Beech trees on the left, they hold their leaves all winter. One little known fact of Lost Valley is that the entire lower end of the Valley was logged in the 1960′s and early 1970′s. When I made my first trip to Lost Valley in 1969, I don’t believe that it was even a state park, and I know it wasn’t part of the Buffalo National River yet. What now is the trail is actually the original logging road that was extended all the way to the Cob Cave area. Most of the Oaks, and Maples of any size were cut down during this time, which allowed the Beech trees to take over the valley. Lost Valley has one of the largest populations of Beech Trees in Arkansas, I know of only a few other areas where they are so dense.

Close up of ice formations at Lower Eden Falls in Lost Valley

Just as I was starting to pack up my gear for the hike back, the sun came back around the corner and really lit up the top and left side of the falls. I worked up to a slightly higher vantage point before I took the pictures. All of these photographs were taken in a series so that I could expose for the sky, the middle ground and the darker area around the base of the falls. The temperature didn’t get much higher than 24 degrees this day but I was pleasantly surprised by how well the batteries lasted in my camera. All of the photographs shown in the article were taken with a Medium Format Digital Camera. For all of them I used a tripod since my exposures were all too slow to hand hold and I knew that I was going to combine the exposures of several images together. Since you will be combining several images, it’s important to stabilize the camera so that all of the images will line up. I used both a 35mm and 55mm medium format lens and on most of the photographs I used a CL-PL (circular polarizer) to take the glare off the water and give a darker blue to the sky. Lost Valley can be reached by taking Hwy 7 all the way to Jasper. From Jasper take Hwy 74 over the mountains to Ponca. Lost Valley is about 1 mile south of Ponca on Hwy 43. Lost Valley has always been a special place for me and I hope that this article has helped to share some it’s beauty with my readers.

Permalink | February 8th, 2010

2 Responses to “02/08/2010 Report on my Lost Valley Hike from early January”

02/10/10 Lost Valley Hike Review | Photos of Arkansas Says:
February 10th, 2010 at 8:43am
[...] I have just added a new blog entry about hiking Lost Valley in the Wintertime. Click here to read it. [...]
Todd Smith Says:
February 10th, 2010 at 11:08pm
Awesome work Paul. Great read and even better photos. You knowledge of the Arkansas outdoors is spectacular.

Simply grand!

TS