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.

If you can get away in the next few days, make sure you travel to Newton County. Anywhere you look, you will find excellent waterfalls. I would consider Smith Creek, Clark Creek, and Hemmend in Hollow for starters. The high bluffs along the Buffalo River will have small waterfalls running off of them. These falls will not be running very many days, only as long as the heavy rains continue. One of the best waterfall is the one at the western end of Roark Bluff. This waterfall must be close to 100 feet tall and falls directly into the Buffalo river. It is surrounded by trees and this of year makes for a excellent and rare shot.

Consider also any of the smaller hollows near the Buffalo as they will all be running at peak flow for the next few days.

For photography, I would consider taking slower exposures, 1.5 to 3 seconds. Use the lower ISO or ASA speed for your camera i.e. 100 or even 50. I would recommend also the use of a CL-PL (Circular Polarizer). This will cut the glare off the water and enhance the greens. Even though there most likely will not be much sun, a CL-PL makes a world of difference around water.

Make sure you bring a tripod or even a mono-pod to help support your camera for these longer shutter speeds. You may have to set a higher aperture, around F11 to F14 to allow your camera to take the 1″ to 3″ exposures. Also try to look for wind noise. If there is a lot of wind blowing the trees around in your shot consider taking two exposures, one for the water and then one for the trees. Move the ISO to around 320 to 400 and try for a shutter speed between 100th to 160th of a second. This will stop the wind noise and allow you to layer the two images together later.

Late fall scene on Petit Jean Mountain

The fall in Arkansas can be one of the most beautiful seasons in the state.  Many elements seem to have to come together however to make for a perfect fall and once again in 2009 in most parts of Arkansas, I just didn’t see the best fall colors.  In the next few entries, I will write about areas that I found to be above par and others that just never seemed to come together.  For sure this year the fall was very species dependent.  For example in and around Pulaski County, the oaks and hickory trees just turned brown and the leaves fell off early.  Arkansas has a great many varieties of oaks, but by far the best for color seem to be the white oak and the black/red oaks.  Sometimes you will get great color from the post oaks.  The White oak leaf in prime color will first turn a light shade of yellow which over time turns to a dark gold color before going brown.  The red/black oaks will most often produce a light red color which will fade to a deep red and then many times develop a wonderful mottled look before turning totally brown.

My other favorite tree, the hickory was very hard to find throughout the state.  The best trees I found were on lower Richland and up on the Mather Lodge trail/Petit Jean Mountain.   The maples seemed to want to come in with nice colors, but just as they should have been prime, they also seemed to drop or lose the majority of their color.

As I traveled throughout the state, I kept on the lookout for any oaks that were going to produce significant color.  However mostly I just found dark brown leaves with the only expection being down around the Cossatot and Little Missouri Rivers, in the southwest corner of Arkansas.  Here I found many nice oak trees even late in October and into the first week of November.

As usual, I worked the Buffalo River area first, since most often the fall is up to 2 weeks earlier in that part of the state.  However due to the excessive rainfall, the week of the 18th of October was the last time I was able to get up to the Buffalo and safely cross it.  Most of the views I like to work are below Steel creek which require several crossings of the river and at a normal level these are no problem, but when the Buffalo is over 400 CFS, I have found that it seems more difficult to cross than say Richland creek at the same level.  I was also attempting to work the elk during the early part of the rut and this caused me to steer away from some of the better days, but the chance to catch the elk in the rut with fall colors seemed worth the risk.

After giving up on the Buffalo, I came back to my local area, West Pulaski County, and Howard County working into the Flatside Wilderness, however even by the 18th, there seemly was very little color starting to show on Flatside.  Flatside and Forked Mountain have some of the best views of the Ouachita Mountains and give the viewer a great westward view.  I will write more about Flatside later as I ended up making several attempts to catch the colors there later in October and into early November.

No fall for me would be without a trip to Richland.  And Richland was another mixed blessing.  I missed the best color, if it ever happened up at Twin Falls, (for the 8th year in a row) but found wonderful color from Bill’s Thrill rapid all the way to the campground (which by the way is still closed sad to say).  I wonder where the horsemen have been going for the past few years on the 1st weekend of October?  I made two attempts to get Richland the first trip was cancelled due to dark clouds and excessive wind on Saturday, but the next day, was a bright blue day, with almost no wind until late in the afternoon.  I was able to work the entire creek but the water level was on the high side 270 CFS.  The best color was missed by 4 to 5 days, due to high water.  The best day to be there, the creek was running at least 2.500 CFS and I knew that would limit me to only hiking to Shaws Folly rapid and no crossing.  I chose not to come down from Hill Cemetary solo, as I think my days of that may be over.   Richland on that Sunday was perfect in many places, however you would walk around the bend and find no color at all, very hit and miss.

Petit Jean by far was the best for me this year.  I have wanted to catch Cedar Falls with water in it in the fall and this year it was hard to miss.   Cedar falls was running full most of the month but the real gem was the Mather Lodge trail.  The small creek that winds it’s way down to Cedar creek has some of the best cascades in the state.  You have to wait for most of your shots due to the high number of people on the trail, but it’s worth the wait.  Here I found great color in the hickory trees and dogwoods (which of course turn a deep deep blood red in the fall).  I made two trips back to back, one cloudy and rainy the other bright and sunny.  I would have thought that the best day would have been the 2nd, suuny day, however I have found that most of the good work I was able to take came from the cloudy day, as the light was so harsh the following day.

Fall scene from near Flatside Mountain

After Petit Jean, I worked around the Little and Big Mamulle rivers trying to get some bald cypress trees, and finally was able to get a few nice days in.  My favorite tupleo gum tree grove also didn’t disappoint me, by producing some wonderful color late in the 3rd week of October.  I made one trip to the Cossatot, again holding off until the water levels were a manageable level, but missed most of the prime color there also.  The Cossatot did have some very nice white oaks and sycamores that produced excellent color.  It was the sweet gums and black gums that didn’t seem to produce much color at the Cossatot along with the few maples that are down there.  Overall I traveled more than most years, but the end results were not that spectacular.  I have still wondered what caused the dullness, too much water? or the one cold snap?   Much more to write coming up in the next few weeks with more detailed trip reports.

Early in the Morning you can get one of the best sunrises from Petit Jean.  If you are lucky, you will catch the Arkansas river valley fully encased in fog.  The sun will rise over the fog and make for a excellent shot.  Make sure to get there at least 30 minutes before sunrise to allow you to get setup.  The grave site of Petit Jean is one of the best spots but there are other less known ones.  If you just drive past the turn off to Petit Jean’s grave and then then turn towards the Winrock Conference area you will find some great spots  along the road.   You get the same valley view, but with some more encompassing trees.   Once at the grave site, move around the big rocks until you find a spot where you can feature the rocks and the sunrise.  Don’t just limit yourself to the top, look around for cracks and crevases that make for more unique photos.

This shot which was taken from the grave site is looking due west.  The rocks here will come alive in the morning as the sun hits them.  You might have to take some of the more harsh graffiti off in Photoshop, but that seems to be a necessary evil up there.  The early folks were content to just carve in the rocks, but spray paint has taken over as the main method to deface the rocks.   This shot was taken as a series, HDR (high dynamic range) and then combined into one large negative.  I use a different method than most people to work my HDR,  developed by Timothy Farr and have found it to provide the best results.   This shot was taken with a Canon 5D MKII, with a 24-70 lens at 24mm.

The sky that morning was an amazing shade of of blue and it faded from a dark to almost turquoise color that was broken by a slight band of red right at the horizon line.   One issue you can have with any HDR work is movement.  Wind noise as I call it.  If there is a good breeze blowing you can pretty much forget working with traditional HDR methods as the leaves will never line up.  When this happens I work with a method I learned from Todd Smith from Little Rock.  This allows you to take parts from from several of the image to create the final version.  You also have to watch the clouds as they are moving and can blur also.  Your eye will most likely not pick this movement up.

Since Cedar Falls was dry, (surprising due to all the rain), I drove over to Mather lodge.  I am big fan of the trail that runs from Mather Lodge to both Cedar Falls and the Blue hole.  It has non stop photo opportunities and is full of Dogwoods.   The visita from Mather lodge features the canyon that has been created by Cedar Falls Creek.  You can see the cliffs on the left that are part of the Bear Cave area.  This morning there was a good amount of sunlight lighting the valley.  However as I stood there some low hanging clouds started to move up the valley and within 5 minutes the entire look of the valley had changed.

This shot is a what I call a slight pano.  It was taken from two frames from a medium format back in the Landscape mode.  The medium format back is a 4:3 ratio and lends itselft well to this type of work.  I worked the two frames up independently and then combined them in Photoshop.   Photoshop does an good job on this type of work and can  correct for a lot of the optical errors that can occur.   Within 5 more minutes, the clouds were gone and the valley was back to normal light.  You can see from the various trees, that everything was very lush almost like a rain forest.

The cliffs on the right side can be reached from the road that cross Cedar Creek near the campgrounds.

Often you can get great cloud formations during the day at Flatside. Here is a shot that was taken over the past weekend when a Storm was rolling it. I kept thinking I had the best shot, then as I was packing up, the clouds would change and then an even better formation was created.

Springtime View from Flatside Pinnacle

Rolling hills, the view westward from Flatside Pinnacle.

The view is directly facing the west, thus the best lighting will be in the morning when the sun is over your shoulder. Much past 1:00 pm and you
will start shooting directly into the sun. The actual summit of Flatside is rather large and long, make sure you walk the entire summint to look for the best opportunities.

Forked Mountain off to the west also offers an excellent westward view. It’s a considerably harder hike, much like the East Face of Pinnacle Mountain in Little Rock. Forked Mountain has a very small summit that has twin peaks. Both offer excellent vantage points for photography. I have not tried to take a sunset from Forked Mountain due to the longer and more difficult hike.

The trees will have the classic powder puff look for a few more days, then gradually all the shades of green will turn to one.

One other note, the road to Flatside is in good condition however you have to look for damaged trees that have fallen across the road. These trees were effected by the January Ice storm of 2009 and high wind is all that is needed to puch them down.

Enjoy.

This is a great drive that I had forgotten over the years. You cross over several small creeks and drop down into some very pretty valleys before finally climbing up to the high ridge line above Syalmore creek. There are several great campgrounds in this part of the state, Barkshed, Gunner Pool, and the Blanchard Springs Campground. I prefer Gunner Pool over the others, but most of the year it’s hard to get a campsite due to the crowds. I arrived late in the day, and found the campground almost empty and was able to get a spot down by Gunner Pool. The colors all the way down to the campground were as good as the ones I had seen earlier on Hwy 65.

Slyamore Creek is a special gem in Arkansas. It offers a lot to outdoors people, from a dedicated hiking trail, horseback trail and now a fat tire trail. There is access all along the creek due to excellent forest service roads. The creek runs by small bluffs that remind you of the larger bluffs along the White and Buffalo Rivers. The creek tends to run almost gin clear in the summer and doesn’t seem to get as much of the green color in the wintertime.

I did some HDR work towards the late evening, but really didn’t shoot much as the light was fading fast. Here is one shot taken below the Gunner Pool area.

A closeup of rocks and leaves on Sylamore Creek.

The light was very flat but I liked the way the rocks and water worked together. I was up at first light hoping to get some morning fog shots and I wasn’t disappointed. Hiking up the creek, I found a vantage point where I could look back downstream clear of the bridge that crosses Sylamore Creek. There was sunlight filtering through the trees and fog and it made for a beautiful shot. I worked with HDR technique hoping to get more deep saturation from the shadows without burning the fog. There was no wind blowing so I knew I would be able to get by with a HDR composition. The shot came out great and reminds me a lot of Foggy Morning View taken up on the Buffalo.

HDR View of Sylamore Creek

After working this scene, I headed back to the lower creek and found a nice scene near the old WPA dam that was built back in the 1930′s. The light was still very faint with some very nice trees but it was the sky color on the water that really caught my eye. this shot was also taken as an HDR image and did have some problems since the trees on the right side of the image were moving slightly.

HDR of Sylamore Creek Dam

Right after this shot was taken, the sun came out for good and the scene totally changed. I worked with this light and captured some very nice examples of the sun rising on the trees on the left bank of Slyamore creek.

Arkansas always offers some excellent photography opportunities, no matter what subject matter you are looking for. You can find out more information on the Sylamore Creek area online at this link: Arkansas State Parks.

Sunset

I also stopped at the Sam’s Throne area and the Vendor valley. As was last year, the Sam’s Throne area is way behind the Jasper area and still has great potential for color. The trees there are turning more in unison and so far seem to be turning more traditional colors. I saw some beautiful Maples and Oaks just starting to turn. The Black Gums are prime to just past prime at Sam’s and this too is just last year. The walk along the bluff is one of my favorites. It’s interesting that most of the climbers seems to pass up Sam’s for Horseshoe Canyon. The state has really fixed up Sam’s Throne and now the drive in there is nowhere as a treacherous before.

Bluff View from Sam's Throne

I have yet to travel to the southwest part of the state, but hope to get there soon.

Sunset colors in the Fall.

I have yet to head up to Petit Jean but I feel that Cedar Falls will not have a very good flow. The evening skies do allow for some wonderfull sunset work as many nights the deep blue of the evening sky has really stayed out long after the actual sun has set.

Hopefully things will start to come together this weekend as there are only 2 left before the opening of modern gun season.

Over the past weekend, I spent some time up at Ponca AR to photograph the Elk herd. The Elk in Arkansas are considered a great success as the heard now has grown to close to 500 animals. The viewing of the herd has become a big item at Ponca and on the weekends you can expect to get a lot of traffic along Hwy 43 as people stop to look. There were more photographers out looking for the Elk that I expected. Enough that it reminded me of photography in Yellowstone during the fall rut.

The Elk will come down into the main fields near Ponca early in the morning and later in the afternoon. I found that the later afternoon shooting provided the best opportunities for my shooting style. If you are working the fields around Boxley Valley, you are limited to the fence line. This means that most of the visible Elk are between 100 to 200 years out. Even with a 400mm lens, the distance was really too great to take a photo to feature an elk without an extreme amount of cropping. To really bring the animals into view, you would be better suited with at least a 500mm lens, even a 600 or 800mm. There were plenty of people using these huge pieces of glass. Enough that it reminded me of a sporting event.

As you determine the best shot, you run into the question of which lens to use. If you have the ability to use a large fixed telephoto like a 500mm F4 lens, they you can add a 1.4x tele-converter and extend that range to 700mm at F5.6. The only issue here is the cost of such a lens which is around 5K. The other option is to use a traditional zoom telephoto say a 100 to 400mm. This will not give you the same low light abilities, but with the same 1.4x tele-converter you can get to 560mm at around F6.7. This solution should still give you a good crisp image, but will not work as well in the early morning low light. The other thing to consider is your ISO setting. I shot most of the images I took at around ISO 160 to 250 since I was using an older Canon 1Ds MKII which really doesn’t have a great high ISO performance due to the noise that is created. Some of the new cameras out there will operate all the way up to 3200 ISO or higher and that is a real plus for this type of mixed lighting shooting.

It became obvious to me that the real trick is to find a spot where the Elk may appear outside the normal fields in the Boxley Balley. When you are shooting into the fields you basically have a canebrake and fence line as your backdrop. Unfortunately for me, this means getting up the area more often and most likely not on the weekends. I am hopeful that as winter approaches, the Elk may migrate into different fields that will allow for a better photography opportunity.

I was lucky to spend Saturday with Michael Dougherty, a photographer living in Compton AR, who has become a local expert on the Elk. Michael has created a large knowledge base about the Elk in Boxley Valley, and keeps a running blog on one of his websites that contains a great amount of information. You can find the blog here.

If you are considering a trip up to either view or photograph the Elk, make sure you check out Michael’s site, Arkansas Wildlife Photography.com/, before you go.

Shaw's Runout in the early morning at Richland Creek.

I had hoped that more rainfall would have occurred in the later part of September so that Richland and other creeks would be at a higher level in October. It has been 2 years now since there was good water in Richland Creek during fall.

All the way up HWY 7, I noticed that the colors seemed rather muted which is the same way they have appeared around Little Rock. The good news is the Forest Service Road 1205 is still in very good shape all the way down to the bridge over Richland Creek. I had been worried that since the campground was now closed, the routine maintenance on 1205 past Dicky Junction would now be continued. Since the large landslide that occurred on 1205 south of Richland not much has been done to fix 1205 south of Richland Creek campground.

Richland Creek itself has had a hard year as there were two major floods approaching 20,000 CFS on it during the Spring and then one other major flood after Hurricane Gustave saturated Arkansas with rain. The signs of the high water are all along the creek either in the form of small contained landslides or huge trees that were pushed down and have washed up on the bank. All of the rocks were totally scrubbed clean of most of the lichens during the spring floods but these in time will grow back.

I have been hiking in from the parking area on the North side of the Campground bridge. This makes for a tad longer hike, but you also take in some great maple trees along the creek near Maytag rapid. The creek was running at around 8 CFS which is a very low level. At this low level, I chose not to go all the way up to Twin Falls since there would be almost now water coming over the falls.

This day I worked my way up the creek to Bill’s Thrill Rapid and then setup. As was the case in 2006, the trees on one side of the creek had already hit the prime color stages and dropped their leaves and the trees, mainly sweetgums, on the right side of the creek had only begun to change colors. This is a favorite spot of mine due to the formation of large rocks in the creek bed which offers many angles to shoot, both up and downstream. There were a lot of clouds coming over the creek this day and it made for some tricky shooting. The fall colors always seem to pop more when the sun is shinning on them.

After working the Bills Thrill area, I then headed back down the creek and stopped at several different spots. I skipped many of my favorite spots since the water level was so low. The day ended at Shaws folly rapid, which really took some abuse in the Springtime floods. Several of the larger trees that used to help frame this area on the creek were totally broken off at the trunks and all that is left are the stumps. The water made allowed for some very nice close up shots one of which I have featured in this review.

The day was starting to wind down so I didn’t head on over to Falling Water Creek. This is still one of the best creeks to hike down in the fall, but again the water levels would have been very questionable.

The Stack rock area will most likely be perfect in the next 2 weeks and Sam’s Throne should start to peak in color in the next 10 days or so.