Caney Creek Wilderness

[Mr. Leary]

It's been too long since my last "walk" in the woods, and with the weather cooling down and the world returning to habitable status, I couldn't contain myself any longer. I was going for a walk, and that was all there was to it.

The weather forecast predicted thunderstorms all weekend... perfect... nobody else will be out there.

I cleared the dust off of my backpacking gear. I knew that this trip would be a challenge for me, since I am in pretty poor backpacking shape and the 22 mile loop with lots of elevation change would be sure to test my battered joints.

I called the usual suspects, and we plotted our escape from the concrete jungle.

We left relatively late. We knew we would be camping at the trailhead and setting out in the morning. The Cossatot River lay only about a third of a mile down the trail, and since it had been raining all day I was not interested in attempting a crossing in the dark.

In the morning, we got off to a "comfortable" start , at around 0830. We were in no rush, and there is a strict rule against alarm clocks on these trips, established years ago.

The Cossatot was down to mid calf by the time we arrived. Hardly what I expected, even though I knew that it had been dry up there this year just as it has in Texas. We crossed and John filled his Nalgenes. I looked for the heart shaped rocks that I always bring home to my wife after a trip. Lots of neat rocks here. These deeply dug river beds yield several layers of rocks, and the mix is part of the beauty. Perhaps a geologist could tell a tale. I was simply happy to look at them, unconcerned with the mystery they hold.

 

[Mr. Leary]

The Caney Creek trail itself is one of the flattest and easiest trails that I have ever hiked. The last time that I hiked it was in 2006. I remembered it being a little horse trodden and a few trees down. As we progressed further in, the trail condition deteriorated. I could tell that my outing in 2006 was around the last time that this trail saw any maintenance, which was confirmed later when we checked the trail registry. A light rain settled over the valley. We covered the packs, tightened up our laces, and continued to hike. The rain felt refreshing, and it always brings out the pretty qualities in the rocks. The Caney Creek trail has several neat waterfalls, reminiscent of the Ozarks. We detoured around fallen trees and towards these little falls when we spotted them.

Got a few shots of the ever present "stick bugs"

 

[Mr. Leary]

We stopped for lunch at Katy Falls. This is a beautiful feature, and I had to break out the camera while Matt and John prepared lunch / pumped water. I could not get my time lapse shot to come out, but I did grab a few worth keeping...

We stumbled upon a well placed geocache near the falls. We had nothing to leave, so we signed the log (first to do so) and climbed out.

 

[Mr. Leary]

Our next section was Buckeye Mountain trial. The trail is in some serious need of maintenance, and at one point we lost it all together.

I snapped a few photos during a water break. Turned out to be a rare window into how the Ouachitas are laid out...

We continued on. The trail eventually followed an old road trace, so conditions were much better. We made good time coming down the mountain, but my knees were complaining from the pounding... exactly what I had been worried about.

We walked down the forest road until it connected with the eastern Caney Creek trailhead. I knew of a few good campsite areas a couple miles in, so we made our final push for the day. I took a pull of Gray Goose to take the edge off of my knees hurting... amazing how fast that stuff hits you when you have been exercising all day... I would not have been comfortable driving.

We made camp near a creek, but uphill a spell... we knew that there were more thunderstorms coming in the night. I cheated, and used a starter log for the campfire :-$

Nothing quite like old friends telling tales around a campfire... exactly what I needed.

The storms rolled in at around 3AM. Heavy rain and some of the flashes of lightning were so closely followed by the clap of thunder that we got a little worried. John had an equipment failure (tent rain fly) and had to make an emergency repair during the storm. Once again, our friend was "wet," which has become his trademark on our hiking trips ever since botching a creek crossing years ago.

We arose early in the morning, shook the water from out gear as best we could, and hit the trail. We still had around 9 miles to go to get back to the car. More rain slowed our progress and we noticed even more trees down. The hike was uneventful except for an encounter with a Western Pigmy Rattlesnake who stubbornly refused to give the trail to us (sorry no pics). We moved him off to the side with a trekking pole and finished our hike.

My knees hate me today. I need to do this more often…

 

[ttora4runner]

Cool. I haven't seen a walking stick in a good while.