Final Stop: Arkansas
It's time for the last installment of The Shawnanigans Fall Tour!
We’re home with hundreds of photos and thousands of memories plus a good bit of longing to be back on the road. But “real life” called and we had to answer…for now!
So for our last installment of this tour, I’m happy to introduce you to the beautiful state of Arkansas!
Arkansas is often overlooked and very underrated but maybe that’s a good thing. It doesn’t help that any national news coverage of the state is focused on tornadoes, hospitalization numbers of the un-vaccinated, or ole Bill (as in Clinton’s) shenaningans. (Still love ya, Bill.) But as the state where my parents were raised, my husband grew up, and where I spent countless Thanksgivings with a house full of boy cousins, I think it’s pretty great.
So here we go with a brief introduction to The Natural State.
(There is SO much more to see - Eureka Springs, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Hot Springs bath houses... Please reach out if you want some Arkansas travel tips!) Our goal with this last leg was to be in Heber Springs, Arkansas for Thanksgiving. We were meeting family there to spread my father’s ashes in one of his favorite fishing spots on the Little Red River. Driving over from Dallas, Texas with our “no more than 5-hour driving requirement,” we stopped at
Crater of Diamonds State Park in Murfreesboro, Arkansas.
Crater of Diamonds is one of the only places in the world where visitors can dig for real diamonds and keep what they find. The hunt takes place on a 37-acre field on the eroded surface of an old volcanic crater. The field is occasionally plowed to help loosen dirt for easier finds.
All mining tools can be rented on-site. A hefty deposit is required ($40 deposit to rent a $5 wagon) but all deposits are returned when the tools are checked back in. Fees to dig are $10 for adults, $6 for children 6-12 and kids under 6 are free.
Enough with the details. Here’s what you’re wondering…are any diamonds found?
Yes!
And you can view the latest finds at https://www.arkansasstateparks.com/parks/crater-diamonds-state-park.
Keep in mind - these are not huge diamonds (most are about the size of a paper match head) but occasionally a whopper is dug up which keeps visitors returning. The most recent one was found in 2020 and weighed in at 9.07 carats. It’s the second largest diamond found in the park since it opened in 1972. The largest was found in 1924 and weighed 40.23 carats!
So is a visit to Crater of Diamonds worth it? That depends. Do you live within a two-hour drive? Or are you driving an RV and need an interesting stop in southwest Arkansas? Then, yes, I’d definitely do it. Would I plan an entire vacation around a trip there? Probably not. First, it’s not the easiest place to get to pulling a giant RV down two-lane, winding roads. The campground was beautiful but there was little else in the area. Murfreesboro only has about 1,900 people so restaurants were lacking.
Side Note - (I highly recommend hunting for crystals around Hot Springs, Arkansas, especially if you have younger kids. You’ll come away with bags of crystals including some really nice ones if you dig.)
If you do visit Crater of Diamonds, I recommend doing it during the fall, winter or spring. You can visit in the summer if you’re brave. This is the south and I know several adults (my husband included) who spent a sweltering summer day of their childhood digging for diamonds and were less than excited about returning as an adult. Crater of Diamonds has stepped up their summer offerings with the installation of a water park near the entrance for the little ones to cool off.
Did we walk away dripping in diamonds? Sadly, no. But we did take home a bag of cool rocks with one tiny sliver of crystal we thought for sure was a diamond. It wasn't.
On to our next stop -
Heber Springs, Arkansas.
Heber Springs is a beautiful town in the foothills of the Ozark Mountains that sits on Greers Ferry Lake - a 30,000-acre reservoir formed when the Little Red River was dammed in 1960s. We lived here for five years before moving to North Carolina and still miss its beauty and our friends.
My parents moved here after we did and built what was meant to be their retirement home near the Little Red River. My father’s stroke nine years ago took away that dream. But we were back in Heber Springs to gather with family and honor my dad by spreading his ashes in the place he loved best.
(My photos from Heber Springs are lacking because I was more focused on spending time with family. The photos also don't truly show the area's beauty. It's gorgeous!)We stayed at
JFK Campground which sits on the Little Red River just below the JFK dam on Greers Ferry Lake. The area was named for President John F. Kennedy who dedicated the dam in 1963 as one of his last public appearances before his assassination. This campground was beautiful! And it was probably the cheapest of all the campsites on our cross-country adventure.
We fished in the Little Red River, met old friends for supper at the Red Apple Inn on Eden Isle, celebrated Thanksgiving with my brothers, and honored my dad with a casual family get-together that Friday. One brother refitted a cricket box to hold my dad’s ashes while the other brother waded out for the release. We toasted him with a shot of Fireball my uncle brought and spent the day eating barbecue and hanging out with family, exactly what my Dad would’ve wanted.
There were so many more things we could have done in Arkansas but it was time to make the trip home. We bid farewell to the Natural State, for now, and headed on.
Since it was a 10-hour drive, we stayed overnight at
Nashville Shores RV Park which sits on Percy Priest Lake just 10 miles from downtown Nashville. It includes a water park, zipline and ropes course, full hook-ups and jet ski and pontoon boat rentals. We’ll definitely be back when the weather is warmer.
We left Nashville and started down the interstate looking for that first peek of the mountains that means you're almost home. It was time to park the fifth wheel for a well-deserved rest. She’d been good to us and carried us safely across more than 7,000 miles over a two-month period.
I’m still amazed we did it. I mean, look at this map!!!
That's a long way and a lot of driving - 6,987 miles, not counting the side trips.
It really was an incredible experience and super surprising how well we all got along. How’d we do it? Here are a few basic tips….
1. Make sure kids have their own space, no matter how small, to decompress away from the family.
2. Respect their decision to not participate in that day’s activity because they need a break. They don’t have to see everything!
3. Be willing to go off the trip agenda if something isn’t working. It’s okay to cancel a planned horseback tour if the kids would rather go thrift store shopping.
4. Teach the kids how to set up and take down at each campsite from electrical hookups to operating slides and leveling.
5. Learn to laugh at what should make you cry. Sometimes the best memories come from the hysterical laughter that ensues on the brink of disaster like…when the truck is on empty in the desert, you still have 10 miles until the next gas station, your husband is sweating profusely and you casually lie about the distance to make him feel better. Or you lead your husband and giant fifth wheel into the wrong campsite which requires backing up the monstrosity a quarter of a mile in the dark with only the light of your phone and a random, drunk camper to guide you.
And for planning a trip? Use the trip planner at
goodsam.com. We were able to type in our destination and pull up all the campgrounds along the way.
I’m not sure how to end this last Shaw-nanigans post except to say…
If you’re thinking about doing it, then do it.
Take the trip.
Go on the adventure.
See the world.
It’s pretty amazing out there!
Until our next adventure...
-The Shaws