Lake Ouachita State Park - December 2006

We left Friday at lunch to head out for Lake Ouachita Start Park outside of Hot Springs, AR. I had just picked up my "new to me" hybrid trailer December 9th. It is quite a bit bigger than my little 14 foot pop-up trailer (sold that one - 46 cranks - to a MUCH younger, stronger family). The trailer, "Free Bird" (named by the RV Rental place where I purchased it), is an 18 ft Jayco Jay Feather "hybrid" trailer with pop out ends that make into a queen sized bed on one end and a double bed on the other.
It was a bit more difficult to pull since it was twice as heavy and 3 times as high as the pop-up. But it more than made up for that because it only took us about 30 minutes to completely set up camp...which is much better than it used to be with the pop-up. With the pop-up we were lucky to have it set up after about an hour and a half...plus my back usually hurt after setting up. There isn't much physical labor involved in getting the hybrid set up...no 46 cranks to get the roof up, nor pulling...pulling...and more pulling to get the beds out. To set up the beds on the hybrid, you just loosen two handles on each bed, let the bed platform down and put the support poles in...super easy... :-)

This is the second year that we have been to Lake Ouachita for their Eagle Watch. Last year we saw a lot of eagles. This year we only saw three eagles and they were really too far away to take good pictures of. I hope that Lake DeGray has more eagles when we go up there the end of January.
It rained all night Friday night, and it was cold, plus the wind blew pretty hard all day Saturday. So, I did not get to go out in the kayak at all. When we went on the boat ride to see the eagles the ranger said that the water temperature was 56 degrees. I would not have wanted to capsize in that!While I was on the point Saturday evening taking pictures of the sunset, I heard someone on the water scream and say something about it being very cold...I found the source of the scream...it was some guy who had jumped into the water behind a speedboat to go skiing! I watched as he got up on the skies and went off into the sunset. He at least had on half of a wetsuit with short pants and short sleeved top. I would say he needed a full wetsuit for that water!

The sunset was beautiful...I just wish that I had been out in the kayak to take advantage of some gorgeous mountain scenery.I got my "tacky" lights put up during the day Saturday so I could take a night picture.

Sunday turned out to be a nice day and we sat around outside quite a bit just enjoying the campsite. We had full hook-ups in campground A, so I had my first experience with the sewer hookups...quite easy and painless. I thought it was going to be yucky, but it wasn't.

As we were outside sitting we enjoyed the birds that came by to visit. We had a flock of yellow birds come by to see what food they could find. Someone said that this is a pine warbler. It is cute!

And we had a trio of pileated woodpeckers hunting and pecking on the pine trees around the site.

I got Mom and Dad to sit down for some pictures before we left.

So after lunch Sunday we packed up and headed back to Shreveport.

We made much better time on the way back because we went directly through Hot Springs instead of bypassing it like we did on the way up (I was scared of the traffic towing the trailer). I'm glad that we got the trailer. It will make camping a joy again, and I will still feel like I'm tent camping since it has the tent ends.

I do have a few more pictures that I did not put in the blog on my webshots page. Click here if you want to check them out.

So it will be Christmas soon and I am looking forward to seeing Jim and Ann and Jessica home for Christmas.

So, 'til next time...
Merry Christmas - Cathy