September 7, 2012

After breakfast we walked down the river trail along the Arkansas River on the North Little Rock side.  We crossed the river at another pedestrian bridge.  On the bridge we found a geocache.  The last couple of people couldn’t find it -- one guy had over 2,000 finds.  I found it.  We walked along the river on the Little Rock side and crossed again on the Clinton Presidential Bridge.  In the park in front of the Clinton Library there was another geocache.  Jim found it.

We hooked up and drove to Pendleton, Arkansas and got a site at an Army Corps of Engineers park on the Arkansas River.  Jim splurged for one of the three premium spots on top of the levee and we have a great view of the river. The river is not visible from all the other sites in the park.  We sat around camp a while and then drove to the Arkansas Post National Memorial.  This was a trading post established in 1686 by the French (before the founding of New Orleans).  It was the seat of the Arkansas Territory’s government until it was moved to Little Rock in 1821.  The Union won a battle was here in 1863 which helped them control the nearby Mississippi River.  After the Civil War the town declined and today there are no structures left other than a water cistern.  The old Confederate fort site is now underwater due to erosion from the Arkansas River.

There are a lot of rice fields around camp and the road into the park has a rice hopper where the large trucks bring rice from the fields.  Then it is loaded onto barges and floated down the Arkansas River.   There is hardly anyone in this park camping.  The park host says it get full during hunting season.