"Aren't you glad we've got 'em?" - Arkansas Parks
I really enjoy taking my kids
camping at many of the state parks especially Devil's Den which is less than an hour drive from the old homestead. However, last month we tried booking our site a little too late and all the sites we're full at our regular spot. So, like a good dad would, I decided not to give up but find another spot to take the little rugrats. I got online looking for some of the other fairly close campsites and was thinking about Mt. Magazine, near Paris, Arkansas, but somehow had a mental slip and booked at the other park located on top of some mountain and accidentally booked our campsite at Petit Jean State Park. Now, it didn't seem like a huge deal until I realized I had to drive 2 hours instead of only 1 hour to get there. In addition, it would only be myself and my 5 year old daughter and my 6 year old son until my brother, Russell, brought Mackenzie, my 11 year old the next day. Well, Petit Jean, I'm proud to announce, was not a disappointment. As you can tell by the pictures, we had a blast hiking the many trails Petit Jean has to offer.
This picture of the beautiful Pine trees was taken looking straight up right in the middle of our campsite. When I called for the reservation the very nice lady on the phone asked, "Do you a camp site with a lot of trees, a medium amount of trees or not very many trees?" We opted for the "medium" tree campsite.
Saturday morning we started our first hike around 9:00am after a few chocolate donuts and orange
juice. I was quite proud of my 5 and 6 year old kids because they hiked around 2 miles up to one of the lookout points over the waterfall. Once we made it to the top I fed them sprite and pringles as a reward. I was very careful not to over do it with the young ones or I would pay for it later.... It's a fine line between tiring them out so they sleep well and making them down right cranky!
Saturday afternoon my brother brought my oldest child to join us for one night at camp and hiking on Sunday, this was the day to over-do-it! We stared Sunday morning at the main overlook of the waterfall and made our way down a normal hiking trail. As we neared the bottom we notice a more primitive trail that led to a beautiful stream at the bottom of the valley between the huge bluffs. Now, I consider myself a fairly good planner, you know, bring a backpack with water, snacks, flashlights for the caves, etc....but it never occured to me to bring TOILET PAPER! As the kids were playing in the
stream and having a good time using their hiking sticks, Jackson, my 6 year old, has a near panic attack for the need for a bathroom, and when I say bathroom, I don't mean "go wee wee behind a tree". I mean, he had to go! As you can tell by the rest of the pictures of hiking, we now call Jackson "One-Sock".
We eventually got back on the main trail and reconnected to the trail we had completed the previous day but decided to go around the other direction in order to see more of the natural wonders like the massive rocks I had read about. After another 30 minutes or more of walking we came to some awesom rocks and I had 
Mackenzie, Caroline and "One-Sock" pose like they were holding the rock. By this time I'm starting to get "Dad, will you carry me?!?" After walking past the rock formations we ran into some other hikers where I asked "How much further to the traihead?". The answer wasn't what I was looking for..."Well you're exactly half way!" "Half way! What the ...how can we only be half way...these kids are getting tired...and so am I". So like any good dad would, I took turns carrying the two little ones until we reached the next trailhead. It was then that I realized we weren't at the trailhead where the car was parked... how depressing... we still needed to complete another trail after having completed two other complete trails!!! Did I mentin I had a 5 year old and a 6 year old and just finished around 4 miles of hiking??? So we didn't have a choice but to keep hiking and keep taking turns carrying the exhausted kids.
Although it was one of the most tiring and challenging of camping trips it was still a success and ultimately I was blown away by the beauty and the facilities at Petit Jean State Park.
Be sure and check out my other blog on "Why camping with three kids is a lot like the real estate business"
Kevin King, ABR, CRS, GRLA
King Realty Group
Broker/Owner
