A NPS Passport Stamp Quest through AR, MO, & KS

 Executive Summery: On June 9^th and 10^th I made a foray up into Arkansas, Missouri, and Kansas from my home in Mississippi.  The primary gist of this mission was to obtain more National Park Service Passport cancellation stamps in my ongoing quest for the IronButt Association’s National Park Master Traveler award.  I picked up ten new stamps and two new states on the trip.  Plus I got to spend a couple of days riding around in the Ozarks.  That sounds like a success to me.

Big Picture:  Needing more National Park Passport stamps for my ongoing quest to obtain the IBA’s National Park Master Traveler award I planned a trip to take me through western AR and up into MO and KS.  I left my home in Vicksburg, MS about 4:30am on June 9^th and proceeded across Arkansas to Hot Springs National Park in Hot Springs.  I wanted to get my National Park Passport book stamped there.  Going north through the delta area I skirted spotty showers.  There was thunder and lightning in the distance, but I only got in a little sprinkle or two.  My father used to live in Hot Springs so I had spent a good deal of time there and knew where I was going.  I got to Hot Springs just a few minutes before it opened.  A ranger came through the door and mumbled that it would open in a few minutes.  After it opened, I walked in to the bookstore and the fellow behind the counter grumbled that he had already set the date.  So I stamped my book and noticed that it stamped the 10^th rather than the 9^th.  I got the idea that Hot Springs rangers were not chosen for their people skills.  Freshly stamped, I suited back up and hauled it out of town on US-270 going to the Fort Smith Historic District in Fort Smith, AR.  

I had heard of high speed sweepers before, but living in Mississippi I don’t know that I had ever been in them on a bike before.  The chicken strips on my tires diminished as I made my way west.  That section of road took a little longer than I expected and by the time I made Fort Smith I thought maybe I ought to keep on going.  I already had a handful of AR passport stamps and I didn’t want to get caught up trying to park downtown and worry about somebody messing with my bike while I going to the historic district.  So I hopped the interstate there and went up to Pea Ridge, AR, home of the Pea Ridge National Battlefield.  I got the two stamps there (one for the battlefield and another for the Trail of Tears National Trail).  It is a pretty neat place.  The ranger I talked to there was really nice and quite a contradiction to the ones in Hot Springs.  It is only a little after lunch and I have three stamps, but no new states.  So it is time to remedy that problem.  A quick run up to Joplin yields the George Washington Carver stamp.  I pretty neat place dedicated to a pretty neat fellow.  It is not often that genius, finding your place to excel, and being a really nice fellow all come together, but those did all come together with George Washington Carver.  And, for the record, he may have come up with a thousand or so uses for the peanut, but not peanut butter.  Once again the ranger at this stop was very nice and informative. 

Along through here I was thinking how nice it would be to live in this area.  The rolling hills with rocky outcropping just seem like a nice place to be around.  Then, just a little north of this it flattens out and the trees disappear.  Suddenly I am thinking that I am glad I don’t live here.  The trip on over to Fort Scott, KS only takes a little while.  The Fort Scott historic area is an old fort from the Indian War days.  They seem to share rangers with the Hot Springs branch.  I asked if I could leave my helmet and jacket in the bookstore while I walked around, hoping that they would offer to put it behind the counter.  Instead, the fellow said something to the effect of he didn’t care what I did with it, but they were got going to be responsible and that room closed at 4pm, if I wasn’t there they would have to lock it up and I would just have to do without it.  They have a very informative film and the stop is highly recommended.  And you can get there at 2:30 and it is not too hard to walk around there, see everything, watch the film, and still not have to worry about them locking your helmet and jacket up for the night.  This guy was the last of the unfriendly rangers for this trip.  And those and the ones in Hot Springs are just about the only unfriendly ones I recall for all the stops I have made on this quest.

So now I have stamps in MO and KS, I can do what I want.  So I leisurely make my way across to Springfield, MO and go to Bass Pro Shop.  What can I say, I am from the South, if I get within 100 miles of Springfield, I have to go there.  Being on a scooter, I did more looking than buying.  Supper consisted of a Grilled Chicken Salad from the McD’s in Bass Pro Shop.  Then on the Motel 6 where you get a clean room for $29.99 plus tax and park your bike just across from the manager’s window where they will keep an eye on it for you.

Mileage for the day was between 750 and 800 miles.  Two new states were ridden in (MO and KS, for a total of 17 states ridden in total), and several new counties including all those in MO and KS and several others in AR.  Five new national park stamps were obtained over the course of the day.

June 10^th I woke up early and couldn’t go back to sleep.  Finally about 6:30 I packed up and left.  I rode around the area on county roads enjoying the rolling hills and rocky outcropping I was back in.  I made it to Wilson ’s Creek Battlefield a few minutes after it opened.  I spent the next couple of hours watching the films and touring the battlefield.  From there I rode down to Harrison, AR and hit up the Buffalo National River Visitor’s Center.  I had grown up making frequent trips to the Buffalo to go camping and canoeing, so this was a particularly sweet stamp to get.  So sweet that I decided to get the other three stamps along the Buffalo. 

I had noticed that I saw a bunch of Kawasaki K1000 type (or whatever the modern equivalent to them is) motorcycles coming into town.  I met a group of somewhere around 10 or 12.  Then I saw that many more at a Sonic Drive In when I passed.  There must be some kind of group meeting going on here.  Then as I got into Harrison, I started seeing Suzuki V Stroms.  Once again, there were several groups of up to 8 or 10 bikes.  When I left Harrison on Scenic Highway 7 heading south to pick up the stamp at Pruett I ended up behind one of these fellows.  Highway 7 gets to be really curvy and mountainous as you get out of Harrison.  He was taking it all at a pretty good clip and his brake light was almost never coming on.  I was impressed.  I could keep up, but I used both brakes.  I was having a good time following him and kind of hating pulling off at the visitor’s to get stamped.  But I knew I could have a good time without him to. 

From Pruett I crossed the low water bridge Hasty to go back up to Tyler Bend off US65.  A fellow with a brand new Thunderbird (still had a temporary tag on it) was stopped on the bridge taking pictures.  He hopped in his car and took off as to not hold up traffic, but I didn’t think him ill thoughts.  Since I had no one behind me, I stopped and took pictures of my rig on the low water bridge too.  At Tyler Bend I got stamped, watched the film, and ate a power bar for lunch in the shade.  As I was leaving the Thunderbird pulled up and guy got out and walked over to talk.  He was an old Harley Rider that decided this trip was better suited to his new ‘bird.  I told him if I had the option of A/C I would have been using it too.  They went inside and I went on down the road to Buffalo Point to try and get five stamps like I did the day before.  I got behind a fellow pulling a camper that I just could not get around.  I followed him for what seemed like forever.  Finally I got passed him and ran on over to the Ranger Station for my final stamp of the day.  I talked to ranger there about bikes.  He had been through a string of Yamahas in his youth and had the urge for another one.  One of his riding buddies had a BMW so he came out and looked at mine and talked.  Not getting to “just talk” is kind of bad thing about scootering IBA style.  So it is nice when you get a chance to do it.  From Buffalo Point I went on over to Mountain View, AR. Having an interest in traditional music, we have camped in Mountain View lots of times.  I stopped by and saw some friends, got caught up on the local happenings and then got back on the road to my brother’s place in Stuttgart.  Since I had been surviving on power bars and one McD’s salad I thought a stop in Searcy for chicken fajitas was in order.  From there I went to Stuttgart to help my brother with a task he had going.

Mileage for the day was around 500 to 550.  Five new national park stamps were obtained (46 stamps total, 16 states). 

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