(upbeat music) Hello everybody.

The name of the show is Naturally Wild and my name is Steve Wildman Wilson.

I serve as your host here each week on the show.

Thank you so much for watching tonight.

I want to start off this show with a question for you.

When I say outdoor recreation, what's the first thing that comes to your mind?

I mean, what do you consider as outdoor recreation?

Well, I define it pretty simply.

Is anything outdoors that you enjoy doing just as long as you're outside.

It might be mowing the yard, but if you enjoy it, that's outdoor recreation.

Well, some of the most obvious forms of outdoor recreation, especially this time of year, are things like swimming and camping and hiking.

And for me, growing up here in Arkansas, just about all my outdoor recreation evolved around two things, that was hunting and fishing, which sometimes included camping and hiking and swimming if the fish weren't biting.

Hey, tonight's show is all about outdoor recreation in Arkansas other than hunting and fishing.

Let me introduce you to the man in the know about outdoors here in the natural state.

That's what he does for a living at Sam Files.

Sam, good to see you here, buddy.

Thank you for joining me tonight.

Honored to be here.

Thanks for having me, Steve.

Before we tell people where you work and what you do, give us a little background about yourself.

Where are you from?

I was born in North Carolina.

Lived here since I was eight.

Arkansas is all I can remember.

That's all you need to remember.

That's right.

What brought you, what brought you to the natural state?

Family.

My grandparents live in Little Rock, so we moved to Little Rock, and I've been here ever since.

Good.

Now you're an interpreter at Pinnacle Mountain State Park, one of 53 state parks.

Now we got 53, pretty close?

As of not long ago, 53.

That's right.

Yep.

We've had 52.

You know, we're going to do a weekly show here on on the show here about a park of the week.

But now you can't do it.

You got 53 instead of 52.

It won't work.

Got to fit two in there somewhere.

We can do that.

Pinnacle Mountain State Park, tell folks where it's located.

I grew up right out there in Little Rock, and it's just an awesome place.

Tell us where it's located, how to get there?

Well, for for folks who have never been before, Pinnacle Mountain is in West Little Rock at the far, far edge of the city.

Technically a Roland address, but we're off of Highway 10, way out there towards Lake Maumelle.

So beautiful.

I'm a biased source.

Well.

Beautiful area.

You better be.

I know when you come over with a 430 bridge, you look.

That's that's what you say.

That's Pinnacle Mountain State Park.

Yep.

You get a beautiful view of it.

You know, I'll climb the mountain.

Now, obviously, there's a lot of things at Pinnacle Mountain State Park, like the new visitor center I went to, awesome.

But a lot of people just think it's just the mountain.

That's all there is.

But there's more.

But tell us about that mountain, because it's been there a long t Yeah.

Well, the mountain itself stands 1000ft above sea level and 700ft above the river valley floor.

So beautiful trails to the top.

We've got two different trails up to the top, base trail around the bottom.

And our new visitor center is located right at the base of the mountain as well.

So you can park at the visitor center and make your way to the top from there if you want.

A lot of things have changed since I went to the top of it.

I don't think there was a trail.

We just climbed the rocks pretty much.

And your visitor center really just moved down the hill, if you will, last 3 or 4 years.

And isn't that fairly new?

Yeah, less than three years ago.

Still smells like new construction, you know, still breaking in the building.

It's awesome, I got to visit the other day.

And, folks, you need to make your way to Pinnacle Mountain State Park.

Look at the visitor center.

A lot of stuff there.

When I when I planned this show, Sam, we're going to be talking about camping and hiking and biking in Arkansas.

And I really didn't know that Pinnacle offered all that stuff.

Other, I think what the two things you don't have is swimming.

You don't have a swimming hole?

Correct.

What else?

Camping?

You have camping.

We don't have camping on Pinnacl Now our satellite park, Lake Sylvia Recreation Area, has both swimming and camping at it.

So you can still scratch that itch with us just at our satellite park.

And I know something you have that I didn't know you had, was mountain biking trails out there.

Yep.

We opened all of the monument trails at Pinnacle back in 2021.

We've been making additions and changes ever since, and we've got over 20 miles of mountain bike trail at Pinnacle Mountain.

20 miles.

Wow.

Trails.

How many hiking trails different out there?

Well, so 31 miles of trail total.

Some of those mountain biking trails are multi-use hike and bike.

Some are biking only.

We have a track chair route that's open to bikes.

See our track chair.

Yeah.

So lots of different trails, varying degrees of difficulty and levels of strenuousness, something for all ages.

It being right here in central Arkansas, how many visitors roughly do you have a year?

Do you have any idea?

I know you get a lot of families out there as well.

Weekenders because it's close by.

Rough estimate 750,000-2 million a year somewhere in there.

And really, if they don't come to the visitor center, I mean, a lot of people just come visit the mountain leave, don't they?

So, yeah, you probably get a lot more than that, but.

Well, listen, I want to tonight I'm going to start talking about this book right here.

I've got this from your nature center the other day.

You're a state park, and it's called Arkansas - Your Guide to the Natural State.

And I know you've got a lot of great publications out there, but this kind of summed up what I wanted to talk about this evening.

And I want to look at the table of contents.

You got one there.

Yeah.

Let me.

That's the best.

That's the best place to start because the table of contents is exactly covering everything I want to do.

You can see it there.

It's got festivals and festivals and events, art museums, state parks.

But right there you cover camping, hiking, cycling, climbing, fishing, floating, boating.

I mean, that's that outdoor recreation that I was talking to you about a little bit.

All those is a form of outdoor recreation.

We're just going to be able to cover a few this evening.

Let's start off with probably the most common outdoor activity for a lot of Arkansans is camping.

Everybody goes camping, I would think.

Although I'm going to be honest with you, Sam, it surprises me how many people has never spent the night in a tent.

Yeah.

Let me ask you.

Have you ever spent the night in a tent?

Now, if you're my age, I know you have.

But you know you've never lived until you spend the night in a tent.

I remember my first experience of spending the night in a tent was in my backyard.

Really?

Yeah, I was growing up.

I don't know how old I was, but it wouldn't have mattered.

I was just as scared there as I would have been 200 miles away.

There's just something about staying out there under the stars at night, away from what you're used to.

And so that was my first time.

And back then, Sam, before your day, you know, we stayed at deer camp in these big tents and they were so heavy they were made out of canvas.

I remember we were on vacation, my mom and dad, we would go and stay in KOAs, Campgrounds of America and we would plan our stops, not because we enjoyed it, just because we couldn't afford a motel back then, but I can remember it taking like 30 to 45 minutes to putting a tent up.

You had to crawl inside.

And we've come a long way with tents, haven't we?

I know you're a camper.

Oh, yeah, just just a little bit of technological updates over the years from from that time.

But yeah, lots of people nowadays you see a huge variety in our state parks.

And that's what I love about working in a state park, because I can see, you know, all of the different ways that people do these recreations.

And everyone has their own setup, their own system.

But yeah, seeing the kids in their little pup tents all the way to the multi-million dollar motorhomes on wheels, you know.

Now now it's getting in, it's getting where my wife may go camping.

You got air conditioning, got bathrooms in there.

I'm not far away from there.

I've spent a lot of nights in tents and it is fun.

You need to do it one time so you know how to appreciate some of these other things there, too.

I was looking at some of these.

You're camping, I think is on page what, 30 something?

I was lookin Yeah, yeah.

27.

Whatever.

I saw something in here where one of your parks has a thing called a yurt.

What's a yurt?

So a yurt is a canvas and wooden structure that people camp in.

Typically, historically, they were used in cold weather environments with a stove in them.

But they're they're air conditioned.

Some of them have power and electricity.

Some of them have air conditioning.

Depends on where you go.

But we have multiple different state parks that have yurts here in Arkansas.

Daisy State Park.

I know Petit Jean has them.

I believe the Gray Lake Resort State Park has them.

It's a good way to dip your toes in.

Is it, is it so like a teepee.

A little bit, yeah.

It's a round structure with a cone on the top.

And like I said, depending on which ones you go to, some of them have bunk beds.

Some of them have a single bed in them.

Just depends on which which option you go for.

But when you go to a state park and if you're going to camp out or take your motorhome there because your parks have hookups, do you make reservations?

How does that work?

Yeah, all of our sites require reservation in advance.

You can sometimes show up at a park and take a site, but a lot of times, yeah, if you get there and didn't have a reservation, you might be out of luck.

So definitely, definitely make a reservation beforehand.

And another good thing about this book right here, it will tell you all the parts that have camping available and the numbers.

Another thought about that too.

I saw in here that state parks isn't the only thing that offers a lot of campgrounds.

Correct?

You got national parks, offer them.

U.S.

Forest Service has campgrounds as well.

Corps of engineers campgrounds.

Corps parks.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

So you shouldn't have any trouble finding a place to camp if you want to go camping.

It's a great family activity.

You can go for one night or you can go for, now, you lead groups on camping.

Do you do that or just hikes out at Pinnacle?

Out of Pinnacle, we don't have camping.

Okay.

You don't, you don't take the tent with you and camp out there?

Not at Pinnacle Mountain, but we do at other state parks offer programs like that.

Okay.

Notably, one that we just had recently was Lake Ouachita.

They had a float camp where you could make a reservation and for the weekend, go out in canoes with a group, float to the islands and camp on the islands.

And that was something that Lake Ouachita just provided back this spring.

Yeah, a lot of things like that that you don't think about horseback and tent and camping and stuff like that.

Let's go.

Let's go to hiking, hiking trails it's huge in Arkansas and, go back to our table of contents Yeah, get our table.

And they taught me that in school.

But I don't necessarily do very well with table of contents.

I think we got some of the same places to go there, but hiking trails everywhere I look, there's new hiking trails and some of them are hiking and biking trails I guess, too.

But how many hiking trails do you have at Pinnacle?

Oh, off the top of my head.

It's more than 20.

Just there.

Oh yeah, I know you got two leads up top of the mountain?

Right.

The west summit and the east summit trail go to the top and then the base trail rings the bottom of the mountain.

Another really popular hiking trail in the park is our brand new one, Owl Pass.

It's a multi-use trail.

It's paved, ADA accessible, trail goes from the boat launch in the west summit area.

It follows the shoreline of the Little Maumelle River and brings you to the Arkansas Arboretum Trail.

You know, and you've got trails for different levels as well.

I know some of some of these trails you call easy might be rugged for some of us older folks, but you have family trails, easy and steeper trails as well.

And they're marked.

That's correct.

Yeah.

If you go to the visitor center, you can pick up a map.

It lists those levels of difficulty on it.

You can plan out your whole visit from there.

But as I said before, Pinnacle really does have something for everyone.

No matter what you're looking for, no matter what your comfort level is on the trail and your experience level and your physical abilities, there's going to be something there for you.

And you're a guide there?

You take people on guided hikes, I guess, if you will.

Is that just one day hikes or two hour hikes?

How do you do that?

Varying.

Again.

You have to call it in advance?

No.

Okay okay.

For for our programing and guided hikes and things, all you do is check the website or call the visitor center for a schedule.

You can even go to the visitor center and pick up a physical copy.

But all of our hikes at Pinnacle are free and open to the public.

Just show up at the trailhead at the time and join whoever else shows up, and we'll go have a good time out on the trail.

So if you're really brave, try that.

Watch the National Trail all the way from Pinnacle Mountain State Park.

You end up in Oklahoma.

It's a good one to do.

Now that's if you're hiking.

But let me tell you, a new thing that's taken over here in Arkansas is biking or cycling, I guess they call it.

I was looking here on pages 43 all the way for about 20 pages there.

It's all about cycling.

That's, how long has mountain biking been in Arkansas?

We didn't do that when I was, I didn't live around the mountain.

But I mean, it's really taken off here.

As far as I know, back in the 80s, people were starting to bike up in Northwest Arkansas and around, but it really became popular in more recent times.

They started getting funding for trails.

The public started getting more into it.

Right?

The the commercial side of it.

The retailers started to be able to support that recreational more in more recent years.

And so really it's just kind of exploded over the past decade.

You know, there's a lot of different types of cycling, though.

They've got, I guess, flat road, road bikes, you know, the big dam trail out there and whatever.

And, and there's a new trail in East Arkansas.

Is that the rails to trails part of state parks?

Yeah, I think that just got completed.

And that's where they basically took an old railroad bed for a long time.

And they I guess they removed all the rails and the cross ties and made a trail.

It makes sense because it goes through some beautiful territory.

Oh, yeah.

Goes over multiple rivers.

They took those old railroad bridges and restored them, rebuilt them and paved it.

A lot of it's paved some of its gravel.

But yeah, it converted that, that old railway, that elevated railway into, I'm a biased source, but a beautiful trail.

Yeah.

Another thing I read in here about is called gravelling.

That's just kind of a, I guess, a mountain bike, but it's not in a mountain.

You just right across gravel roads.

That's what we did.

Go out and explore the national forests, explore our wooded areas out in the in the Ouachita and the Ozarks, things like that.

Get away from the city, go out and experience nature and stuff.

But instead of walking, you're you're riding, you're doing the miles while you do it.

You get a lot of exercise in, can cover a lot of ground and have fun while you're at it.

All I've got is some advice for you.

Be careful if you're riding on gravel on a bike, that's a personal experience there.

You can lose it pretty quick.

You were telling me earlier, too, about a kind of a hybrid sport.

A lot of people now are getting motorbikes or I guess SUV, street legal, and they're going and finding trail sorts of hybrid.

They go from the road to the gravel.

Yeah, camping out.

Dual sports and adventure riding, things like that, that it's been a popular recreation for a long time all over the world.

But we just had a new trail opened this past winter.

The trail up near the Buffalo.

It's a 480 mile gravel loop that goes through the Ozarks, connects Mountainburg to Jasper to Oark, and a lot of people take motorcycles or street legal off road vehicles, but street legal vehicles and drive that and spend a few days camping as they go.

A lot of river crossings on that trail just really puts you to the test, but you get out there and have fun while you're at it.

You know I was up there fishing on Piney Creek.

And I saw a ton of side by sides coming in a trailer load, trailer loads, and people just getting off riding the ride the roads.

I mean, look at some of the scenery.

That's what you got to keep in mind.

Arkansas' a natural.

And you know, now you know why people want to go, right?

And they can see some beautiful scenery, especially during the fall times of year too.

Yeah, but but cycling, now mountain biking, I heard that Northwest Arkansas is actually the world capital for mountain biking.

It's a popular place.

Yeah, very hopping in the world of mountain biking right now.

No pun intended there, but lots of lots of different parks opening up up there for different levels of experience with riding.

They've got that bike lift going in.

Yeah.

What he's talking about there folks, I think it's the Ozark bike trail.

Whatever they've got, it's like a ski lift, but no snow.

You get on it, you put your bikes on it, it carries you up to the top of the mountain.

You ride back down.

You don't.

Yeah, that makes sense.

You can ride the lift back up to the top and take a different trail back down, and you can do it all day.

I saw some video that that's pretty wicked up there.

We've got one coming as well.

Arkansas state parks.

Oh, really?

Out in Mena, Arkansas, at Queen Wilhelmina State Park.

They're putting in a lift out there and they're putting in a trail system to support it.

So yeah, there's lots of updates, lots of growth happening in that recreation area.

Before we run out of time, though, let's talk about how people can find out more about all these things.

I mean, we just touched on a few of them here.

We didn't talk about boating and floating.

Which man, we're 600,000 acres of lakes here.

You got whitewater.

I know you're a big kayaker, aren't you?

I am, yes, sir.

What's your favorite river or stream to float?

I'm a biased source.

The Little Maumelle.

The Little Maumelle River.

People don't think about that.

You got floating right there.

You actually do tours on kayak.

Tours, guided floats on the Little Maumelle River.

It's 12 mile long trail that goes from Pinnacle Mountain all the way to River Mountain Park, down just below the 430 bridge, float through beautiful cypress forest.

There's a floating camping platform out there.

You can actually make reservations and go camp on the river.

It's only accessible via boat.

Some other favorites of mine, I like the Cadron in Conway.

I like floating the Cadron.

It's always nice and peaceful.

See a lot of wildlife on it.

But we got some rivers in Arkansas state parks.

Cossatot River State Park.

That's not peaceful.

I mean, if you like whitewater, that's where you need to go.

Yeah, that's a little bit above my level.

You won't catch me on that river too often.

On floating, now hiking, the Cossatot is a beautiful, beautiful place to explore.

That's an amazing state park, but I'll leave that one to the pros when it comes to floating.

Sam, also, I know the Game of Fish Commission has developed some what they call water trails you have to paddle.

In other words, there's no current.

But the good part about that is over mostly in eastern Arkansas and some of the bayous, and bayous to view and so forth.

A totally different type of forest.

You get to see different types of wildlife.

But what I like about it, you don't have to have a shuttle, you don't have to have anybody to go downstream and get you.

You put right there.

You go out and you come back to where you were.

As long as you don't get lost, it gets some big country over there too.

Beautiful, beautiful place to explore.

And that Little Maumelle River is actually one of the game and fish water trails as well, is it?

It's got a very, very low flow so you can come back upstream, no problem.

And you have canoes right there and kayaks you can rent on the checkout.

There's a kiosk there at the boat launch, both of our boat launches in the park where you can use a card and your phone just right on your phone there, and get a kayak or a paddle board and then.

Paddle board.

And we didn't even talk about paddle boarding.

And I don't think I really want to because I don't think I could stand up on it.

I don't have very good balance either.

I'm with you.

I prefer kayak, but yeah, we do have those resources for people.

And also if you want something more out of that, if you want to learn as you go, if you aren't comfortable being out on the water by yourself, or if you want to go with a group, then Pinnacle provides that service as well.

We do guided floats.

We make reservations, take reservations on those, and we'll take you out on the water and let you have fun and experience that in a safe and controlled environment.

Yeah, I know there's different, there's canoe clubs around.

Arkansas Canoe Club.

So it's a good, another good family event that you can do because they make them in all types of water.

Just like your difficulties.

You can choose if you want to.

If you have family and all sizes, it's a good family event to get outside as well.

Absolutely.

And of course boating.

We won't forget boating.

A lot of people enjoy 600,000 acres of lakes here.

You're right out there by Lake Maumelle and that's a beautiful lake.

And another way to see the outdoors.

An outdoor recreation.

A lot of boaters other than fishing.

You can do that too.

But tubing is big.

You know, you got some of your bigger lakes.

Ouachita.

Greers Ferry.

I know they've had a lot of water lately, so be careful out there.

But just I mean, folks, this thing here tells you all about it.

It'll tell you all about the lakes and the rivers and the streams and the hiking trails and biking trails.

Mountain climbing.

You have rock climbing out there at Pinnacle Mountain.

Do you have that?

We've got a few routes in the park, but right next door to us, Rattlesnake Ridge.

Oh yeah.

Yeah, the Arkansas Natural Heritage Commission and Nature Conservancy, they manage that.

And there's lots of really, really good climbing routes on there.

Several walls covered in routes.

Also new climbing park that just opened in North Little Rock, Crystal Bluff or, I haven't been.

Yeah, I think that's what it's called.

Over by Riverfront Park, near Riverfront Park.

Over 100 routes put up there recently.

Beautiful view of the Capitol building from the top of those.

If you go the other way and look at the lakes and streams, perfect.

But the other thing too, about this, this book will tell you all different parts of the state.

I know this show gets all around the state, so you don't have to travel far to get some of these places, because there's a good chance there's one of these things or more in your area where they live, because there's parts all over.

Like I said, we've got 53 of them and are scattered all over the state.

Yep, lots of different things to do, lots of different resources.

Our state parks are spread all over the state.

Like you were saying, anywhere you live in Arkansas, you're within an hour of an Arkansas state park.

So I encourage people to get out and explore.

You know, you don't have to go far to do it.

Well, go to a state park and they can tell you about everything we've been talking about here, or pick up one of these guys.

I mean, that's a must.

You got you got a state parks guide.

All this is online as well too, isn't it?

You can go to Arkansas State Parks and I know parks before we run out of time.

They just started kind of a new thing in Arkansas.

It's called Arkansas Guide or Guide Ark, Guide Ark.

And what it is, it's a list of guides that will take you anything like we're talking about tonight.

They're certified guides.

They have to fill out an application and be certified because you want reputable people.

If you're going to have somebody take your family out and teach you how to set up a tent, you know, and of course, hunting and fishing guides, they're all over the state.

Trout fishing or duck.

Duck hunting, you can do that.

But this is sort of new.

So you can go to Guide Ark, Guide Ark, I believe it is.

And I think it's still in the forming.

If you if you know of a guide or if you're in the guide service, you might want to contact the state parks and get your name on that list.

Fill out the application.

Yeah, I don't know what the application process looks like specifically.

I do know that they're vetted guides and things, and it's to provide a service outside of our state parks.

We provide this service in parks.

If you want to come and hike in a state park, look at our list of events, talk to an interpreter, or talk to some of the other staff and get on the trail with them.

But there's lots of places out there, public land in Arkansas that doesn't provide that service.

And that's where this program fits in.

It's to provide that service in places that people previously wouldn't have had that opportunity.

And you just want to make sure they're reputable.

That's right.

Yes.

Thank you so much for being here.

We're out of time, man.

Thank you so much.

I'm coming back to Pinnacle Mountain State Park, but I'm not climbing the mountain.

All right, come on.

We'll get you on something out there.

Come on out and have fun.

Thank you for having me.

Thank you so much for tuning in tonight.

We appreciate you so much.

And we'll see you next time right here on Naturally Wild.

This program was made possible by Arkansas Hunters Feeding the Hungry, East Harding Construction Company.

David's Burgers, Greenway Equipment, Arkansas Farm Bureau, and the Electric Cooperative of Arkansas.

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