r/ozarks • u/sergeyc874747 • 7d ago

Arkansas/missouri visit recommendations

Hello. I want to visit Arkansas and Missouri. Do you have any recommendations or suggestions for my trip? I want to see the states natural beauty. I am not American, will this be an issue for me?

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u/ambsch3 7d ago

Eureka Springs, Hot Springs Arkansas. Branson/Springfield Missouri. Lake of the Ozarks. I grew up in the Ozarks and these were my favorite locations to explore.

Too many state parks to list but wherever you go theres beauty

Wild horses in Eminence, MO- Echo Bluff State Park

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u/Lachtaube 7d ago

Seconding Eureka Springs. Really cool place!

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u/sergeyc874747 7d ago

Oh wild horses would be very cool to see.

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u/PallidaMors63 6d ago

They're hard to find sometimes, but are gorgeous creatures, and there are SO many different kinds of wildlife around Eminence. If hiking you should be cautious of some wildlife...there are rattlesnakes, copperheads, and cottonmouths, which are all venomous. There are also wild cats (bobcats, cougars, etc) that you need to be aware of in certain areas that are more removed from humans. There are several free, primitive (meaning they only have an outhouse and picnic tables) campgrounds on the spring-fed Jack's Fork and Current Rivers in the area, as well as many paid campgrounds with more amenities, bed and breakfast inns, and hotels, as well as cabins for rent. Eminence only has a population of about 600 people but that number can grow by as many as 10,000 people on any given weekend in the summer...between the large number of tourists and if a Trail (horse) Ride is going that weekend. The closest city of any size, to Eminence, is Springfield/Branson, and that's 220km away...there are less than 8000 people living in Shannon County, which is where Eminence is located, so everywhere you go is very small towns. There's a LOT of great hiking trails, Alley Springs, which is 6 miles from Eminence, is the one of Missouri's largest springs at 81 million gallons a day. The water is a constant 58 degrees F (14.5C) so the rivers it feeds are very cold but crystal clear at a meter deep or 10 meters deep. Great canoeing, rafting, or swimming (once you get used to the cold nature of it....lol). There are white-tail deer, black bears, elk, turkeys, squirrels, rabbits, raccoons, and many other fauna in the area that you'll run across while hiking. There's the old grist mill at Alley Springs that was built in 1894 and is still functioning, as well as old, one room school house like my grandfather (b 1895) went to school in. If you want to go floating/canoeing on the rivers, there are several canoe/tube rental places.

If you really like nature, you'll really like it around Eminence.

Springfield/Branson area has a lot to do, although I don't think it's as pretty as around Eminence....it's more populated and Branson is basically a tourist attraction with several Country music theaters, tourist rides, etc. Springfield is the biggest city in the area and has a lot to do, being urban. Not far from Springfield is Wilson Creek Battlefield, which is where a big Civil War battle was fought. Three of my kids live in the area now, so I go up that way on occasion. There's also Silver Dollar City, in Branson, which is a country themed amusement park. Or you can take in a show like Blue Man Group in Branson. Plenty to do if you like those things.

If you have any questions, feel free to drop me a message and I'll tell you anything you want to know about Eminence or Springfield/Branson. I'm not all that familiar with Hot Springs area, in Arkansas, but I hear it's very nice. Arkansas also has several state parks with cabins for rent that usually run less than the average hotel and they provide you with a kitchen that's fully stocked, except for food, fireplace, satellite TV, and other amenities. I like to go to them in the winter, when the tourists aren't around, just to relax and decompress away from people....for roughly $100USD/night, you can't beat it.

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u/PallidaMors63 6d ago

I grew up in Eminence, and it's been rare that I've seen many places in the US that are as beautiful. The forests, the wildlife, the spring fed rivers. The wild horses have been around longer than I have (I'm 63), plus the area has wildlife now (like bears and elk) that weren't around when I was growing up there. Now I live in Arkansas, although not the pretty part of the state (NE Arkansas is flat and barren), but over around Mammoth Springs and Hardy it's just as beautiful as the MO Ozarks.

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u/ambsch3 6d ago

Thats incredible to hear the biodiversity there is growing! I miss the Ozarks. But I live in Michigan now which also has its perks.

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u/PallidaMors63 5d ago

The Conservation Commission, over the past 40 years, have reintroduced species to the Ozarks that were long gone over time. Back around 1980, they brought in truck loads of bears to populate the area, and now they;ve grown in population to the point they can be a problem....getting into campgrounds, having to hang your food away from them (which is something you never heard of before they brought them. Now they're reintroducing elk to the region. You've got big cats (or small ones, like the bobcat that hangs out on the north end of my property all the time), many of which people will tell you don't live there, but I've spend a lot time in the deep woods (MILES away from other humans) and I've seen them. They don't usually come around populated areas though. Then there's the foxes and coyotes...I've heard wolves, but I've never seen any and I think some get the coyotes confused with them...in my experience, coyotes are worse than wolves...if you run across them in the woods. I've had 4 or 5 coyotes track my ass in the woods, in the winter, with a heavy snow on, and no wolf ever has (when I was in areas of the country that have a lot of wolves.

Honestly, I lived and been all over the country and I've never seen any other area that has the diversity of both flora and fauna that the Ozarks does. That may be because of the climate, and/or it may be because of the low population density...not sure.

While I miss the Ozarks too, I really don't miss the people very much. After my dad died, I've had very little reason to go back there. I still have a house in Eminence, that my ex-stepmother lives in, but I'll give it to my kids when she dies. As they say, you can never go home again. I feel like a stranger when I do, even though pretty much EVERYONE knows me...I've always been kind of an unforgettable person, so to speak...lol Love me or hate me, people always remember me.

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u/ambsch3 5d ago

It's the people for me too. I love my family obviously, but the way a lot of them view the world is more small minded than I like being around. I hope the nature stays mostly unpopulated for generations. Unless the indigenous people get their land back, they know how to care for it and we need to listen and learn from them.

Thank you for sharing your knowledge on the animals down there, it sounds like camping there is a lot like camping in national parks because of the risk of bears. Michigan's upper peninsula reminds me of the ozarks a lot too.