We borrowed boats from our friends over at Arkansas Outside to try out a stretch of the Little Maumelle River. There are so many things I love about central Arkansas. Imagine being able to paddle a kayak for eight plus miles down a river, within the city limits of the largest city in your state. We began at Pinnacle Mountain State Park and floated through a forest of cypress trees, ending our trip just past Two Rivers park, at the boat launch at the bottom of River Mountain Road.
Ivydog was nearly perfect. Hayduke was terrible. He and I ended up in a single kayak, hanging back out of sight of the rest of the group. When he can’t see anyone else, he’s a lot calmer about being in the boat.
I wish I’d had a camera, because he was extremely excited today about lily pads. We floated through big stretches of water that’s so still and shallow that lilies grow in big ‘fields.’ Hayduke thought it was great fun to hang his big head out of the boat and try to snatch the flat leaves in his mouth. Once he grabbed a lily bud and pulled it up, four foot stalk and all. He looked at me as if to say “well, I caught it, but now I don’t know what to do with it.” We left a trail of leaves with bites taken out of them.
Hayduke is a nightmare on the water but he has so much fun it’d be sad to leave him at home.
I used to take my whitewater kayak and put it on the Little Maumelle at Ferndale and float down to the fire department at highway 10 when the water was high enough. It was a fun float and If it was late enough in the spring, the days were long enough I could leave work at 5, kayak the run and be off the water before dark. It's a fun little run but a little rocky in places and you got to keep an eye out for downed trees!