Little Rock, AR

 The campground we are staying at is right over the bridge from Little Rock.  There is a nice walking bridge over.  Our first night here we decided to check out the bridge and walk over to a brewery.  It is an old train bridge that had a section that moved up when tall boats had to come through.  We had a nice time at the brewery and when we were ready to leave, it was pouring.  Thank you uber for the ride back to the campground.

A couple rainy days, so school work and car maintenance for Dave and craft projects, laundry and food shopping for me.  Still have to deal with every day things on the road.

When the rain stopped, we headed in to explore Little Rock.  It was nice with the walking bridge that we didn’t take the car, just walked everywhere.  We started at a local coffee shop.  Then we just started walking along the Arkansas River Trail.  

We went to the nature center.  We saw a ground hog outside in their garden and found out there was an alligator turtle.  Kind of a spiny shell and a large head.  It was interesting learning about the local nature. 

The walk next took us by a karate garden.  Cool entry and fun statues inside.  

The Grandfather - I like the expression on the face

I liked the detail in this staff

Statue of Nine Turtles.  Turtles traditionally signify longevity.  The eight turtles on the moms back signifies strength of family and unity.

We then went to the Old State House which is now a museum.  It was completed in 1842.  In it’s life it was the State House, a State Police headquarters and a Medical School.

Interesting facts about the Old State House:

Greek Architecture, but the building was made of all bricks.  Even the columns were brick with plaster overlay.  All the bricks were made on site.

In1867 they found that the State House was already falling into disrepair, so they approved an addition and renovation.   Throughout the years there were many bills put forth for repairs of the state house, many did not pass and its condition continued to deteriorate.

After a new state house was built there were several groups that fought long and hard to keep the Old State House as a historic site.  It was not an easy battle, but it was successful.  In 1995 there was a total replacement of the foundation of the building.  They did find many artifacts during that replacement.  

The Supreme Court of Arkansas was also housed in the building in 1836.  I liked this one quote they had:  “Although the court system was patterned upon the federal Constitution, Arkansas was a wilderness, and justice often reflected the rough customs of the frontier.”

This is a picture of a circular “hole” that went through all the floors in the Old State House.  The original blueprints for the building had a dome on top, but it was not affordable once they got to that point.  So it would have let light through all of these “holes”.

This is just a funny thing - the Date, Explorer and way they spelled Arkansas.

Next stop on our walking journey was the Vogel Schwartz Sculpture Garden.  It was along the Arkansas River & Trail.  These are some of the sculptures I enjoyed.

Fancy Turkey

This one was funny in and of itself, but then someone added sunglasses to it.

These 2 lambs “dance steps” cracked me up.

I can imagine some annoying thing this guy said that made her make that face.

We then went across the Junction Bridge, which was 1,800 feet long.  It had a 385 foot span that would lift to let boats through and then go back down for the train to go across.

Our next and final stop for the day was a double header at the local AA Baseball team, the Arkansas Travelers, a minor league team associated with the Seattle Mariners.  Had seats right behind home plate.  It was a nice evening for baseball.  They lost both games, but when it’s not “your team”, it’s not stressful.  

This is one of the bridges lit up at night.

The last adventure day in Little Rock we had was on Friday.  We went to a different coffee shop and then went to the Clinton Presidential Library.  We have never been to a Presidential Library before.  I found it very interesting.  

Museum had interesting architecture, as the long section with only one “column” holding it up,

Flags reflected in building.  

Exact replica of oval office during Clinton’s presidency.  One interesting fact, the designer bought enough material to do the oval office and do the library all at once.

A small display of the many gifts that were received during his presidency

These blue boxes were in all of the columns in the bottom picture.  These all store documents, mostly correspondence from the American people to the president during his two terms.

We had a yummy lunch with a great view at the library

Tomorrow we leave Little Rock and head to a Harvest Host to break up the long ride to our next state park in Georgia.

Til next time…