Ouachita National Forest

National Forest, Proclaimed In 1907 As The Arkansas National Forest The Oldest National Forest In The Southern United States. Renamed Ouachita In 1926. Roughly 1.8 Million Acres Across Western Arkansas And South Eastern Oklahoma. · Hot Springs, Arkansas

The Ouachita is the oldest national forest in the South, proclaimed in 1907 when it was still called the Arkansas National Forest, and at roughly 1.8 million acres it is also the largest. What makes it unusual is the ground itself: the Ouachita Mountains run east to west, which almost no other range in North America does, so the ridges march in long parallel lines and the valleys between them run the wrong way for an American mountain range. The 223-mile Ouachita National Recreation Trail follows that grain from Pinnacle Mountain near Little Rock across into Oklahoma. The forest holds Lake Ouachita, three wilderness areas, several hundred miles of horse and off-road trail, and the quartz crystal belt around Mount Ida that rockhounds travel across the country to dig. It is working forest as well as recreation land, so logging roads, active hunting seasons and locked gates are as much part of the landscape as the trails are.

Ouachita National Forest, west-central Arkansas, Hot Springs, Arkansas, United States

The forest is open at all times and there is no entrance fee. Developed recreation areas, campgrounds and boat ramps mostly run from spring to autumn and some close for the winter; a few stay open year-round at reduced service. District ranger offices keep weekday business hours. Hunting seasons run through autumn and winter and change what the forest is being used for - check the Arkansas Game and Fish calendar before hiking in November. Forest roads can be gated seasonally or closed after storms.

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