It’s hard to believe it has been four years since my first visit.  This weekend I finally made it back to the Upper Buffalo Wilderness for a 2-night backpacking trip with a friend from Kansas City (RC).

We parked at the Kapark trail head Friday afternoon and made our way along a well-worn path to Ken Smith Falls and then over to nearby McClure Falls. Both of these are double falls, with heights of 54′ & 71′, and 24′ & 33′ respectively.  There was no more than a trickle of water, naturally.  We camped on a ridge overlooking the valley below the falls.

On Saturday we bushwhacked to the Buffalo River – a rather steep 400′ drop.  It’s been very dry in the area for several months so I was really surprised to see water flowing this far upstream.  We went a bit further upstream before climbing back up to the level of the falls.  On a future trip I’ll follow that drainage up to the base of Ken Smith Falls.  I’ll bet it’s pretty impressive to see the looming bluff line from there.

We spent the rest of the day wandering around north of the falls and hiked out Sunday morning.