Morning on Courtois Creek, Photo by Author

Day Two, Diary from Six Days on the Ozark Trail

Courtois Creek → Little Brazil Creek

Morning

The creek below our campsite speaks at the perfect volume to no one in particular. It’s speaking to me now, as I wake up, of the defining elements of this landscape: river and bluff. Limestone carved by water to resemble small mountain ranges, sometimes flooded by fog as we saw yesterday, and sometimes by clear, blue light like this morning.

Hundreds of people, maybe thousands will be on the rivers this morning and today. The heat brings them here, or rather chases them here in their pick-up trucks, their broad pale bodies. Pink, bearded faces, from the suburbs of St louis, Kansas City, Springfield, Columbia.

Timber cut along the trail, Photo by Author

The Ozarks feel like the mass tourism Exhibit A: middle class families, piling into vans to float in the sun, camp in private, overloaded campgrounds, drink beer, and call it the best experience of their lives. To be sure, it is a tone of fun, and the region is beautiful. It reminds me a lot of the Finger Lakes, which is maybe why I describe it like that. Except the prominent geology here is a white and red clay limestone, compared to our…