Down home in Arkansas: wine cellars, frontier history, mountain vistas—and yes, reminders of Bill Clinton—flavor travels in the Natural State - State of the Month

Travel America, Sept-Oct, 2003 by Margaret Dornaus

THROUGHOUT MY LIFE. I'VE CALLED various cities my home--New York, Atlanta, Tulsa. But regardless of how far I've been from the state I've resided in for most of my adult life, I've always considered Arkansas my true home. It's the place where I came of age, fell in love, married, put down roots. It's the place that keeps calling me back--to its rivers and lakes, its mountains, its woods. A place where unparalleled natural beauty rivals the sounds and sights of the city. A place with a rhythm that's deep and dark and wild.

Today I have the privilege of living surrounded by that beauty--of sitting on my back deck to watch the sun set each night over mountain ranges that centuries have shaped into the Ozarks' rolling hills; of walking down a hill to find myself propelled deep into the hardwood forest I share with wild turkeys and deer and a reclusive black bear; of standing on a nearby mountaintop with the man I love to drink in a panorama at twilight.

The area I call home is one of many such sanctuaries Arkansas has to offer. In addition to a national forest that spans two states (Arkansas and Missouri), the place where I live boasts one of the state's finest floating rivers--the Mulberry, which curves through densely wooded bluffs outlining spectacular vistas of the Ozark National Forest. Located just off historic Highway 23 (known as "The Pig Trail") north of Ozark the Mulberry features campgrounds and canoe rental operations that dot the scenic river valley road.

Just south of the Mulberry off I-40, the small Arkansas River Valley town of Altus represents the heat of Arkansas' wine country trail, with a bouquet of wineries that are internationally competitive. At the center of this bacchanalian landscape is Wiederkehr Wine Cellars, where the Wiederkehr family (immigrating from Switzerland in 1880) has been producing wine for more than a century. In addition to daily tastings, Wiederkehr Village offers tours of its historic stone cellars. The Weinkeller Restaurant, meanwhile, serving German specialties like knackwurst and schnitzel, is open for lunch and dinner in a log-timbered building listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In late September, the entire complex comes alive with a Swiss Alpine-style harvest celebration that includes traditional music, food, and dancing.

Altus' Post Familie Winery also dates back to the 1880s--when Jacob Post, like Johann Wiederkehr, arrived in America and established a vineyard on St. Mary's Mountain. Today, fourth- and fifth-generation winemakers greet visitors to the Post Familie Vineyard for tastings and tours as well as to Mount Bethel Winery, established by Eugene Post and his wife, Peggy, in 1956.

To Altus' east and west on the I-40 corridor are Arkansas' two largest cities: Little Rock and Fort Smith. The two distinctly different metropolises offer a wide range of experiences, with the state's capital city--like its western neighbor--focusing much of its activity on the Arkansas riverfront.

In Little Rock, Bill Clinton's presidential library/museum is scheduled to open in 2004. Surrounded by an eight-block area known as the River Market District, the 28-acre complex will breathe further life into Little Rock's once bedraggled downtown, now alive with specialty shops, restaurants, and nightlife. At Ottenheimer Market Hall, vendors sell gourmet victuals year-round and area farmers proffer the freshest of produce in adjacent outdoor pavilions from early spring through late fall.

On the far side of the Arkansas in North Little Rock, the $80-million Alltel Arena is a state-of-the-art, 11-story center for performing artists and the home of Little Rock's East Coast Hockey League team, the Arkansas RiverBlades. The arena's imposing riverfront placement links the two distinct urban areas. But the planned addition of a pedestrian path bridging the river--part of a 14-mile Millennium Trail project spanning 7,000 acres of city, county, state, and federal parkland--will bind the communities together more closely with the completion of the presidential library.

More improvements are, quite literally, just around the river's bend. Little Rock-based Heifer International--a nonprofit organization dedicated to fighting world hunger and poverty--plans to relocate its global headquarters to a 30-acre site adjacent to the library by 2005. The complex will include the first Global Village (an authentic representation designed to educate visitors on living conditions in five of the world's most impoverished locations) placed in an urban setting.

Other area attractions--such as the city's six-story-high IMAX theater at the Aerospace Education Center and the Arkansas Arts Center with its world-class collection of drawings--lie just south of the riverfront district. Adding more substance to the newly revitalized district are recent expansions to such landmarks as the Historic Arkansas Museum (formerly known as the Territorial Restoration), a collection of early 19th century buildings where historians re-enact frontier life, and the nearby Old State House Museum--where Arkansas legislators first convened in 1836, and where, in 1992 and 1996, Bill Clinton delivered his election night victory speeches.