Enjoy Spring Break at Arkansas State Parks

Below is a message from our state park folks:

Arkansas’s spring break is coming up fast, March 16-24. Every town in the Natural State has at least one state park within an hour’s drive.

State park interpreters in over twenty locations have scheduled daily programs during spring break, including guided nature hikes, kayak tours, arts and crafts, hands-on workshops, historic site tours, and much more. Programs are scheduled at different times throughout the day, with additional evening activities such as night hikes, campfires, and owl prowls. In addition, many historic state park sites offer daily tours.

Many programs are offered free of charge. Those requiring fees include most lake cruises, kayak tours, and historic site tours. Fees are minimal in most cases.

Arkansans are encouraged to use the department’s online calendar of events to find a program that fits their family’s schedule. You can find that here.

Many parents are expressing concern about children’s growing alienation from nature, which Richard Louv described as “nature deficit disorder” in his bestseller, Last Child in the Woods. Louv’s 2005 book launched a national movement to connect families and kids to the outdoors, something the Arkansas State Parks has been doing since the late 1930s when the doors opened at Arkansas’s first state park: Petit Jean.