Arkansas Sphinx

I went hiking on this trail with three other friends. None of us had ever hiked here nor did we directly know of any people who had hiked the trail. My friend found this trail by following a Arkansas hiking group on Instagram. After making two wrong turns on the road and falling forty minutes behind our schedule we saw the Sphinx. It was visible from the road and towered on top of the steep mountain-side. AllTrails said that the trail was 0.5 miles in and back. It should have taken a max of thirty minutes, and then we were going to find a waterfall somewhere else but that is not what happened.

We parked on the side of the road directly below the Sphinx and could not see any trail. Because the Instagram account does a lot of off trail hikes, we assumed that there wasn’t a path. There was a natural break in the mountain side with a stream cutting through it. We began our hike going up the stream, but I quickly decided that going directly up the slope would be quicker and easier than following the stream.

The hardest part of this hike was the fact that the entire mountain was covered in thick bushes of thorns. I was wearing long pants, tall hiking socks, and a long sleeve so I did not get too many scratches. My friends got a lot of scratches on their arms and ankles. I used sticks to push as many thorns out of my way as possible. The climb was very steep so the extra foliage made it a more difficult hike than any of us were expecting. Around three-fourths of the way up the mountain, I found the trail! It wasn’t very wide, but it was so much easier to hike the rest of the way without fitting the thorns.

The 360 view from the top was beautiful! I could see all the way to the Russellville cooling tower off in the distance. There is also a range of mountains in the distance. Above the Sphinx were flat rocks which were so peaceful to just sit on and enjoy the view. We brought sandwiches and ate lunch up there.

We took some pictures, but couldn’t enjoy it too long because the hike ended up taking us three hours! One person needed to be back in Conway by a certain time so we had to quickly go back down. We used the trail this time, and it took us less than ten minutes. If we originally took the trail, it probably would have taken us less than thirty minutes.

I would recommend wearing tall socks and long pants for this trail. You should also use the path! I probably wouldn’t go when the snakes are out because the thick bushes on the mountain seemed like a good place for them to live. Overall the hike was hard but the view was great!