Our time in the lovely town of Eureka Springs, Arkansas was full. We were in the tourist mode but with a couple of Oddasee destinations downtown. We have visited more than a few tourist zones and found most of the them boring and kind of repulsive. E. Springs just proved to be much more than expected. It's part Manitou Springs (times about 25) with shops and houses stacked side by side on steep hills, part Madrid, NM or Jerome, (quirky with a dash of Hippie) and a taste of Santa Barbara (historical and rich). There are many shops that are not high-end nor cheesy tourist crap. The architecture alone is impressive in quality and quantity. There are 4 or 5 massive stone hotels from the 1800's. Some of these are quite exclusive and others more like living museums. An unbelievable number of hotels, cabins, motels are scattered for miles. I am willing to bet that this place has more B&Bs per capita than anywhere in the world. We went into many little shops (yes R. was shopping..... ahh the trials of love) and were surprised to find a few very nice galleries. The best word for the entire town would be diversity. It is a tourist haven but a nice balance of silly stuff, history and uniqueness. We really enjoyed our two and a half days there.
The targets:
1. "Mitchell's Folly" - The first clue that we had once again found an alternate universe was the building that housed this shop/museum/disaster area. Barely standing but unlocked... we gingerly entered......welcome to chaos. The first room was filled to the gills and the walls left no space un-utilized. Shortly after our arrival the door opened behind us and a very curious creature entered; it was John Mitchell. This undeniably "different" character was small in stature but it was his way of speaking that was especially unsettling. Mr. Mitchell spoke in an almost unintelligible and soft mumble. It's was not a whisper but just very low talking with the volume knob at 1 or 2. This fellow's bizarre emporium had no discernible direction. There was furniture, tools, dolls and a huge number of paintings and prints. There were some very cool chairs but the price was wacky expensive. This was the case with many items. The pricing was laughable and weird because many objects were not being taken care of in the least. That said, someone with knowledge might well find some true treasures in the art collection - that is of course assuming one could actually get the proprietor to sell anything. Hard to describe the entire experience. Walking around the dusty items strewn about three rooms with our mumbling softly and more than just "odd" guide made for a very remarkable experience. Note: Unfortunately, I did not have the bigger camera as the place was mostly void of lights and made it difficult to get good shots.
2. "Frog Fantasies - Frog Museum" - Sadly the main part of the museum had recently been moved into storage. The owners had decided to simplify and move to a lower level of their house/business building in part because they had grown tired of all the stairs. They have kept their retail shop open with many of the museum pieces still on view. We were met first by Mr. Pat Mesa but he quickly said "Wait just a moment. I'll go get the Frog Lady." Then came the sweetheart called Louise. She beamed with pride as she told us about her frog collection. In addition to an impressive array of frog related retail items, she pointed out the treasures. At first we feared we would tire of such a tour. The opposite was soon the case. The true treasures of the place are the Mesas themselves. They were so genuine and happy to tell their tales. Once again, the collection became secondary to the people. It was so sweet as they showed us parts of their home, the thousands of frogs (over 7000 in storage), the new garden and pond. Honestly, I was so taken aback by these two folks that I simply forgot to get many photos. There must be some fountain of youth that these two amphibian loving people have discovered -- when S. asked me to guess Mr. Mesa's age, I thought maybe 75-80 .... nope 93!
Hard to believe; no photo -- sorry.
Love with soft mummmbbbly sweet riiiiiibbets,
Rodney and Susan
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