April May 2019 in Arkansas, Crater Diamond State Park, Hot Springs National Park, North Little Rock

Murfreesboro, Arkansas
We camped three days to allow one day of diamond hunting in the field. There is a gift shop, visitor information center, a diamond discovery center and of course the mine.  You can purchase or rent tools for your hunt in the dirt.

One of the only places in the world where the public can search for real diamonds. 
It's a 37 acre plowed field, the eroded surface of a volcanic crater.

It wasn't in our cards to walk away with a diamond. 
More than 33,100 diamonds have been found by park visitors since it became a Arkansas state park in 1972.

The largest diamond was 40.23-carat, Uncle Sam, recently  August 20, 2019 was a 3.7-carat yellow diamond found by Miranda Hollingshead from Texas.

About 35 miles north of Crater of Diamonds is Hot Springs.  My vision, hot tubs everywhere, not what I found.
Inside the Fordyce Bathhouse is a museum. 
You can wander through the building and various floors that show
case the different types of bath's and treatments used in that era.  Some treatments included shock treatments, yikes!
The Bathhouses were built between 1892 - 1923.

This is bathhouse row, inside the hot-springs are piped into the spa's. 
You have to pay for a spa treatment in the water, which vary in temperature.

This is the other side of bathhouse row.  It's very pretty and clean in front and behind the bathhouses.
The buildings are amazing. 

Behind Bathhouse Row is the Grand Promenade, a beautiful walking park that has springs along the path.  Most of the springs are capped off and the water is diverted into the Bathhouses.

Another spring running along the Grand Promenade walkway.

Hot Springs is a National Park in downtown Hot Springs, Arkansas. 
The gardens and parks are beautiful.

In and around Hot Springs there are many hiking trails and scenic drives. 
This was a view from a drive just above town.

North Little Rock, Arkansas.  We are camped on the other side of this pedestrian bridge.

We are right on the river, in the city of North Little Rock.  Three weeks later the town was evacuated due to the rising river.

The lights around the downtown area were spectacular.  Both sides of the river had parks with walking/biking trails.  It was about a 20 mile round trip to traverse both sides of the river.