Run for the Hills--And Relax
By Arline Chandler

What could be more relaxing than a hideaway cave--a rather luxurious cave, that is? Longbow, a property with two rustic and romantic, cave-like cabins in the Arkansas Ozark Mountains, is total privacy and complete communion with nature. No neighbors dropping in. No deadlines to meet. And no phones, TVs, or door bells to distract from a hammock gently swaying under the shelter of a sandstone overhang.

World famous archer, Ben Pearson built the property's original cabin after answering an ad for the 444-acre Longbow in the Wall Street Journal. Located near Prim, Arkansas, Pearson found a wild game paradise with cold, clear springs, creeks spilling into waterfalls, and massive sedimentary rocks jutting up from a pre-historic sea bed. He imagined a get-away cabin built between a sheer cliff and a huge sandstone next to a waterfall splashing into a blue-green pool.A hunter who always preferred his bow and arrow over a gun, Pearson traveled the world on successful hunts for polar bears and grizzlies, wild boar, cougars, and pronghorn antelope.

"When Dad began bow hunting in the state of Arkansas, one was fortunate to simply see a deer track," his son, Ben Pearson, Jr. says. "But in 1955, he connected with a fine eight-point, which was the state's second recorded bow kill."

Ben Jr. relates that despite his dad's world travels, the famous archer felt a kinship to the Ozarks. The design for his cabin blended his keen sense of the outdoor world with his family's need for basic creature comforts. Originally a one-level room with two cave walls and a view of the 30-foot waterfall spouting from a narrow chute atop layers of time-built crevices, Ben Pearson completed his retreat in 1967.

Ben, Jr. recalls the cabin and its encompassing hillsides were a young boy's dream. "I spent carefree days on the property with my dad, hunting arrowheads, riding horses, hiking, and swimming," he says.

With a typical 14-year-old's pluck, he discovered that the waterfall's chute, timeworn by centuries of creek waters pouring into the pool, formed a natural waterslide. "After several tries that bottomed out in the pool, I perfected my stance by leaning back as I plunged with the force of the water," he states with the recollection of a teenager's idyllic summers twinkling in his eyes.

Following Ben Pearson's death in 1971, the road washed out and the cabin sat lonely. Ben, Jr., picking up on his dad's affinity with the isolated land standing relatively untouched for centuries, took up the challenge of modernizing the cabin, yet leaving intact the natural beauty of the deep canyon.

Remembering his own boyhood treks up and down steep hillsides to the shelter of sandstone overhangs with fossils embedded in the ceiling, Ben Jr. put hours of thought into remodeling the cabin, appropriately named Longbow to commemorate his dad's first bow. He added modern conveniences in the kitchen plus a sleeping loft with small windows eye level with the treetops.

Arrowhead motifs decorate the upstairs banister. Horns, collected by Ben Jr. when he walked behind his dad in the woods, turn utilitarian in the rustic light fixtures. A natural rock wall rising 20 feet from the living room floor reflects earthy colors from its mineral deposits.

In a stone planter, which Ben Jr. designed to catch drips from the wall, he places fossils he and his family have found outside the cabin. The living area and kitchen, wedged between two cave walls, overlook the waterfall cascading year-round into the six-foot-deep pool. Outside, rock steps wind to a poolside patio tucked under a rock ledge. A barbecue grill, patio chairs and a swaying hammock enhance an afternoon of reading, daydreaming or solitary plunges into the waters of the still pool.

Around a curve in the narrow road leading to the cabin's hidden doorway, Ben Jr. points out a creek bed with bungalow-sized boulders. Drawing on an imagination inherited from his dad, he constructed a second two-level cabin, perched over the rushing waters of the creek. Called Bushmaster in honor of another of his dad's famous bows, the cabin is situated to be compatible with Longbow if families or friends reserve both accommodations, yet completely private if strangers share the remote canyon.

In the Bushmaster cabin, rocks undisturbed for millions of years form two walls of the bathroom. A whirlpool tub blends rustic with luxury. Decks on two levels of the new cabin create an ideal landing for grilling steaks and a perfect vantage point for spotting the Longbow property's wild turkey, foxes, deer, coyotes, and eagles.

Ben, Jr. says a geologist surmised the rock in the canyon sheltering the two cabins is possibly 250 million years old. "He believes it was part of a massive river system that carved out all the bluffs," Ben Jr. states. "The finer indentations and cracks came after the river descended. The geologist speculated that huge rocks may have been a bridge centuries before it collapsed into the creek."

From the weathered sign at Longbow's entrance to the archery museum and small business conference center in Ben Jr.'s future plans, every inch of the isolated property kindles the legacy of Ben Pearson's connection with the wildness of the Ozarks. Descending a narrow, rutted road from grassy pastures into the deep canyon, the towering moss-covered bluffs hold the secrets of hunters whose shadows once faded into the camouflage of the woods. The two cabins, tucked harmoniously into the hills and rocks, are the only signs of human infringement.

"The canyon changes with the season," Ben Jr. says. "Summer's stunning green foliage and lush ferns block the beauty of the bluffs visible through winter's bare trees. On occasional winters, the waterfall at Longbow freezes from top to bottom. Several times, I've walked across the iced pool and leaned against the water frozen in motion. Almost every winter, icicles hang like a giant's beard from the cliffs where sunlight rarely reaches."

But summer has its pluses, too. Sunsets shoot rays of soft light directly down the canyon. Reflections dance on the pool and into the cabin. Spring is a butterfly paradise with fragile colored wings flitting across the still pool waters to light on dogwoods, wild azaleas, and iris. Fall turns the canyon walls into a riot of color with sunlight shimmering red, yellow, and orange from the feet of the lowest bushes to the tips of native hardwoods.

In any season, Longbow, a world away from paved streets, flashing lights, and speeding motorists, pays tribute to Ben Pearson and the men who climbed the hills before him, stalking the game that inhabited the woods. Pearson, a legend among bow hunters, lives on in the collectible Ben Pearson bows and arrows and in the offspring of those who are yet to hide in his Ozark hills--and relax.

Longbow is located near Prim, Arkansas, just seven miles north of 40,000-acre Greers Ferry Lake. World-record trout and walleye caught in nearby Greers Ferry Lake and Little Red River. Mountain View (the Folk Music Capital of the World) is a half-hour drive to the north. Explore three paved miles inside Blanchard Springs Caverns. Visit The Folk Center State Park. Horseback riding and dinner theatres available.

Longbow and Bushmaster cabins are open by reservation to guests year-round and toured for a charge by appointment only. To arrange a visit to Longbow, contact Ben & Paulette Pearson, P.O. Box 66, Prim, AR 72130; phone: 870-948-2362. E-mail: longbowben@mvtel.net longbowben@mvtel.net. Check their website: http://www.globalriver.com/longbow/

Copyright Arline Chandler

Photos by Arline Chandler