Associate Director of Media Relations, Univ. of Arkansas

Yes, sir. Duck-hunting in Stuttgart is world-class. The lakes are loaded with largemouths and crappie and Arkansas is home to the most gorgeous river in the country (that I've seen, anyway), the Buffalo, America's only river to be designated a national park.

Fayetteville actually is a very cool and somewhat progressive town -- see Dickson Street -- and was listed a week or two ago by Forbes as the No. 7 best place to live in the country.

 

I lived in Fayetteville for a summer and loved it. The alcohol rules around there are different but you can get used to that. It's very pretty and has cool things to do. I don't know the airport situation too well though.

 

Northwest Regional actually is about 10-15 miles outside of Fayetteville in a tiny fleck called Highfield. It's been around about 10 years, I think, and is about middle of the road in size. Not tiny, not giant. Plenty efficient for the area.

 

The only bad thing is Northwest Regional's rates are pretty high. I know of several people who fly into Tulsa or Springfield -- two hours away -- and actually save money by driving the rest of the way.

 

Tulsa is a much larger airport and also Southwest flies out of there, so the rates can be and usually are much cheaper than out of XNA. Not sure about Springfield, but we use Tulsa on occasion if several are traveling together and we know enough ahead of time to take advantage of the lower fares. Sometimes the savings can be pretty substantial to make the drive over, but not not very often at $4 per gallon now.

 

I'm a flat-lander. I enjoy the scenic views of Northwest Arkansas, but for everyone to bag on the delta is ridiculous.

There are just as many nice-looking places on the southeastern side of that line as the northwestern side.

 

never used springfield, either, but we traveled through tulsa several times. u can often save $100-$200 per ticket, so if you're flying several, that's obviously a big saver.

but, boy, that 100-mile drive-in after a long roadtrip blows!