Being in nature is one of the biggest tourism draws to Hot Springs, and mountain bikers from across the country flock to the Northwoods Trails system each month.
Northwoods Trails Coordinator Traci Berry is well-known for her work with the ever-growing 21.5 miles of the trails system, earning recognition from her colleagues in the Arkansas Trails Council last month who named her Professional of the Year.
While Berry has been in love with sports and being outdoors for her entire life, she did not get involved in mountain biking until the early 2000s. A native of East End, Berry earned her bachelor's and master's degrees from Henderson State University after graduating from Sheridan.
"I started out my working career in education," she said. "I coached, I taught, and by the end of it, I was an ALE Director, Alternative Learning Education. But along that way, I had gotten into mountain biking in the early 2000s, and ... I call it my gateway adventure activity of choice that kind of got me into several other things. Mountain biking, it's what got me into adventure racing, and then through adventure racing, I was opened up to paddling, which got me into rowing and rock climbing and all of that. So it kind of opened up that door to all these things."
While in high school and college, Berry competed in multiple sports including basketball and track.
"It wasn't until I was in my 20s that this whole new world was opened to me," she said. "I always enjoyed being outside. I mean, I would adventure out in the land that my grandma's farm was on, and that we lived on. I always helped her with the cows, so I always wanted to be outside in the woods, but I had never experienced it this way."
While on a school trip to Puerto Rico, Berry took a zipline canopy tour through the rainforest.
Berry "fell in love with ziplining. I'm just kind of an adrenaline junkie, and so I came back to Arkansas and thought, 'Man, that would be really cool to see a zipline here and especially in the Ozarks.' I spent a lot of time up along the Buffalo River, and that's when I met Mike Mills."
Mills, who founded Buffalo Outdoor Center in Ponca, was looking to add a zipline to his facility and asked if she would be interested in getting involved in the project. Berry went up to Ponca to meet with the company that was designing the zipline, and they asked her if she had "some gloves and some shoes because I'm always wearing my sandals."
"They put me to work for about 10 to 12 hours, moving boulders and cutting up trees to move aside, so we could get down some old logging roads to just see where the platforms and canopy tour would go," she recalled. "And at the end of that day, they took me back up to the top, and they said, 'We think it'd be a great addition to the team if you want to come help us build this thing.'"
Berry joined the crew that summer as the only woman on the build, which led to her being one of the first guides and managers for the zipline tour. After deciding to leave education, Berry was living in Little Rock and had competed in the Raid the Rock Adventure Race, and when the organizers were looking to move on, she had the opportunity to take on the project.
"So I did, and so I'm still the race director and still have Raid the Rock," she said. "And it's the longest-running adventure race in Arkansas. After education, after getting out of ziplining, I had several different odd jobs in Little Rock."
While working as an advertising salesperson for a publication, Berry saw a news release about the Northwoods Trails and decided she needed to discuss bringing an adventure race or other event to the Hot Springs area. She set up a meeting with Visit Hot Springs Director of Marketing Bill Solleder to discuss some events when he told her there would be a job opening for a trails coordinator.
"I just started my first year at the Clinton School of Public Service, my second master's, which was an online program," she said. "It was the first year that they did the (Executive Master of Public Service) program, and I had wanted to attend that school since its inception. So I got this opportunity, and I took it, and I was already kind of into my first year of that and had some other things going on in Little Rock. He said, 'I know you've got a lot, but just think about it.' ... We talked about some other things, and he had to leave. But before he left, he came back to the table, and he put a postcard down on the table. He said, 'I just want you to think about this,' and it was a Spa-Con postcard."
Solleder suggested to her the idea of someone rappelling off the Arlington Resort Hotel and Spa dressed as Spider-Man. She decided the following day to look into the possibility of it.
"He didn't get permission for the Arlington that year, but he did get permission for the Waters Hotel before they had the rooftop bar," she said. "And so at the time, my friend was the owner of Blue Rock Climbing Center, and he was my go-to for any ropes set up from our races. ... We took a look at it. We decided we could do it and make it safe, and so we ended up rappelling off of the roof of the Waters Hotel as Batman and Robin."
Berry eventually decided to apply for the trails coordinator job and was hired in 2018.
"To be honest with you, I don't know why I'd never thought about Hot Springs, but it has been probably -- no, it's just been the best job I've ever had ever, in my almost 50 years of life," she said. "I've really been surprised. ... I was really excited about the job, but it was just a change. I'd been in Little Rock for 15 years and had a home there and had a lot of things going on there, but this has been just an amazing surprise."
Being outdoors has always been Berry's "happy place."
"It's where I can go and have sometimes my private time and just time to reflect and think and just be out in nature, which is so beautiful in so many ways in Arkansas, and also to spend time with friends," she said. "Something about being outside has always kind of -- it may sound cheesy -- but kind of fed my soul. Where I can just kind of ... reflect."
With a diverse career that also has included retail and warehouse management, Berry thinks everything has helped prepare her for her current position.
"Growing up, too, I was brought up in church with my family, and there was a lot of service there," she said. "I mean, all of the women in my family especially had roles in the church, whether it was children's church director, Vacation Bible School. I mean, my grandmother was always the one coordinating meals for people when people were sick or in the hospital, for their families, or someone passed away. And I, as a young person really got involved with that with my grandmother, my aunts and my mom. And I think that really, my gravitation towards service started at a young age through that, and I've just really always enjoyed doing things for other people or for the community or in the community, with the community."
While Berry has been instrumental in helping shape the trails system, she credits her staff for helping the trails to be so successful.
"It feels good when our trails are voted number one by Arkansas Outside readers year after year," she said. "To see even our (National Interscholastic Cycling Association) team grow, to see more women on bikes, to see more plates from different states come through. I mean, you sit downtown, any day of the week, and see all the different cars that come through with bikes on the back, and you know where they're going.
"I'm proud of it. I'm proud of my staff. We have two full-time staff that are the main guys that are out here on the ground, taking care of the trails on a day to day, and, you know, I'm proud that their work is recognized. ... I'm definitely proud of what we have done as a team to accomplish because it's definitely not on me. Our trails wouldn't be as popular as they are without our maintenance staff."
Berry's family is very supportive of her work, and her fiancee, Katie Windham, is as well.
"I think that they couldn't be more excited and proud of me and that I have found this and something that makes me happy," she said. "She's, again, one of my biggest fans, and I feel like I'm one of her biggest fans. She has moved here to Arkansas from Texas and made a huge impact. ... I feel like we're kind of each other's biggest supporter and biggest fan because she has also done some really cool things and made a big impact since she's been here over the last six years."
While the trails system has grown quite a bit since she started in November of 2018, Berry said the work is far from done. To help accommodate the larger number of people who have started visiting the trails, Visit Hot Springs is adding another parking lot farther up Pineland Drive as well as trails to connect it to the trails system.
"Just getting more people on mountain bikes, but on bikes in general, is really a goal of mine or what I would like to see happen here locally," she said. "I do think that our city officials are starting to do that as well and are trying to make those things happen because it is a pretty unique place that our downtown is literally surrounded by a national park. So there's only so much property that we have to work with. But I do feel like if there's a way to do it, they're gonna make it happen. It's just a process."