Friday, December 30th
– Saturday, February 4th
Photo link:https://goo.gl/photos/3dWbZkSZ847EZEPP7
After leaving Hobe Sound, the first stop in Florida was Fisheating
Creek, our favorite campground to celebrate New Year’s Eve. The weather was good,
but the creek water level was too low for any serious kayaking. We enjoyed four
days there hiking, relaxing and celebrating the New Year. While Kurt was out
looking for campfire wood, he found a discarded Christmas tree, which he
brought back for a New Year’s Eve super-fire. When he lit that tree, it went up
like a bomb. Wow, way more than we expected, but it was fun to watch. While we
were packing up to leave, I accidently smashed my left hand middle finger in
the truck door… OUCH. I know the finger above the knuckle was crushed and it
was very painful. I just wrapped it up and went about my business. It will take
weeks to heal and I will lose the fingernail eventually.
After FEC, we headed toward our favorite Florida mountain
biking location, Alafia River S.P. As usual, the campground was great and we
settled in. We spent four days there, but I was not able to ride the trails,
due to my injured finger. While there, our friends the Lea family from
Clearwater, came over to visit. Lindsay brought the kids over for the day,
Walker (Dad) had to work. We made tacos for lunch and went on a hike. It’s
always a great time to hang out with them, the kids are so much fun. On the
last day there, I did get out on the trails to see if I could ride with my injured
finger and was pleased to be able to. We would have loved to stay longer, but
there was no more availability.
Next, we headed to Santos Campground, south of Ocala.
Another great mountain biking experience and I was able to ride each day. We
were there for 6 nights and enjoyed it as usual. Next we headed to Salt Springs
in the Ocala National Forest for 12 nights. Our friends, the Leas, also camped
there for the weekend. We had a lot of fun playing with the kids (Pickett,
Makena, Brynnan and Tallulah) and catching up with Walker and Lindsay.
Manatee Springs S.P. was our next destination. This park is
near the Gulf Coast of Florida, where the Suwanee River dumps into the Gulf,
near Cedar Key. We have camped there before and enjoyed our two night stop.
Next we headed toward Apalachicola on the Gulf coast and stayed at Coastline RV
Resort, a very nice RV resort. It was a new park on the bayfront. We normally
don’t stay at RV resorts, but this one offered very good discounts and made it
worth the price. This was one of the nicest, well designed RV resorts we have
ever experienced. One day, we drove around the town of Apalachicola, and St. George Island. We stopped at a great seafood restaurant and had raw oysters and fish. Also, while there we went on a hike in Tate’s Hell State Forest.
There was a marked “hiking” trail that we decided to take with the dogs. The
hike started out very nice, a normal hiking trail through the forest, but then it
quickly evolved into nothing but huge sandy, double-track trail right in the middle
of hunting season. We were over halfway into the 6 mile hike and decided to
continue forward. It was mildly frightening as we were not wearing bright
orange clothing, as all the hunters were. We hiked as fast as possible to get
out of there. What was so annoying was the trailhead advertised a hiking trail,
but no indication that active hunting was in process. We were so happy when
this was over, and later when Kurt spoke with a FWC officer he mentioned this
lack of notice. The officer also indicated that it was heavily populated by
black bears (again no notice at trailhead). Wow, I wonder how many tourists get
into this situation!
Our last destination in Florida was Blackwater River S.P.
north of Pensacola. One of our favorites due to the great paddling in the area.
While there we paddled Juniper Creek (with the dogs) and Kurt paddled the
Blackwater River. We were also very excited to find a new mountain biking trail
system just a few miles north in the forest. It makes this campground even more
inviting for future camping. While there, we drove down to Niceville (near
Pensacola) to visit our friends, the Falzone family. We hadn’t seen them in a
couple of years, so our visit was wonderful and it was great to see Lily and
the kids, Abby and Craig.
As we left Florida, we were excited to move westward and
visit some new places. 