Time: 4.5 Hours
Difficulty: Intermediate
Description:
We had a good trip on Sunday kayaking at Alexander Springs in the Ocala National Forest. We dropped Mandy's jeep off at the take out, which was a launch about five miles down a forest road, I use the term road loosely. The road was half puddles, but Mandy's Jeep and Jordan's Toyota truck made it through thanks to some good driving. For future reference I would stick with 4x4s if you go down the road. We put in at Alexander Springs state park. The spring was beautiful and the run was deep and crystal clear for the first part of the trip, we saw schools of mullet and quite a few bass and a river otter. The river then transitioned to a river of grass, wide and no more than 3 ft deep. Here we saw a number of alligator, one about 6ft long basking on a log. We stopped to eat lunch on an old dock, then continued down the river. The river transformed again into a smaller tanin colored creek that wound its way through hyacinths, water lilies and islands. At a few points the hyacinths and reeds got pretty thick and we were wondering if the river was navigable, but it turned out there was always a way through, around an island or under a branch. Overall we made it to the takeout, 7.5 miles down river in about 4.5 hours. We were greeted by an extraordinary collection of good ole boys jumping off trees at the launch.
We had some issues when we returned, we forgot to lock the gate when we left, and a entymology student took the key for safe keeping. Eventually we were let in and retrieved our key earlier this week. So we learned a new motto, "Don't forget to shut the gate, stay out of the bees," in order to stay on the good side of the bio students which we share the storage space with.
Anyway it was a good paddle, I want to go check out more of the Ocala National Forest.
Put-in: Alexander Springs State Park
Take-out: Difficult (refer to description above)
Contact: Jake