A Week-end at Myakka River

Friday January 2 & Saturday January 3, 2015
Myakka River State Park
Sarasota, Florida

 

 

FRIDAY

The Florida State Parks have rules about how long you can stay in any one park.   Their limits are 2 weeks at a time and 56 days in a 6 month period.   So today we are moving up the road to Myakka River for the week-end in order to spend another two weeks at Oscar Scherer. 

In Florida it’s almost always above freezing as long as you are south of Tampa.  There are only a limited number of state and federal parks south of Tampa so those are really heavily used.  We decided this year to stay a month at Oscar Scherer but we have to go away and come back.   No problem, on Friday we drive up about 15 miles and move into Myakka River State Park just for the week-end. 

Our site is the Palmetto Ridge campground which is the newest of the three in the park and has full hook ups.  We’ve been here before and for this week-end our site is fully paved and right next door to the bath house.  So I take full advantage of our proximity to do two loads of wash.

 

 

SATURDAY

 

Myakka is a great place to bike and today we set off down the park road for what turns out to be a 10 mile ride.

 

 

The bridge over the river never disappoints.   It’s a beautiful spot that always has wading birds and gators.  I’m going to take a stab at identifying these since I hope Judy will be reading and correct me if I’m wrong.

 

 

 

 

 

The dark spot there in the river is the alligator.  It’s just a gorgeous day today in South Florida.  I feel so sorry for Carrie in Maryland where the highs are in the 30’s and it looks to get much colder.

 

 

 

 

 

Across on the other side I see a roseate spoonbill and a wood stork hanging out together.

 

 

On down the road we pull in to take a look at the river as it flows. Everyone says it is very low as is often the case in winter in Florida so I don’t know if paddling would be possible but it is really a great place to kayak and we’ll be back in a few weeks to see whether we can.   There is one loan fisherman here on the far bank.

 

 

 

 

 

We peddle on through the forest to the Myakka River Outpost.

 

 

On the way we stop to check out this feral hog pen.  It looks like it is no longer in use.  I sure hope there are other newer versions since the feral hogs are really tearing up the park.

 

 

 

The outpost is in the distance of this picture.  It is a store with lots of souvenirs and limited foods but they include coffee and ice cream.  They also sell tickets for the air boat ride on Upper Myakka Lake and they rent kayaks and canoes.   It’s a beautiful setting.

 

 

 

 

But we’re not here for the Outpost.  We’ve come to see what birds are at the Weir.  So David locks up the bikes and we hike on down.

 

 

The forest here is primeval looking.

 

 

 

When we get there, we find there is a locked gate and signs saying stay off the weir.  They’ve always had the signs which no one paid any attention to.  I later learn that even with the gate people aren’t obeying the law.  I suspect that would change if the sign also included the information that there is a $250 fine for trespassing.

We used to be able to see flocks of wood storks, a few black vultures and some spoonbills.  But now it seems the vultures have taken over the place and there isn’t any one here but them, a few cormorants and one lone roseate spoonbill.  But his pictures are the best of the day I’d say.

 

 

 

 

What a bill!

 

Our farthest stop away from Winnona is at the Bird Walk, a long boardwalk out into the shallow Upper Myakka Lake.   By the time we arrive, the volunteer on duty with a scope tells us that less than 1/3 of the birds are still here compared with just an hour or so ago.  We vow to come out for sunrise tomorrow.

 

 

 

We do see this glossy ibis who looks particularly fine fishing among the water plants.

 

 

 

The gators and the heron seem to be ignoring one another.

 

 

 

Not sure if I were the heron I could quite ignore such a open mouth.

 

 

 

A flock of spoonbills are so busy they rarely put their heads up at all.

 

 

We peddle back along the lake among the moss draped trees.

 

 

In anticipation of lunch we decide to make some microwave chips with sweet potatoes and they turn out fabulously.  If you haven’t seen the post on doing this with regular potatoes, you can find it here.   Actually we do one potato of each to have with a sandwich and fruit for lunch.

 

 

 

 

Today’s humor.  For dinner tonight David makes pizza.  When I do it, I give the yeast water the finger test and just decide if it’s warm enough.  But then I’m a bread baker.  David on the other hand wants to be precise so he points and shoots his laser temperature gun at the water in the cup to make sure it is exactly between 105 and 117 degrees as the recipe requires.  Too funny since the recipe is flour/yeast/water.  How wrong can you go?   Sorry I didn’t get a picture of the pizza before we devoured it.

 

It’s life at our house!