Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Way Down Upon The Suwanee River

About a year ago I posted a tale about me and a close friend who went in search of her family property at the confluence of the Suwanee and Sante Fe Rivers deep in central Florida.  The property had been purchased by her father many years ago and passed down to she and her siblings.  Pat hadn't seen the property since she was a child and when she first told me about it my immediate reaction was... let's go.

We tried to find it by land but failed as the property is not bordered by a paved road and you must pass through adjoining property to reach it.  Even with her older brother's instructions, we couldn't locate the small dirt trail leading to it and settled for tipping a few beers across the river at a small RV park and fish camp named Ellie Ray's.

About a week ago I got an email from Pat telling me that her cousin, Al Jr., had agreed to take her to the property on his pontoon boat and did I want to go.  The rest is history.

Launching at Ellie Ray's.  The river is as low as I have ever seen it which makes the spring-fed Sante Fe crystal clear and stunningly beautiful.

Captain Al at the wheel.  Couldn't have asked for a more congenial host.  Al is 80-yrs old and happy to spend a day on the water.  Ellie Ray's in the background.
My friend Pat, a Florida gal who grew up in the little town of Mayo, not far from here.  Her son Travis in the navigator's seat.  Not long after this picture was taken the boat stopped running.  After pulling off the engine cover and cleaning the gas filter, I discovered that the gas line had come loose.  Day saved and on we go.
The Sante Fe River on a brisk February day.  If you look closely you can see the discolored water.  That's the river bottom, clearly visible about 8' down.
The confluence of the Suwanee and Sante Fe.  This is a view from Pat's property looking across the Suwanee (which curves to the left) towards the Sante Fe just behind the sandy beach across the river.  These two rivers are American Heritage rivers and truly old Florida.  There are houses along the banks but also miles of forest.  As I was walking the beach I heard a familiar chortle and was a little confused as I assumed, at first, that it was the hundreds of black vultures resting in the trees on their migration.  Then I spotted the sandhill cranes, a thousand feet above, their wonderful call filling the air.  As we lunched at the site we enjoyed tangerines from a wild tree on the property and were rewarded with visits by a manatee and a large sturgeon.
I had seen on Google Earth that there were three depression ponds on the property and I wanted to walk to one of them for a look-see.  The pond was dry but I was greeted by a meadow of day lilies.
A view of the Sante Fe on the return trip.
On the way home we passed Hannah's and had to stop for a photo.  I always love getting out of the city and back to the land.  Out here, the air is clean.  Just breathing gives you energy.

21 comments:

  1. These are stunning photos. Thank you for this glimpse into a landscape very different from anything I'm familiar with. I followed the link from Friko's blog in case you wondered how I found you. :-)

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  2. Thanks and thanks for stopping by Perpetua. Friko is one of my favorites. Ya'll please make yourselves welcome.

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  3. Did I see my name mentioned?

    In spite of politics getting a look-in I love your previous post. Not altogether sure about the prison term, no holidays.

    Suwannee (Swannee?_) and Santa Fe, names out of films and music only for me and here you are, sailing down them as bold as brass.

    Sometimes I find it hard to believe that we all get together via our blogs and the world suddenly becomes a real place.

    Lovely photos. And so much sun!

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  4. I really like the last photo. As Friko said, we all come from such different places and yet we find ourselves together in these blogs. Quite amazing, really.

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  5. The blogging community is the reason I blog. It's just plain fun.

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  6. Beautiful pictures. I took a boat ride through the bayous near Homa, Louisiana, about twenty years ago. Your pictures brought back memories.

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  7. The meadow of day lilies seems so out of place from the rest of the scenery. These are certainly beautiful pictures of the rivers and your land.

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  8. Rubye... Florida is an amazing place with multi-ecosystems occupying a small area. In the space of a few hundred yards you can walk from the river through the floodplain to a depression pond/marsh to a sandhill of tall pines and scrub oaks to the rosemary scrub of small twisted vegetation and bare sand.

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  9. I love that 'country store', we don't get those over here.

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  10. What a wonderful outing, and a great bunch of pictures to show for it. (But I wish you would've gotten a shot of the manatee ... one of my favorite critters of all time.)

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  11. Wonderful pictures. Now I want to go there.

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  12. beautiful; back to the land.... that's where i am heading this weekend, although the northern landscape will look a little different!!

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  13. absolutely beautiful..Oh man, I'd be there in a heart beat building a little cabin..

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  14. We have made a pact to go back and camp one weekend.

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  15. I think Hannah's is my favorite photo, too.

    I've told you of my love for Marjorie Kinan Rawlings' Florida, haven't I? These pictures bring her Cross Creek stories back to me.

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  16. OK it's official i want to move out of the slum..but only if every day looks like that one did!

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  17. Walking man,
    Didn't we say you should go find your peace of green paradise on one of your recent posts. I think Mr. Charleston has shown us both the place to go. It's beautiful and as usual, I am envious.

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  18. Nance... Welcome back. Thought we had lost you. I share your love of MKR. Though not Cross Creek, this area is a kissing cousin.

    WM... I have never been to the Suwanee under any weather circumstances that it wasn't just flat out beautiful. Come on down.

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  19. thanks, Mr. C for that visual and now I'm singing, Way Down Upon the Swanee River, far, far, away...but obviously one needs to take groceries with them! haha! have a great weekend!

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  20. Very nice, C. Once again you've made me homesick. Nebraska has a beauty of it's own (including the sandhills area, where the cranes originate), but this is the scene that sticks to my heart. All in where one grew up, I suppose.

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