Tag Archives: trails

All Good Things Must End

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For my last night in Florida I headed north to Lake Okeechobee. This is the largest fresh water lake in the state of FLorida and the 7th largest freshwater lake in the United States. Thinking of little Lake Enola in Orlando I assumed there would be some scenic places to get sunset shots. Since I do not know the area at all I was left with just driving around to try to find someplace, a park or preserve or recreation area.

Because of the direction that I approached the lake from I found myself on the southern end. Along this the southern edge of the lake, the wetlands built up the layers of peat rapidly enough (reaching 4-to-4.3-metre (13 to 14.1 ft) thick) to form a dam, until the lake overflowed into the Everglades. At its capacity, the lake holds 1 trillion gallons of water and is the headwaters of the Everglades. But tonight with sunset approaching I wasn’t having much luck.

I followed one side road to a boat ramp. Although the road led up a steep embankment before dipping back down to a parking lot, there wasn’t much to see here. I kept seeing signs for trail heads but I couldn’t find a way to get to the trails. The guide-book says The 30 m wide (100 foot) dike surrounding Lake Okeechobee is a part of the Florida Trail, a 2,250 km (1,400-mile) long trail that is a National Scenic Trail. There is a well-maintained paved pathway along the majority of the perimeter. It is used by hikers and bicyclists, and is wide enough to accommodate authorized vehicles.

okeechobee

I didn’t find it. Eventually I headed back to the hotel to pack and prepare to leave in the morning. Although my flight wasn’t until 12:45 I was meeting my cousin at Lester’s Diner for breakfast and there’s no telling how much we’d get talking. I haven’t seen the Florida branch of the family in a long time so we had a lot of catching up to do.

Bar Harbor, walkin’ the walk

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Bar Harbor is a beautiful area sitting like it is in the heart of Acadia National Park.

Acadia is a bit different from most of the National Parks. It’s a patchwork made up mostly of land  and islands that have been donated for preservation. As I understand it, no more land is being accepted into the park although there are other preservation projects that may be available to potential donors.

The eastern portion of the park includes the 27 mile long loop road and 45 miles of carriage roads. The carriage roads are closed to automobiles but you can take a horse-drawn carriage ride or walk the well maintained roads.

We started our day with a traditional Maine breakfast at the Great Maine Breakfast. The traditional breakfast is the lumberjack breakfast, meat and potatoes, eggs and  pancakes. They had a jar of Berrylicious native blueberry jam on the table too.

Oh so good but neither JR or I could finish  our meal. It was a shame too because they were the best pancakes I’ve ever had in a restaurant…no offense to Denny’s or IHop.

After breakfast we (I anyway) waddled out to the car and picked up the cameras. I was hoping I’d see  a fellow we’d spotted the night before when I didn’t have my camera. He was providing me with my “kitty fix” for this trip. He had a pretty white and black cat that he was walking on a lease. I really wanted to take their picture but I didn’t see them this morning.

We moved the car to a better parking spot near a little park on the waterfront and began to explore.

There was a trail that reminded me of the Cliff Walk in Newport.

It ran along the water on one side and large homes and Inns on the other. I think it was about a mile long. We took our time taking plenty of pictures along the way.

Back at the car we decided to find the marina with the boat for the Puffin Tour. It looked to be too far to walk when we checked the map which is why we had the car this morning. It turned out that it would have been quite a hike.

From there we found our way to the visitor center at the park.  I forgot my National Park passport book in the room but I can get the stamp when we come back.  We picked up loads of handouts and information about the park, the trails and the activities. By then it was time to drive JR back to town where he planned to explore while I went looking for some funny little birds called Puffins!

Mud Flats and Salt Marsh our Brewster Adventure Continues

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After we wrapped up our visit at the museum I took Dawn and Alex outside so that Nancy could pop into the gift shop real quick. We wandered around the building and found some picnic tables and a sand box.

Dawn was into that sand box in a heartbeat. It was almost lunch time. I expected that we’d be heading back to the car to find a place for lunch but when Nancy joined us she had other ideas. It was time to walk the trails.

The trails were amazing. The only problem was that I wasn’t prepared so I was dragging along behind everyone. It was kind of embarrassing when I’m used to setting the pace but I have noticed that I have definitely begun to slow down.

Anyway it wasn’t long before we reached the salt marsh. A narrow board walk path crossed the marsh. The osprey nest was to the right and there were two osprey on the nest. I wish I had the tripod and the bigger lens. I have to come back!

After crossing the salt marsh the kids spotted some standing stones. It was a solar calendar. A marker gave us information on how it worked and then the kids were off again! 🙂

We continued on down the trail with me bringing up the rear. We began to meet  people returning. They told us to keep going and we’d get to the water. Sure enough. Once we got out of the trees we were looking out over the dunes. The path sloped downward through the scrub grass and sand until we mounted the last rise to find ourselves looking out over the mud flats with the ocean beyond.

Nancy and Dawn walked down the beach to look for shells. I sat on the bank and Alex hung back with me. A lady with a couple of dogs stopped by to talk and we made friends with the canines, a little chihuahua and another medium-sized curly-haired black dog. They were really cute and the view was spectacular.

When Nancy and Dawn came back we headed back to the car. We drove back across the cape to Chatham where we stopped at the Kreme and Cone for a seafood lunch.