Bushnell Part 2

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Even though we have stayed in nearby Brooksville for a total of 10 months over the past few years, we are still finding things to do in the area. Sometimes the spots are ones we haven’t visited and other times we return to places we have enjoyed in the past and want to see again. Inverness Florida is one of this repeat spots for us. Whispering Pines City park has lots of hiking and biking trails and a fair number of geocaches. We saw there were a couple of new caches hidden in the park since our last visit to the area so we would return for a hike. The park is only a 30 mile drive from camp, so it is relatively close. We enjoyed the wooded trails and found what we were looking for before heading into downtown Inverness to get a tour of town with a couple of Adventure Labs.

Large Mural in Downtown Inverness

Even though we have visited this town before, there is something different when we are walking around the downtown area and being given a history lesson about some of the buildings and locations in town via the Adventure Lab.

Citrus County Courthouse

Cooter Pond Park is just to the east of downtown. We have biked by Cooter Pond before since the Withlacoochee State Trail goes right past it but we didn’t realized there is a nice boardwalk area on the other side of the pond.

Start of Boardwalk at Cooter Pond

Cooter Pond

The namesake for the pond are the many cooter turtles that call this place home. It doesn’t take us long to see multiple turtles swimming around in the shallow waters near the boardwalk.

Cooter

Common Gallinule

More Boardwalk

There were a few other people out enjoying the beautiful day in Florida. We saw one medium size alligator resting on a marshy area. We spent about 90 minutes total just wandering around town before heading home.

Cooter Statue

Gator

Cooter on the Move

We have been making good use of the annual Florida State Park Pass we bought when we first arrived this season. Lake Louisa SP is not quite 60 miles to the southeast of camp on the west side of Orlando. There are numerous trails and about a dozen geocaches hidden in the park so we knew we could keep ourselves busy. Our first hike was on the south side of the park not too far from the campground area. We had a couple of geocaches to go for along the trail. It turned out that this section of the park is multipurpose trails and probably best suited for horseback riders. The trail was in fine condition but it was in full sun for the majority of the 3.5 miles.

Pond in Lake Louisa SP

After this hike, we headed up to the beach area on the north side of the park on the shore of Lake Louisa. This was a pretty spot but not many people out and nobody using the water. There were a few more caches off of a trail near the beach and that was a bit more shaded and pleasant walk

Beach Area of Lake Louisa SP

Since we still had energy and time left, we drove to one last spot within the park next to Dixie Lake to do a section of the Sandhill Loop Trail. This was a much nicer, wooded trail. There were some primitive campsites and a few tenters taking advantage of the secluded nature of the area. The view of the lake from the boardwalk was pretty nice.

A Proper Trail in the Woods

Dixie Lake

Before heading home, we saw there was another Adventure Lab at Palatlakaha River Park just on the north end of Lake Louisa. We went thru a lot of heavily populated areas to get to the small green space that was next to the river that connects with Lake Susan to the north. The trail may have gone further than the tour needed us to go but we decided we were getting tired and still had the 60 mile drive back home.

Palatlakaha River

The hikes at Lake Louisa weren’t all that great so we decided to head out a couple days later into a section of the Withlacoochee State Forest near Richloam. There are many miles of trail in this area and we have done a fair number of them but there were a handful of geocaches along one part of the Florida Trail we hadn’t found yet. When we head into remote forest wilderness areas like this, we are always cautious about whether we are entering a hunting area or not. We keep blaze orange vests and hats in the car so we can put them on in case we get to a trailhead where we suspect there might be hunting allowed. Best as we could tell from the regulation website, we were going to be hiking during the “small game” season. So when we got to the trailhead, we donned our gear and headed south along the Richloam South Loop Trail.

Starting Off at Richloam

Just a few hundred feet down the trail we hit an intersection. The Scenic Low Water River Trail sounded interesting and based on our map, it would connect back up with the main trail in a mile and a half. We decide to give it a try with the hopes that the water is low enough in the river to make this option passable.

Well Marked Intersection

Small Bridge Along Trail

This trail does run right along the river for most of it and is very pretty. The trail itself was dry although there was some water we needed to get around while going for one of the caches well off the trail. Many areas have thousands of cypress knees. These are a sure sign of areas that get flooded on occasion. Another, more obvious, sign was the water line that is visible on most of the trees. We didn’t have a tape measure with us so we used Chris as a ruler - looks about chest high! Obviously this section of trail cannot be used at all times of the year.

Withlacoochee River View

Cypress Knees As Far as the Eye Can See

Chris Points Out High Water Mark on Tree

Our side trail came back to the main trail as expected and we continued to the south. We knew that we would have a creek crossing at around the 2.5 to 3 mile point. Based on a geocacher’s log from 2 years ago, the water level in Devil’s Creek was around calf to thigh high. If this was the case for us, we were simply going to turn back - we don’t enjoy hiking with soaked boots even if there are geocaches to be found on the other side! So as we approached the creek, we were delighted to see a bridge. Obviously this is a rather new addition. As we cross the bridge and looked down on the creek, we estimated it to be about waist deep.

New Bridge Over Devil's Creek

Creek View from Bridge

We continued on to get a few caches south of the creek. One was at something call the “notched oak”. A live oak tree that has fallen in a manner to make an archway over the trail. At the 3.5 mile point we turn back realizing we had that long of hike to get back to the car and the caches further south of there could be reached from a different trailhead along another road on another day. We really enjoyed this hike. We didn’t see any other hikers and only heard one vehicle in the distance. We didn’t see any hunters although they possibly saw us with our orange gear on.

Notched Oak

Gator on Opposite Bank of River

We ended up taking several days off from hiking and biking. The bodies needed to recuperate and we decided to get our COVID shots which made me feel pretty lethargic the following day. We did find a restaurant in downtown Brooksville that was quite good. Main Street Eatery is a small place but we had a good lunch and even got a piece of peanut butter pie to share for dessert. Yum!

Now that we were feeling back to normal, we head back up towards The Villages to go to Lake Griffin State Park. This is a fairly small state park with just one trail about 2 miles long. They do have the second largest oak tree in the state an it is estimated to be in the 300 to 500 year old range. I will admit it is rather big.

Lake Griffith State Park

Second Largest Live Oak Tree

There is a boat and kayak launch in the park that allows you to boat out onto the lake. They also have a pontoon boat that periodically takes groups out on the lake. Being there midweek, meant there were no scheduled boat trips that day. The hiking trail takes you thru an area that appears to get rather wet at times. There are stretches where boards are laid out to form a low platform to walk over some of the wetter sections. Fortunately most of the trail was dry so we didn’t have issues when we ran into somebody heading the opposite direction. This was a quick stop since it is a small park but still worth the visit.

Boat Ramp

Pontoon Tour Boat

Boards at Wet Trail Sections

We still had plenty of time after we finished the park that we could do a quick search of what else was nearby for us to do. We saw a series of 10 geocaches just south of the town of Tavares which could be part of our drive home. At first it wasn’t clear why this cluster of caches existed but we discovered it to be the Tavares Nature Park. It looked like there might be a mile or so trail that looped around the park. The parking lot isn’t very big but there was only one other car parked when we arrived. The trail starts out in a wooded section with a wide grassy surface. As we work our way around doing the caches, we come out into a clearing and now have a rather dry sandy trail to follow.

Wooded Trail at Tavares Nature Park

As we loop around at the south end, we come back up to the wooded section and a small pond. On the east side of the park, the wide grassy trail has become more of a wet, muddy mess. It didn’t help that some vehicle had driven thru the soft ground and rutted the trail up. We are able to tip toe thru the muck and keep dry. Back at the car, I walk across the street and check out the lake with lots of homes and boat docks. Turns out this is the western end of Lake Dora. This ended up being a nice day.

Lily Covered Pond

Muddy Trail

Lake Dora

Super Bowl Sunday was upon us and we wanted to get in a bit of a walk before the game started. Dade Battlefield Historic State Park is very close to camp. We have actually been there once before about 2 years ago. During the first full weekend of January they hold a reenactment of the start of the Second Seminole War at this spot. While that was a pretty neat thing to experience, we really hadn’t gotten a chance to explore the park since there were so many people and things going on. Coming on a Sunday in early February, we should have a better chance to look around without the crowds.

We don’t have the place to ourselves but there are only 5 other cars here, so we shouldn’t have a problem getting to see everything. Some of the outside displays include the cannons that are used during the reenactment. The visitor center has lots of displays and information and includes a short video about the battlefield and its history. There were a couple of campers here but I suspect these are some of the volunteers that get a site for working here. When the reenactment was taking place, the grounds had lots of campers and tents with the many dozens of people taking part in the event.

Cannon

Azalea in Bloom

Painting of Battle

After checking out all the historical things, we decided to get in a short walk. There is a 1.7 mile trail that goes around the perimeter of the park. While it might not rival trails in other state parks, it was a pleasant walk and got us ready to watch the big game. We have less than a week left at Sumter Oaks but we haven’t run out of things to see and do.

Wide Trail at Dade Battlefield