The Florida Trail - Alexander Springs to Buck Lake

2/28/2018 – Arrived at Alexander Springs Rec Area, in Ocala National Park.  Plan to do some canoeing and hiking while here for the next 7 days.  67 miles of the Florida National Scenic Trail runs through Ocala NF, which is known as the heart of the FT.  The Florida Trail Assoc was founded by James Kerns, who envisioned a long distance hiking trail in FL while hiking the AT in the early ‘60s.  With the help of volunteers the first orange blaze was painted in Ocala NF in 1966.  The FT was officially recognized as a NST in 1983 and now is over 1,300 miles.

3/1 – Hiked the ½ mile connector trail from the campground to the FT than hiked 4miles north/west to a little past RT 19.  It felt good to be out on the trail after several days in a car getting here.  Pete O hiked with me.  The trail was will blazed and showed signs of maintaince, newly cleared trees and evidence of   pruning. There are signs all around about this being bear country, but no sign of bear.

3/2 – Was joined yesterday with the Banjaks.  Carolyn aka Freckles, was my hiking companion in 2014 for my AT thru hike.  Today with paddled the Alexander River starting at the spring in the Rec Area.  The river has a lot of vegetation so it was fun working our way thru little channels of clear water.  Only had to back up once out of a dead end.  Not many birds and only 3 gators.  Lots of turtles sitting on logs sunning themselves.  Freckles found an I phone, in a waterproof case, lying on the bottom of the river.  It still worked and Pete O was able to open some email and get in touch with the owner, so we were able to mail it back to him.

3/3 – Today was a hiking day.  After being dropped at Rt 42, Freckles and I hiked the 10+ miles north back to our camping area at Alexander Springs.  There was a large area that had been burned off and some hot spots still remained.  Some smoke and a few flames, but there were plenty of nice pine and palmetto forests.  While taking a break at a beautiful little spring Bookworm came along.  We had met him yesterday at the Alexander River Canoe takeout.  He is backpacking a section of the FT and had bushwhacked a mile plus to get to the swimming hole on the river.  When he got there he found the area full of trash, so after getting some big black trash bags from some folks at the parking lot he was taking a zero day to pick up trash.  He had gathered 4 huge bags full and there was still more.  I hope someone with a pickup truck was good enough to haul it out.  The amount of trash along the roads has been very depressing.  I can’t figure out what is wrong with people who just throw things out the window.

3/4 – Sunday – Some friends of Banjaks had joined us last night for camping and a cookout.  They live in St Augustine, FL and wanted to paddle the Silver Springs with us.  Silver Springs has a large Regis monkey population.  I have heard two stories on how they got there.  One they are left over from when the jungle area was used to make a Tarzan movie and the other story is that there was a tourist attraction that had monkeys and they had escaped.  I like the Tarzan story.  We paddled around the spring and river and saw lots of monkeys.  A few very young ones, with their mothers, who were quick to lets us know if we were to close.  The whole park at Siver Springs was crowded with kayaks and glass bottom boats.  Guess that is to be expected on a Sunday.

3/5 – Monday – Hike day.  We dropped a vehicle at Rt 19 and then drove to Juniper Springs SP to begin our hike.  I had figured the hike would be about 10 miles so Pete O decided to join Freckles and I for this section.  Very nice hike through dense forest and Farles prairie and some nice lakes.  We met up with Bookworm again, still hiking.  When we stopped by Buck Lake we learned that camping is no longer allowed around the lake.  The men we were talking to said they closed it for camping because of the “Rainbow” people.  The story is that there is a large group of “Grateful Dead” living in the Ocala NF.  I have seen no sign of them so not sure if this is urban legend or a fact.  It is a very large area so who knows what or who can be living there.  The hike turned out to be 14+ miles so we were pretty tired at the end.   I haven’t been doing enough hiking for that much mileage and guess what.  There was a hill.  I didn’t think there were any hills in FL.  I now have completed 26 miles on the Florida National Scenic Trail.  We will be moving to a camping area further west for a few days where I plan to hike the FT in the Withlacoochee SF.  This area is known for more challenging hikes.   Florida hikers go there to train for the AT.