Hiking In and Near Cedar Key

February 2024                                                          Most Recent Posts:
Cedar Key RV Resort                                            Cedar Key – the Island Town
Sumner Florida                                                       A New Plan in Florida

In addition to hiking around the sweet town of Cedar Key which I did multiple times, I found a few other trails reasonably nearby.

One of the first trails I hiked, though I’m not sure I can call it a hike given how short it was, is the Railroad Trestle Trail.  Still it’s interesting.  It’s located just on the edge of town right off the main incoming road from the mainland, Route 24

Cedar Key was once a railroad town.  The first train arrived on March 1, 1861.  You can see from the map (which suffers from the light and being a phone picture) that it was a cross Florida railroad from Fernandina Beach on the east coast to Cedar Key on the West.  It was largely the project of State Senator David Yulee. This article tells the very interesting history including the destruction caused by the Civil War from which it really never recovered.  Daily passenger and freight service continued until the 1880’s when Henry Plant’s railroad by passed Cedar Key for the larger port of Tampa.  The Plant vendetta is also covered in the article.   The last train left from Cedar Key in 1932.  

At that point the line was abandoned and nature reclaimed the land.  But when development mushroomed in the late 1990’s there were those who wanted to preserve some of the pristine habitat areas.  The trail project was undertaken to both preserve habitat and history.

The trail is at best half a mile beneath towering pines and cedars.  Along its sandy path there are a variety of plants many marked with identification signs.   Looking closely I saw at least one railroad tie along the edge of the raised trail. 

The Spanish Bayonette’s serrated margins and pointed tips of its stiff linear leaves are responsible for its name.  I kept my distance.  You can see the water in the background.  The trestle is built pretty much on an arm sticking out into the marsh.  It is a raised roadbed.

At the end you can look across the marsh to where the line once connected with the main shipping dock.  Some old trestle posts are still visible at the water’s edge.

At this point you can see the small mangroves dotting the water.  I saw one boat of folks who seemed to have the whole place to themselves which was very appealing. Look closely at the picture below.  Now to figure out where is a put in to get there and to not get lost.

This was a very nice little hike which I took more than once as hiking was somewhat limited nearby.

Another “in town hike” was what they call the Cemetery Boardwalk.  Not as interesting as the trestle hike but popular with families and fishermen as it leads to Cemetery Point Park.  The boardwalk starts just to the left of the entrance to the cemetery.

Everything in Cedar Key seems to be on the edge of the water and the boardwalk takes you through the mangroves along the water’s edge.  The mangroves help  protect the cemetery from flooding.

When you reach the end of the boardwalk, you have arrived at the park.

The Red star shows the end of the boardwalk.  The walking trails are the light brown lines.  There is a “fitness” trail with work out stations on the far right top of the map in dark brown.  The blue lines are the Disc Golf course.  There are picnic tables and what the map calls a kayak landing rather than a launch.  It would be a long haul to bring your kayak to it.   Disc Golf and fishing seem to be the two most popular uses for the park.

One of the work out stations

One of the disc golf baskets

 

Not sure if this is a fishing spot, kayak landing  or both. 

As you can see from the map above, the park is surrounded by water on 3 sides. It’s a very nice public space.  Nicer than many in much larger towns I’ve visited.

I could not get this nice map of Cedar Key to lie flat for its picture so I hope you can see the detail.  If you are on a phone, I doubt it but try clicking the map to see if that helps.   Those who can see it will notice that Cedar Key is on multiple connected islands and is surrounded by islands.  All part of the Lower Suwanee National Wildlife Refuge. 

The yellow section near the bottom of the map is the “downtown” area.  The mainland connects to Cedar Key at the top of the map at No 4 Bridge.  And the very bottom right is the island of Atsena Otie Key to which I kayaked one day.  Post to come.

All of the hikes from here on are part of the Lower Suwanee National Wildlife Refuge established in 1979 to protect the water quality of the Suwanee River Estuary.  The Refuge is one of the largest undeveloped delta-estuarine systems in the United States.  It completely surrounds Cedar Key.

One of the very interesting parts of the refuge is Shell Mound.  It’s on one of the many finger peninsulas that jut out into the gulf,

There are two trails at Shell Mound.  I’m going to do a separate post on the Shell Mound Trail but the other trail was a nice more than a mile loop called the Dennis Creek Trail obviously because it crosses Dennis Creek and travels across one of the tiny coastal islands that dot the waters everywhere around Cedar Key.

The trail goes through a coastal hammock between saw palmetto stands and under wind swept oaks.

The ecosystem changes as I cross the boardwalk over the salt flats to the island. 

There are interesting interpretive signs along the trail through the salt marsh immediately adjacent to the Gulf of Mexico..

The boardwalk goes over the island  and leads to a scenic observation deck.

The large lake here is at the center of the island.

It appears this may be damage from the fall hurricane of 2023.

Oyster beds are visible along the edges of the creek but I am surprised when I walk down this short side trail to find a big  pile of Whelk shells on the side.

It is illegal to harvest live whelks.  How did such a pile get here?   Could it be a midden?   I thought those were nearly always oyster shells.

Many of the whelk shells are good size.

Dennis Creek as seen from the last boardwalk.

Other hikes I took or tried to take in the Lower Suwanee National Wildlife Refuge that surrounds Cedar Key were somewhat less successful

Like Cedar Key Scrub State Reserve which protects some of the lastsremaining scrub habitat in Northern Florida.  This is not a favorite habitat of mine but many threatened and protected species depend on this habitat notably the Threatened Florida Scrub Jay.

I’m a fan of the Florida Scrub Jay and hoped I might see some here.  They are fun birds attracted to shiny things like sparkles on hats as David and I found out at the  Lyonia Scrub Jay preserve  near Deland Florida and Blue Springs State Park.

I was hoping perhaps to see some here.

There are two sections to the park.  Perhaps I was on the wrong side.

The entry trail started off seeming possible.

But it very quickly became clear to me that there wouldn’t be any jays near these roads.   I walked quite a way along this one looking for trails into the scrub but no luck.

The information kiosk says pets must be on a 6’ leash,  still this looks like a great and safe place to let a canine burn off some energy chasing a ball or a frisby up and down this road.

I had better luck with one of two trails near the Refuge Headquarters.

As you can see from the map, there are many different ecosystems in this section of the Wild Life Refuge. 

I wasn’t able to hike in  the in the floodplain swamp or the bottomland hardwoods.  The River Trail  had been destroyed by the recent hurricane. I was really sorry as I wanted to walk along the Suwannee.  Apparently funding for repairs/replacement is the issue.  Does that always seem to be a problem for the National Parks and Wild Life Refugest?

I was definitely bummed when I encountered this sign.

But I did walk the Tram Ridge Trail named I assume since it was once a logging railroad bed.  This land was also used for turpentine extraction in earlier days.    There were information signs along the way.

There were several cypress ponds which I know the frogs must love.

Among the habitats were hardwood and pine and scrub oaks as below.

The trail becomes wet and muddy and I am so glad that some instinct told me to put on hiking boots for this trail.  I usually just hike in my walking shoes in Florida.

Whoever drove over made the mud worse.

Trying to hike around the mud but not get cut by the palmettos was a challenge.

The boardwalk was very welcome though it did not take me to the end of the trail.

Not sure what these pretty little things were there in the scrubby flatwoods but they brought a smile to my face and were the last photographs I took on the trail.

In my efforts to get some exercise other than walking around the campground or town I investigated most of the hiking possibilities within reasonable driving distance.  None of the trails were quite long enough.