Lake Kissimmee: Kayaking

January 21-February 2, 2023                                      Most Recent Posts:
Lake Kissimmee State Park                              Lake Kissimmee State Park
site 12                                                                     Florida SKP For the First Time
Lake Wales, Florida

Here’s a reminder of where I am in site 12 at Lake Kissimmee State Park.  What I LOVE about state parks as opposed to private parks is the ability to WALK not drive to all the trail heads and to the kayak launch.

And that’s pretty much what I did every day.  I alternated between kayaking the canal and hiking the trails.   The lakes are oten too rough and too many air boats which are VERY popular here.   So I did not kayak them.   The canal is about an hour paddle up to Lake Rosalie and is relatively sheltered from the wind unless it is blowing straight up or down the canal.

This is a combination of pictures from the days I was on the water. 

This launch site is just down from the damn dam.  The dam and canal control the water in both lakes.

I knew the deer were in my campsite and on the trails but I wasn’t really expecting them to wade in the water.  They must be getting their feet wet this close since the canal edges are marshy.   She’s really reaching out to get something.

I was also surprised that the birds on the canal were so skittish, given all the kayakers that must do this all year long.   Nearly all the pictures of them I took required my canon’s zoom lens since as soon as I got even 200 feet away it seemed, they were on the wing.   The exception was the egret who didn’t seem to be very bothered.  He saved a lot of energy.

How does a large bird like an anhinga perch on such insubstantial branches?  Especially with big black webbed feet.

Most of my days paddling down the canal were cloudy like this one.

Many of my bird shots looked like this.

All of these shots were taken from quite a distance and cropped.  This looked sort of like an anhinga apartment house with 3 floors.

Such wonderful feather patterns on their backs.

You can barely see the three in the tree branches on the right.

Notice the great green legs.   I think this is an immature Little Blue Heron but hopefully Laurel will let me know for sure.

That’s the opening to the lake.  The lovely red/pink are the maple catkins.  Spring in late January.

Not sure who the buoys are supposed to keep out of the canal from the lake but they don’t keep out fishermen with trolling motors.   Notice the bird on the pole.

I saw many more anhingas than Double Breasted Cormorants.  This is a zoom picture so you cannot see his great feather designs on his back.   The gray sky made it hard to show his designs.

Another distant bird shot but I got her closer later on.  I’m surprised I even saw her up there since I would never think to look for her so high up.  If you’ve ever heard a bird sound like a woman in distress, it’s probably a Limpkin like this.

Better light angle although I still had to lighten it.

I just love this rattling bird.  He is SO fast that I consider it a real coup when I can get a non blurry shot of him.  He doesn’t sit still long enough. 

This is the sort of thing I saw over and over.   And then too, many of the shots I tried to get of them in flight were too blurry.  It’s hard to keep up with a moving bird when you are zoomed in.   He flies right out of your frame.

I loved the shimmering water color look to these so I’m using 3 of them.  Even the one that isn’t quite sharp.

Who is this with the black wing tips?  Head is too light for a wood stork.  Can’t be a white pelican here.  Whooping crane has black feet.   I thought White Ibis only had black wing tips on the farthest ends of the wings not all the way around.  Help Laurel.

More birds in flight.

Aren’t they amazing.

And then there are birds that fly and swim.  The Anhinga is also known as the snake bird.  You can see why here.

I went out on the canal pretty much every other morning.  Some days were much sunnier than others

And some were much windier.

Still most of the birds were flying away when I got near.

But this kingfisher didn’t and you can see why.  How did he fly to this branch with that big fish?

These pictures are combinations of several days and on another day from the above I caught a great shot of this kingfisher chattering.

The rough water didn’t seem to bother this Common Moorhen at all. 

One of the birds I saw most frequently and one less likely to fly before I was anywhere near was the Little Blue Heron.

Turtles were only out on the sunny mornings which was less than half the days I was on the water.

The canal was exquisite on these few bright blue sky days.

I was surprised to spot this gator on the bank in the woods rather than in the sun where they usually like to soak up the heat.

In the picture above you have to look closely to see his head in the water.  He was relatively long.   Below is a close up of his eyes watching.

After I had already put the cloudy day pictures together I came upon this sunny day picture of the same Cormorant, I assume, perched in the same place on another brighter day.  His designs and black webbed feet are more visible here.

These are the days on which I feel as though I am paddling through the skies.

This water bird has  had his name changed so many times that I can’t keep up.   He was the Florida Gallinule, then switched over to the Common Gallinule and in 1982 to the Common Moorhen which is how I know him.  But in 2011 they switched back to the Common Gallinule but I’m not doing it.  I didn’t join in the switching around of the Rufous Sided Towhee to the Eastern Towhee either.   He’s rufous to me.

I was amazed that the moorhen was not the least bit bothered by being within a foot or two of my boat  and paid me no mind as he nibbled what I assume were seeds off of the grasses on the edge of Lake Rosalie

His bill always reminds me of Halloween candy corn.  He makes me laugh.  What a design.

Here’s a non water bird I was able to spot along the shore. the red bellied woodpecker.

This “look mom no hands” pose also always makes me laugh.

Don’t think this is the same alligator since he doesn’t look as long.  But I spotted him or a different day so it is possible.

As an appropriate ending to my days on the canal – another bird on the wing.

And on only one day did I see the darling Pied Billed Grebe who was there every day when I started out paddling and returned on the Wekiwa Spring Run.

I had intended to do one quick post on kayaking and hiking at Lake Kissimmee.  Clearly I got very carried away and unable to contain my pictures.  This is a constant problem for me.  Anyone with suggestions on how to curb it please do advise    Next post will be about hiking at the park.   I’ll try to do better but without some advice I don’t know if it will happen.

Lake Kissimmee State Park

January 19-20, 2023                                             Most Recent Posts
Lake Kissimmee State Park                               Florida SKP For the First Time
Site 12                                                               Highlands Hammock to Start 2023
Lake Wales, Florida

Pulled out of Lake Kissimmee State Park this morning (February 2)  on my way to Koreshan with a stop at SKP.  Koreshan was one of the last two state parks to reopen after the hurricane and they don’t open until the 3rd.  My reservation started today so I’m overnighting at Florida SKP since I had to leave Lake Kissimmee today.  Thank heavens for SKP!!   But I digress.  This post is about the first two days of my two weeks at Lake Kissimmee.  Yes, I am behind again.  But not toooo much.

Lake Kissimmee State Park is another park like Florida SKP, that in 11 years of spending winters in Florida, I had never been to.   It is not exactly on the lake but is on canals that lead into Lake Kissimmee and  Lake Rosalie both of which are located within the Kissimmee River.  Made possible of course by damn dams.

The park has its good points and its bad points.   If you want to be isolated, this is your place.  It is 3 miles from the Ranger Station to the campground and 15.5 miles from the Ranger Station to the nearest town, Lake Wales.

The sites are nicely sized and separated with vegetation.   There are many trails through the palmettos, sable palms and gorgeous large Live Oak trees.  There is a kayak on the canal leading to Lake Rosalie which is too big and too rough to kayak on.

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The down side is  the internet and fluctuating cell service.  Both are quite iffy though there is good wifi if you go to the camp store and not too many others are there.  The store is walkable if you are a walker.  Say a mile?  Or you can drive in a few minutes.  It’s on the fishing docks and power boat ramps

Lake Kissimmee itself is full of air boats whose pollution both noise and water make me angry.   And the last down side was a big one for me.  The mosquitos are out all day long.  If you do not have a screened room either plan to use a lot of deet or plan to stay inside unless you are moving as in hiking or kayaking.  No reading outside on the patio.  I optimistically put my reading chair out on my mat when I first arrived.

There are two campground loops each with one bath house and one washer and one dryer.

I met my first neighbor as I was backing into my site on the day I arrived.  In my backup camera, I saw him moseying along taking his time, directly behind me.  So I stopped to move him out of the way.  When I got out of the rig, a ranger was there in his ATV and moved the gopher tortoise and guide me into my site.   It was a very nice welcome.

As I was setting up my patio mat and chair I heard another neighbor snuffling around in the under brush.   Take a close look at his designs and colors.

What a face!

Although I only saw the tortoise one other time in the entire two weeks I was here, I saw an armadillo daily somewhere on my hikes or walks around the campground and very often in my campsite.

My second day I scoped out the park.  I checked out the store and walked down to the cow camp.  4 or so miles in total.

The store is called the Cracker Shack in honor of the Florida Cracker cattle and horses and those who tended and raised them, the Florida Crackers.

This view from the long docks shows the back porch where you can sit at picnic tables and use the wifi.   Not much in the store actually.  A few snacks, ice cream bars, t shirts and bait.  This side looks a lot like a cracker house (cracker shack) with the low roof to keep out the sun.

I made a big mistake here.  Not in hiking to the Cow Camp but in not coming back after my first visit.

This is the trail to the cow camp.  It’s a mile or so from the store.  Looks like they are funneling the visitors.  On this Friday, there was no one but me.

As you walk along there are these signs and a bench to sit and read them

Sign reads:  Imagine now that you are stepping into the past.  The year is 1876, this is a frontier region of Florida remote from towns, railroads or any of the comforts of civilization.  This is a cow camp where Florida cow hunters corral and catch the lean rangy scrub cattle for cutting and branding.  You will see the cattle and meet one of the cow hunters……  clearly the sign has not been repaired in some time.  But it seems to say this is a living history enactment.

Next sign says:  STOP  Beyond this sign you will enter the year 1876.  Grant is president.  The cow hunter you are about to meet is a hard working uneducated Florida cracker.  He likes to talk about his life and times and encourages questions.  Forget about the 20th and 21st century.  That history has not yet been made.

Great lead up I thought and appropriate delivery.

On the left is the pump providing water to the cattle pens.  On the right is the chickee, a shelter with no walls originally used by the Seminole Indians

The pump definitely works. 

I sent some down the trough and into the pen myself.

There was no cow hunter here today.

One side for his long table and bench on the right and his bed on the left.  The other side for a wagon.

I assume there would have been some sort of straw tick on the mattress.

There were several pens but no descendants of the Andalusian cattle brought over and left to run wild by the conquistadors.  The cow hunters were hired by the land barons to round up the wild cattle and brand them.  I didn’t realize that Florida was the first cattle state in the US.  Before Texas.  Florida still ranks high in beef production.

The pens overlook “range” as far as the eye could see.  I saw a horse out there but he was behind trees and too far away to get a good picture of.  Wonder if he was a cracker pony used to herd cracker cattle.

Unfortunately for me, there was no sign anywhere on the hike or here at the camp saying that any reenactment was done any more.  I later learned that there is a ranger who portrays the cow hunter on Saturday between 10 and 3.  I don’t know if they bring in any cattle or ponies but I doubt it since neither were here on the day before.  Apparently they used to.

The next day was Saturday but I usually stay home and away from the increased folks on week-ends and at that point I didn’t know anything was still done at the camp.   The next Saturday I had a 24 hour return of my fever and didn’t want to go anywhere.   I’m really sorry I missed this as it is the one really unique thing about Lake Kissimmee State Park.   So learn by my experience.  If you go to Lake Kissimmee State Park, be sure to visit the cow camp on Saturday and tell me all about it.