SKP then Koreshan

February 3 –February 13, 2023                                  Most Recent Posts:
Koreshan State Historic Site                  Hiking at Lake Kissimmee State Park
Site 48                                                                  Lake Kissimmee: Kayaking
Estero, Florida

Koreshan was hit badly by the hurricane and has been closed ever since.  I was quite worried that I would be stuck in Florida in February with no campsite.
My reservation was supposed to start on the 31st of January for 2 weeks.

Luckily in playing the Florida Lottery I had overlapped my reservations at Lake Kissimmee and Koreshan.  Usually I cancel these overlaps but also “fortunately” I forgot about this one.   Hmmmmmm

Anyway, the park sent me an email saying they would reopen on the 3rd of February.   My reservation at Lake Kissimmee ended on the 2nd so I only need a one night overlap.

I had been on a FHU site at Florida SKP park before going to Kissimmee and had asked them then if I could come for one of their over night or boondocking spots.   When I arrived February 2nd they had a 30 amp grass spot so that’s where I spent the night before  moving on to Estero.  I love Escapees.

I had other RVs on passenger side and the fence dividing me from the next door orange grove which is patrolled by a crowing rooster and some Rhode Island Reds.  Same birds we raised for years.  I felt right at home.   Never saw the rooster but I heard him loud and clear.  The hens were busy working over the area around the orange trees.

Hens busy at work

On February 3rd I moved to Koreshan State Historic Site which has a very interesting history that I’ve talked about in previous years’ posts.  You can find those by typing Koreshan in the search box on the top right of this blog.  I’ll also include a link to a fairly good video in my next post about the grounds.  It’s an intricate and pretty amazing story if you hear it all.   And of course I have a book if you are really interested in this unusual “community” and it’s even more unusual founder.

I really do love/hate this park.  Their Friends group is so active.  They do tours of the historic area and have demonstrations, they have an annual “ghost walk” that happened the week-end I arrived but was sold out.  They have musical performances and lectures in the Art Building, have ranger talks on butterflies and birds and tons of other things, lead a guided kayak trip on the river and there is a farmer’s market on Sunday.

What I do not like about it is the campground whose sites are very narrow.  I thought I’d picked one with a wide opening and it was fine.  I got Winnona in but I was too close to the pine tree on the driver’s side where the site narrows.  When I went to pull out and move over, the wheels must have been turned and I clipped the tree.  No damage to the tree but here’s what happened to Winnona.

Luckily the lights all still work but I pretty much spent the 9 days I was at the park trying to get this repaired at least enough to be driven.   Unfortunately when I went to leave the park the connection between the lights on the RV and the lights on the car no longer work.  I can’t help but think it’s something in the repair since it had been fine for over a year.  Now I have no turn signals or brake lights on Ruby.  Pretty sure that’s illegal.

I definitely hope bad luck doesn’t come in 3’s because right after I had this problem and got the RV positioned correctly and went to level up I found the passenger side was quite low.  The site was too narrow for me to try to reposition again and I wasn’t in any mood to so I thought I would just use enough blocks to take care of it.  

When I went to put the jacks down, they all came down but the passenger’s front which would extend only about an inch.  I’d had no trouble with it at Lake Kissimmee, up and down with no problem.  I hadn’t used the jacks at SKP the night before.   What is going on?

No amount of storing them and putting them out would get me level.  Without being level, I couldn’t put the slides out.  I called the office for a recommendation of an RV Tech.  No they don’t recommend but they could give me 3 cards.  I asked the camp host.  No he did all the work on his RV himself.  Yes that’s what David did, but I don’t.  So I started googling and reading reviews.  Luckily I had gotten here in time to find someone and call them but more on that later.

In these 9 days, I did hike the trails numerous times and kayaked the Estero River once on my daughter’s birthday February 7 to celebrate one of the best things in my life.   I also went to the farmer’s market both Sunday’s I was there.

So I’ll start with the Farmer’s market  on Sunday and return to the Friday I arrived problems later.

This is the hike from the campground to the Settlement Grounds where the Farmer’s Market is held.   it’s a lovely riverside path through pines and palms and the dreaded bamboo.  More on it next post.  That’s the river on the left of the picture to the left.

The Settlement has two lovely bridges.   This is the one I crossed on my way to the market.

There were many booths selling everything you could think of.  I’ll highlight 3 of my favorites.  

Artisian Bread is my downfall.  He makes fabulous bread and pastries.

Both weeks I bought some of his wares and I didn’t take one picture of them>

The name of this booth was Sea Glass Collections.  She’s made lovely jewelry and whimsical signs.  My friend Pam collects sea glass on the beach in Duck North Carolina and I know she will love these things.

And finally the produce vendor with I’m pretty sure every fruit or vegetable that grows in Florida and that’s nearly all of them.  Well maybe no peas.  Too warm now.  But plenty of ripe red tomatoes as you can see.

Definitely a great setting for a farmer’s market.  And WALKABLE!!

After I dropped my kayak rack off for repair, more on that later, I took the kayak to the boat launch and locked it so I could come any time and take it on the river.

Unfortunately because of my shortened stay and the number of chores I had to take care of,  I was only able to kayak the Estero river once.   Then, when I got what problems I could fixed I couldn’t get the high and low tides to make it possible for me to go back.

At the time the community was founded, this river must have been much wider and less over hung since they and later all their goods arrived by boat.  There were no roads here.

There are two directions to go,  east or west.  Meaning turn right or left out of the boat launch.  I turned right, went under route 41 and continued on as the river got smaller and smaller going toward its source.  This has always been my favorite direction to paddle her.

There are many fewer houses facing the river than going east toward the gulf.

As you can see the tide is going out so I can’t stay terribly long but on subsequent days the times were even worse.

There had been several obstacles in the river from the hurrican including what looked like a downed power line which I carefully avoided though I later learned that of course it had been turned off.   I wasn’t able to go nearly as far as I usually do when I met with a complete blockage of the river.

I had no choice but to turn around.   I was going to pass the park and continue on east instead.

I passed the ruined steps that once led from the dock at the store for those delivering or picking up goods here.

Back behind the trees is the  cottage of the original owner of the land Gustaf Domkoller.

This is the Bamboo Landing which was the entry way for all guests and visitors to the site.  Not a great look from my low in the water kayak but I understand that at the time, from a passenger ferry or other boat it was quite impressive.

The river is getting lower, the mangrove roots are reaching down.

This Great Blue Heron was the only bird I saw on this paddle.  I continued east and the river widened and there was a housing development along the shore.  The wind picked up and I wasn’t terribly interested in fighting the wind to see just how much development there was along the section of the river not protected by the park so I turned back and thought I’d come back on another less windy day and see what happens when you paddle west to the gulf, but that was not to be.

Back to the Friday I arrived problem.   That was the day I learned my lesson the hard way to ask a campground volunteer host or a ranger to guide me into the

narrow sites here.  After my research, I called Affordable Mobile RV Service and of course with such good recommendations they were booked out for a week.  I pleaded for them to fit me into their schedule.  After the accident, but before I called them I had discovered that my right passenger’s jack would not extend beyond and inch and thus I could not fully level the coach in this site that was very unlevel side to side.   If you aren’t level, you can’t put your slides out and it may damage your refrigerator.    The woman who does the scheduling, Karen, was one of the nicest people I’ve ever dealt with.  She understood my situation completely.  She said despite the fact that they were slammed and were one technician short,  she would try to send someone today.  It was 2:00 in the afternoon. 

As dark approached I’d decided it wasn’t going to be able to be today.  I hadn’t extended my slides but I was worried about the refrigerator.  Then there was a knock at the door.  I wasn’t expecting the owner Kevin to show up with his 30 years of experience but there he was that very day to help me with the jack problem. 

First he looked under the hood, checked the panel, listened to the hydraulic motor as we ran the jacks up and down several times but to no avail.  He’s thinking the solenoid is the problem.  Notice that he just leans over and looks in the hood.  For me to do that requires a two step stool.  Kevin is 6 foot 5.

He doesn’t have a solendoid but he does have a plan.  He says we’ll just use a bottle jack to hold that side up.  David had a bottle jack and I know it is in one of these compartments but I check and cannot find it anywhere.  Did I take it out thinking I would never use it?

No problem he’ll loan me one of his.  And down on the ground he goes to set it up.

One problem solved temporarily.  But by the time he leaves we’re working by flashlight and I’ve lightened the picture so you can see it.

The next Friday, seven days later he’s back to fix my damage.  As you saw in the above picture of the damage, it had to be repaired before I could leave the campground.  I was leaving on Monday.

And here’s my hero with the finished job.  I need to get a little paint but everything is working.  I sure hope this repair was not the cause of my lights problem on Ruby when towing which is my latest problem.

Next problem, I can’t give him his jack back right now because I’m not leaving until Monday and it’s only Friday.  I ask if I can drop it off on my way North.  He says “don’t worry about it.  You’ll need it until you can get it repaired”.   A nicer more knowledgeable technician and company you will not find.   Boy am I lucky they were so willing to work way overtime to help me.

And now to a problem that I did get solved.

I have had my hullivators on top of my Honda since the year after I bought the car.  David gave them to me that Christmas because they are hydraulic lifts.  But after nearly 20 years, one of the feet that support them had too much Florida Rust so I took the whole thing to Estero River Outfitters which I had used before and knew they were great.  I was right.  Justin did the impossible.

I had taken them to several other outfitters selling kayak/canoe car racks.  All of them told me that style was no longer made by Hullivator and I’d have to buy a whole new system for $1500 or $1600.   Justin on the other hand thought he had some old parts and could fix me up.   He said the hullivators themselves were still fine though I should try to mitigate the rust.   He took them off, kept the rack itself and in the picture above he’s reinstalling it with some new feet and new bars. Justin’s parents opened this store in the 70’s and their 3 sons co-own it now.  Justin is a wealth of information and knowledge.  What he doesn’t know isn’t known.  Can’t recommend him enough

Here it is all redone and ready to go.   I am a seriously happy and now unworried kayaker.  

And that’s about it for the things I did at Koreshan other than daily walks around and two tours of the grounds.  That will be in my next post.

I’m sorry to fill this post with so many problems but that was what happened over this time.  Yes it’s true I seem to have a lot  (maybe more than my share) of problems and they do cause me stress and worry.  We are all getting older.  Winnona, Ruby, and the hullivators are 20 years older.  I am many more years older than that.  We have our aches and pains but still,  we’re going to stick together as long as we can. I Love this way of life.

Hiking at Lake Kissimmee State Park

January 21-February 2, 2023                                   Most Recent Posts
Lake Kissimmee State Park                                      Lake Kissimmee: Kayaking
Lake Wales Florida                                                     Lake Kissimmee State Park

I forgot in my last post about paddling, subconsciously intentional no doubt, to put a picture of the damn dam that makes Lake Kissimmee possible.

This is what you can see of it from the kayak put in. The orange is the water block for the dam.  Notice the park’s boats there on the right.  At the launch you can only go left down to Lake Rosalie.  You cannot go under the bridge.

The other thing I forgot was the two videos I wanted to put in.  If you haven’t read the kayaking post you might want to first but for those who did,  The first short video is of my first attempt at kayaking on Lake Rosalie at the end of the canal.

And the second one is an even shorter seriously amateur video of the Anhinga playing his snake bird role and flying off.

On the days when I was not paddling up and down the canal at Lake Kissimmee as I talked about in my previous post, I was hiking on their trails.  As you can see, they have a lot of trails from .25 miles to 6.7 miles.  In addition there are service roads and fire roads which are also on the hand map which is in black and white.  But they are not on this posted colored version.

The Green Trail was nearest the campground and I walked it multiple times.  Sometimes connecting to the blue trail and some service roads to create a different route.  At first it was a shaded walk among lovely large Live Oak Trees.

Live Oak trees are so wonderful.  They can be from 40 to 60 feet tall with a 60 to 100 food spread and curving branches which in some cases will be lying on the ground.  They love this sandy soil.

And in many cases they are covered with Spanish Moss.  Both the tree and the “moss” are native plants and the moss is not parasitic on the tree but it can potentially shade it from the sun and block photosynthesis.

As I got closer to Lake Kissimmee on the trail, the habitat changed to open grasses and big sky.

And eventually to muddy and marshy.  That little white spot between the trees at the end of the road is the view of the lake.

Not much of a lake view and a wet and marshy shore line.  The arrow there indicates where the trail I was on goes next.  Doesn’t look like anyone has been able to walk there in some time.  High water.   At this point I backed up and started investigating how else I could get myself along this trail.

It takes the shade of the Live Oaks and palmettos to create a habitat for these bright shelf mushrooms.

I really love the shapes and structure of the Live Oaks.

At the end of one of the hikes  on this north east side of the park, I found myself at the Observation Tower.  It is 3 stories, 35’ tall but you can no longer access the very top level.  Apparently it has been this way for some time.

When I arrived no one but the guy on the railing was there.  The close up of him is for you Pam since you like vultures.

This is the view from the second tier with no zoom.  The railing is in the bottom corner of the picture.  You can barely see the view of the lake this was designed to showcase.

I asked a park volunteer who came around while I was here why it was closed off and he something structural and it had been that way for a long time.  I looked from here and from underneath but didn’t see anything.  I think the difference to the view from one  more story would be striking.

It would probably be a better version of this zoomed in shot I took from the 2nd level.

This view of the structure from the other side shows how much higher the third tier is than the one I was limited to

For some reason on several days after I got back from hiking, the deer were possibly looking for handouts that unscrupulous previous campers had given them. 

It was fun having them so close though I’d prefer that they were a tad wilder.  I always worry that when humans feed animals and then those humans disappear in the winter that can cause serious problems.  But of course in Florida, the campers are in the parks year round.

Don’t they just have the daintiest feet?

I have deer just like this at the farm and sometimes in my yard in family groups but this group hardly batted an eye when I came up and waked right by them into the rig.  At the farm, if I open the door, they are nothing but white tail flags as they jump the fence and are long gone.

They didn’t wander on until some time after I went inside.

This is the yellow trail on north west side of the park.  It is named for Kristin Jacobs a state representative who before her death from cancer at age 60, spent much of career focused on environmental issues.  The trail is a biking trail but in all the times I hiked it I saw mostly hikers and only one or two bikers.

The habitat it goes through is quite different from that on the east side of the park.

I was very shocked to see this on the side of the trail and wondered what predator here had left it.

I saw deer on this trail nearly every time I hiked it.

I recognized this destruction at the edge of the trail as the work of wild hogs.  Perhaps they are the predator.

These palm tree trunks are the result of the park’s reliance on controlled burns to imitated the actions of nature.

Even though I know this prickly pear cactus is native to Florida, it always surprises me that it is here and not in a desert.   I do love the various ways they grow.

Like deer, this west side had a number of live armadillos.

Looks like an armored animal.  Right down to his tail.  Amazing that he could be prey.

This installation at a trail crossing the park road was wonderful.  I wish I’d asked at the ranger station how it came to be and who built it.  I had noticed it the couple of times I’d driven in and out but I got a good look when the trail I was on crossed the road where it was.

Feb 1  black faced squirrel  Pretty sure he’s a Sherman’s Fox Squirrel.  He was great to watch.

I saw this guy a couple of times.  He’s a Sherman’s Fox Squirrel. He’s native to mid and northern Florida and South Georgia.  He’s a large squirrel with a fancy big bushy tail.

He was great fun to watch with his black face, white ears and nose.

I’m not sure what he has in his hands but he stood right up to eat it and didn’t mind me at all as long as I stood stock still.

Lake Kissimmee has two campground loops in figure 8.  Each of them has a “pioneer-tent”.  Not sure if these are done by the same company that did the glamping thing I showed in my Alafia River post.  You’ll have to click this link to see the inside as no one was using one the day I saw it and it was closed up.  They call it carefree camping.  What do you think?  Would any of you do it?

As I mentioned in my first post on Lake Kissimmee State Park, it is WAY OUT THERE.  The internet and phone are iffy.  It is 3 miles from the ranger station to the campground and 15.5 more to the nearest town of Lake Wales.  Where I went only once for groceries and a special treat.

I met Shayne and Bev at a very popular local restaurant named Jay Bees.  Shayne used to live in this area and suggested we meet there as they were going to be in the area.

One of Bev’s friends made her this great shirt.  The quote appears to be from Bev’s Bible.  Just in case I didn’t blow it up big enough for you to read it all, it says

YES,
I’m Always Cold
    ME 24:7
Book of Bev

The portions here are large.  Enough to take home for sure except Shayne will help Bev out with hers. 

But no sharing the wonderful chocolate peanut butter pie.  So glad I thought to get this picture before I scarfed it all up.  Boy was it delicious!!!