The ranger that verified our reservation at the Ochlockonee River State Park entrance station warned us with, “I wouldn’t let your dog swim in the rivers. We have a little bit of everything here: snakes…gators…bears.” A sign at the boat ramp, went a step further and advised visitors with: Caution. For Your Safety. Alligators are dangerous. Do not swim with alligators. Do not approach, frighten or feed by state law.
The tag line for the Sunshine State’s parks is “…the Real Florida.” Based on the boat ramp’s sign, I guess visitors need to be reminded that they’ve left the theme park zone and are in the wild. We didn’t see any signs of gators, but I still voted to walk away from the water, on the woodland path.
While standing at the edge of Ochlockonee, I noticed the distance horizon lacked relief. It was flat. So flat, that if I’d grown up here, a round world would have been inconceivable. Our late afternoon hike was short, we followed the river trail loop through the pine flat woods until we found a trail back to the campground.
We just stayed one night. In the morning we walked through the woods looking for birds and spotted a yellow-bellied sapsucker and a red-breasted nuthatch. Thankfully during our short visit we didn’t encounter any snakes, gators or bears.
