We have recorded 18 inches of rain in the past month and a half; all the rivers are near flood stage.
The one park that doesn’t close has the boat ramps closed because the dock is seriously under water.
The Red Tide has taken over most of the west coast. St. Pete, alone, has pulled more than 670 tons of dead from the water, and that barely makes a dent.
It is early in the season for both of these things. The rainy season is less than halfway over and the Red Tide has never been this bad this early.
I am almost done with a footrest I am making for my flat water boat and was hoping to try it out, it may be a while.
I went up to Silver River last weekend and it was beautiful. The lower part of the river was brown from the rain and the water levels were high but these were both minor. It’s a 2+ hour drive from St Pete but definitely worth it. I launched at Ray Wayside park and paddled up to the spring and back (11 miles) but you can launch from Silver Spring State Park and make a nice loop with the Fort King paddling trail. It wasn’t terribly crowded even on a Saturday.
The red tide is terrible, I live on my sailboat in a marina in downtown St Pete so I have been living in the fish kill for the last couple of weeks.
I have paddled the Silver River somewhere around twenty times, but at the moment I don’t have time to make a six hour trip. I just wanted to go and use up an hour or two, I am not, at the moment, entirely sure of my ability in that boat, I haven’t had a lot of seat time in it of late.
Good luck in St. Pete. I have friends in Shore Acres and the residential canals are packed full of the dead fish, it is horrible.
I’m not familiar with the red tide areas…been deleting the reports…going the other way…
what about?
Weki Watchie…
Mud river from Mary’s fish camp? gulf areas
Hilsbourogh state park…short paddle stay out of thee swamp
Lithia Springs park and upstream (water up? )
Brandon boat ramp on the Riverview River up stream to Lithia springs park. (water up?)
Arbuckle Creek or Arbuckle lake…near Avon Park, fl…water coulld be up
Lake Manatee state park…
I didn’t see any monkeys this time but I have seen them several times in the past. Hopefully all of this clears up soon but I think it will be around for a while unfortunately.
Not sure since it’s been awhile and I’ve never been there but aren’t the Crystal Springs close to where you are with that ultra-clear water?
Then of course there’s the swamp, and I suspect the East Coast isn’t too far away either, if I recall my Florida geography from vacations back in the day, eons ago.
Crystal river is a good 90 minutes away. East coast is 2.5 hours. If by the “swamp” you mean the Everglades that’s 3-4 hours. Tampa is centrally located but Florida is a much bigger state than many realize (and traffic is a problem)
Chassahowitzka perhaps? Homosassa? I am up north now and no idea of the flood situation near Tampa. Won’t the Hillsborough start down once the flooding ebbs at least in the upper reaches. I do like that river and liked it was so wild being so near Tampa
I borrowed a friend’s lake. For payment I spent a few hours fishing from a power boat, something I haven’t done for a while.
The fishing wasn’t bad, but…
I mainly wanted to test a footplate I had built. I wanted to test it to make sure it worked better than just good before I spent the time to finish it.
All of the rivers to the south an east are close to flood stage. The north and east of me has seen more rain. but they drain quickly. The Hillsborough and Manatee have dams that sloe that.
This boat won me a state championship before I went to a dermatologist. The Squamist Cell surgey
Damn, the surgery hit nerve in my left arm. I lost my rhythm to be able to paddle it for over a year.
So much of me changed during that time that the 3/4 tube used as a footrest could not work for me.
