Manatee Springs SP (Oct 30-31)

Thursday - This leg of the trip stretched our limit for distance at 205 miles. The drive was really fun, because we followed Hwy 98, which follows the coast most of the way. We got in and set up, then drove the Envoy to High Springs to meet our friends, the Masts, for dinner at Alice's. We had a great time catching up with everyone. There were eleven of us.

Friday - We took our morning coffee walk down to the springs and boardwalk to the Suwannee River. This is a very pretty, quiet area. We don't get any wi-fi or phone service here, but they have wi-fi down by the consession stand. They also have a good menu, but our meals are planned. We baked bread in the Dutch oven, which came out great. A deer came into our site and didn't mind at all being close to us. They have gotten quite tame here.

St. Joseph Peninsula SP (Oct 23-29)

Wednesday - Joan picked out a great route here, which skirted Panama City. We got here safely after driving 123 miles. After getting set up, walking our loop, and having dinner, we went over to the beach so Joan could take pictures of the sunset and John could fish the surf. Both of us were successful, with Joan capturing a beautiful sky and John catching a quite large ladyfish and having a couple others break off. He finally upped his tippet from 10 to 20 pound to catch the one. We put up the canopy with screening because of Mosquitos and biting flies. 

Thursday - We took an early walk on the beach with a nice cool breeze blowing and gentle waves breaking onto the beach. At intervals, we could see large fish chasing bait onto the shoreline. They are amazingly fast. Later, after lunch, we launched our kayaks over on the bay side. Things started off slow, but picked up after awhile. We each caught a trout, which is a good sign, but they were too small to keep. Legal is 15 inches , but we like them to be at least 17. It was quite windy, but we managed fine. In the evening we went back over to the beach to watch the partial eclipse and sunset and so John could help a new friend, Ed with his fly casting. He has a new 8 wt rod and hasn't used it yet. He actually did quite well. While fishing John had a fish hit and take out line well into the backing. Sadly it got off. It was a gorgeous evening again. We are really liking it here. 

Friday - Again, we walked over to the beach, but this time brought the fly rods. Ed met us there and practiced some casting and received a few pointers. There was little action except for groups of stingrays chasing bait. Ed and Pricilla are leaving, but we are planning on getting together on the Crystal River. After our scrumptious chicken and rice dinner that John does in the Dutch oven, we launched the kayaks in the bay to fish. It got quite windy on us making fishing difficult. We caught fish, but not the reds or trout we were after. 

Saturday - Down day today. We took a walk on the beach, then John tied a dozen flies (streamers and Clousers) and both did some cleanup. It was calm and pleasant over on our side of the campground so we decided to try to fish the surf. We were disappointed to discover that there was about a 20 mph wind on the beach, so casting a flyrod was not going to happen. We walked and enjoyed the sunset instead. 

Sunday - We took a walk on the nature trail that runs along the bay for about a mile. The tide was out, so we could see what the bottom looked like. We saw many areas that should hold fish when the tide comes in. Our friends, Robert, Tammy, Tanner, & Trenton, that we met at Cottonhill COE, came over to visit. We got the boys out in the bay in the kayaks, which they seemed to really enjoy. We then did hotdogs over a campfire. They live nearby in Panama City. 

Monday - The surf calmed down enough this morning to fish, so we gave it a go. We could see large fish traveling slowly north, but they turned out to be mullet, which are vegetarian. Tom & Lisa who live close to us up north came by while we were fishing and bidded us so long. They are the couple that have the sailboat. John caught a whiting, that are not supposed to hit flys, but this one must not have read the book. They are small, and one would not have done us much good, so we let it go.  In the evening, we launched on the bay with the idea of fishing shallow with top water hoppers. This was foiled because of grass floating on the surface. We went deeper and John caught two ladyfish, two too small to keep trout, and two pinfish. Our new friends Terry and Louise caught a flounder and a keeper trout. They were using live bait. Joan saw a bald eagle and osprey having a dispute quite close to her. It was a beautiful evening.  

Tuesday - We hiked the beach this AM and were the only ones on it. Nice! We then drove about 5 miles outside the park and checked out a beach area that is adjacent to an area of heavy rip-rap. This is supposed to be a good fishing area. The wind there prevented us from trying. Across the road is a kayak launch that looked interesting. We will have to try it when the tide is higher. About 5 PM we put the yaks in again and headed to deeper water. It was quite windy, so we nearly decided not to. We both tangled with hefty ladyfish that put up great battles. John caught a 22" spotted sea trout, which was the first keeper, edible fish on this trip. We were using sparse streamers on #1 hooks. 

Wednesday - We did some walking around and decided to take it easy today. We met a neat family down by the launch who were getting their inflatable kayaks ready. We were very interested in their stories of their adventures. John cooked the trout on the grill in foil, which was delicious. We also got some things ready to leave tomorrow. 

Rocky Bayou SP (Oct 17-21)

Friday - It was a hop skip and jump here today. We got set up and took a walk around the campground. Even though we were here back in 2009 it took a while for it to become familiar again. After showers and dinner, we drove down to the boat launch and fished awhile. Nothing! John doesn't think that trout and reds are in the bays yet in their winter locations. We did see a pair of dolphins chasing bait. They are always so cool to watch. We are planning on going over to Henderson Beach State Park next week and try over there closer to the Gulf.
Saturday - We launched the kayaks at the boat ramp and fished for about 3 hours. John had the only action, landing a 23 inch ladyfish that gave him a very good fight.We saw some fish crashing bait, but not a lot. We received some local advice for places to try,so we will give them a try next time.

Sunday - The last time we were here, we attended the Niceville United Methodist Church and really enjoyed it, so we decided to return again this year. On way, we stopped at The Coffee Shoppe and had a nice breakfast, then hiked at The Turkey Walk Park in Niceville. The boardwalk that runs along the river is spectacular and runs about three quarters of a mile. There are a couple of places where people can swim. The worship service was very nice with good music and a great message about anger.
We did a Wally run then just hung out around camp for the rest of the day.

Monday - We got a tip from the ranger here that the fishing is very good over by the Destin Bridge. We had intentions on launching the kayaks there, but when we got there, it looked like there was considerable area to fish from shore. There were several people already fishing, which is a good sign. We saw considerable amount of bait and the tide was moving very well through that area by the bridge. We fished hard for a couple of hours, but the only fish we caught was a small ladyfish. We only saw one other ladyfish caught all the time we were there and noticed that most people had left. It was a beautiful area, and although we had limited success, we enjoyed our time there. We stopped and had lunch under the bridge in the shade.

Tuesday - John had the brite idea to take a Tenkara rod down to the boat ramp and see if we could catch some pin fish using bits of Gulp Nightcrawlers on a bead head nymph. After John caught a couple of nice sized ones, he gave Joan a try. She had a nice sized one on when a school of 10 pound Jack Crevalle came by. One grabbed the pinfish and of course broke off the light tippet and took off. After dinner, we returned to the boat ramp to see if the Jack Crevalle would return. Sadly, they did not, we fished until dark anyway, but caught nothing. A man was fishing when we got there, but left leaving his rods there saying that he would be back soon. In a few minutes one of the rods began shaking, so Joan reeled in a nice freshwater catfish. John put it on a stringer and gave it to the man when he returned. Very strange!

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Blackwater River SP -Milton, Fl (Oct 12-16)

Sunday - After attending the outdoor worship service and saying goodbye to our friends, we made the 181 mile journey here. This is a gorgeous campground with new gravel on every site. There are only 30 sites and is almost full. This is a great place for kids, since there is a nice sandy beach on the river a short walk across a boardwalk away. John got the satellite set up after several tries. The tall pines here provide a challenge in finding open sky. We are too far from the Atlanta feed, so John missed seeing the Bears beat Atlanta.

Monday - We took an early walk, since it is still very warm here, with rain do later. We walked to the beach area and John tried the Tenkara with a all hopper. He got some action catching a small bream. We are hoping there might be som Talapia in the river. Joan took pictures while John fished. Thankfully, we don't have the gnats here. The rain has started about noon.

Tuesday - Heavy rains and lightening during the night, but no damage. More storms coming doing the day today. We are protected some from winds here in a pine woods. We headed into Milton to check out some parks on the water where we could launch the kayaks. We found a couple of beautiful ones, but it doesn't appear that the fish have come up into the rivers yet. We saw no action of fish crashing bait. Also, there were no fishermen anywhere. We also did a Walmart run. 

Wednesday - We tried to hike the trail down by the river, but after about a mile, we ran into water and had to turn back. It was a beautiful day , however. 

Thursday - Today was explore day to the coast. We started at Navarre Beach and paid a whole $2 to walk out on the fishing pier, to observe only. We saw a lot of fish in the water and also a shark cruising around not more than 200 yards away from people in the water. Several ladyfish were caught and a lady was quite excited with her Spanish mackerel. We then drove to the end of Gulf Islands National Sea Shore and checked out Ft. Pickens. Hie fort was quite interesting and was actually a Union stronghold during the Civil War. Again we walked the pier and saw several jellyfish float by. One man netted about a dozen mullet. We ended our outing with dinner on the water. 

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Cottonhill COE (Oct 9-11)

This was a shorter trip today, 135 miles. It was a very pretty drive the way we came. We picked up a lot of Argentine ants at our last stop and brought many of them with us. We had to do some spraying. Here, the problem seems to be gnats. Also the lake is choked with weeds. Hopefully, we can still fish. Our site is nice and shady.

Friday - Ants made their way along about 50 feet of satellite cable to get to the MH and we are out of spray. We found the local dollar store and took care of them. One way folks combat these Argentine ants is with Comet around anything that touches the ground. John had an idea to put cord into a container of Comet and run the cord around the wheels etc. it is important that the cord lays totally flat, so the area must be swept first. The fishing continues to be poor. 

Saturday - The families next to us didn't have a long enough cable to get their satellite working, so John loaned them our spare. They were elated that they could now watch Florida State play, and invited us to watch with them. We spent the afternoon, enjoyed getting to know them and shared burgers on the grill.

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Whitetail Ridge COE (Oct 3-5)

Monday - This was the longest leg on our return to Florida, covering 230 miles. It was cloudy most of the way, but cleared up when we neared LaGrange. We got set up and had Joan's stuffed pepper soup for dinner. This is a beautiful spot on site #47, on the lake. We went down to the boat launch and fished for a few minutes, but John lost the only biter.

Tuesday - We woke up this morning to a beautiful sunrise. This is something we miss at Trackrock because of all the mountains around us. Not complaining, though. Later in the Morning we took our Tenkara rods back over to the boat launch area and caught a bunch of bream. Most were too small to keep, but there were a few nice ones. John had a very large bass on, but the 4 pound test tippet on the Tenkara was no match for this fish. In the evening we fished there again using the 6wt fly rods, but it was much slower.

Wednesday - In the morning we drove over to the Horace King Recreation Area nearby and fished from shore. The shoreline has more gravel here and is less muddy than by the campground. The bream are larger here, but since we were going to go grocery shopping afterwards, we couldn't keep any. This time it was Joan's turn to hook a large bass, but the result was the same with it breaking off. We had the most success on small yellow hoppers. After doing some needed cleaning of the motorhome and dinner, we took our cane poles and plastic worms over to the boat launch. Together we hooked and lost three nice bass. It was a beautiful, warm evening.

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