Cypress Glen Camp at Silver Lake for 11 Days

We left Paul & Helen’s on Sunday morning to drive only 25 miles to one of our favorite campgrounds. The area is called Silver Lake which has 2 campgrounds with water and electric hookups and one rustic campground for tents. These campgrounds are in a State Forest and they now take reservations. However with the Covid restrictions this year they are only using 50% of the sites so we have lots of room and we are not near anyone. As I mentioned a few weeks ago we had to find different places to camp from our original schedule since Ocean Pond Campground was closed so we added 3 more days here.

Canoeing/Kayaking

Beside this being a beautiful area, the two main reasons we come here is for the canoeing and the biking. We are only 100 yards from launching our canoe into a wide spot on the Withlacoochee River called Silver Lake. The river is slow so you can paddle upstream or downstream from our campsite and then paddle back so no vehicle shuttle is necessary. However if you do want to set up a shuttle you can drive down the road about 10 miles to a wayside park in Nobleton, drop off your vehicle and use the paved bike trail to bike back to the campground. You can also paddle upstream and try the narrow winding Little Withlacoochee if the water level is high enough or continue upstream on the main river past the Crooked River Campground as far as you like and then paddle back to camp.

Biking

You can bike 1-1/4 miles through the campground and reach the 46 mile long paved Withlacoochee State Trail at mile marker 9. From that trail here you have 3 options. Pedal south to Trilby the start of the trail, Pedal north toward Floral City & Inverness or go north about 1 mile to the 10 mile long paved Good Neighbor Trail and go west to the city of Brooksville. The map I posted shows the options, the white dots are one mile markers.

This is a view of the river near Crooked River Campground upstream from Silver Lake

Paul & Helen came over to visit us on Friday with their new Chevy Volt. They were so nice and brought over a prescription that I had mailed to them that was supposed to come before we left our visit to their home in Inverness.

We had a nice afternoon talking about old trips to Mexico and the past election. It was a nice rest day and gave me time to write this blog.

Here is a picture Helen took a couple of years ago at the very same campsite.

The Withlacoochee River is very pretty and is lined with Cypress trees and it flows through state forest land without any private homes along the way.

We will be here at this same campsite for 8 more nights. We plan to bike & paddle before we move head a little further south to Lithia Springs outside of Tampa.