Lithia Springs near Tampa

 

After staying overnight with my friend's Paul & Helen, I planned to shop and stay overnight at a Lowes near the campground so I could get to campground early on Sunday morning and get a campsite when the weekend campers leave. This campground does not take reservations. 

When I got near Tampa the forecasted heavy rain started, I thought that will chase the weekend campers away, so I decided to go directly to the camp at about 11 AM Saturday. I got campsite #50 near the river take-out beach trail.

Barry & Kimberly arrived on Sunday afternoon and we paddled the Upper Alafia River on Monday at a flow of 315 CFS. Which was great since it had been very low the past two weeks.

This is another favorite campground I havestayed here 15 different times over the past 24 years. Lithia Springs County Park has a large spring which is their swimming area. The water flows into the Alafia River. 

There are two sections we paddle. I like the upstream section from Alderman Ford to the campground which is a 9 mile paddle with a good current and little sandstone rapids. The difficulty for beginners is not the rapids but there are dozens of fallen trees to duck under, or paddle around.  Turtles, large birds and alligators are easy to see.

We had our campground host Chris drive Barry's van and our three kayaks to the put-in and then he dropped the van back at our campsite. 

Here is a picture of Chris last year with my kayak. He used to take Peggy & me along with our canoe with his jeep. I really appreciate all the help he has given me.

The lower section starts from the campground and is almost 7 mi to the Brandon Boat Ramp. No fallen trees, just limestone riffles. The last 3 mi has some big houses and some small motor boats, so I don't like it as well as the upper, but if the river level is low it is still paddleable.

The river level was dropping fast; we ran the upper at the peak flow of 315cfs on Monday and decided to paddle the lower on Wednesday which already had dropped to 215 cfs. The lowest I ever run the lower was 140 cfs. 

Barry dropped his car at the boat ramp take-out and peddled his bike back to camp, only an 8 mi ride on bike trails and neighborhood streets.

On Tuesday we took a 19 mi bike ride through all the concrete trails at Fish Hawk Ranch. As usual even though there are thousands of homes very few residents use these beautiful trails in their natural areas.

The weather all week was cool, 50 in morning and 65 for highs but finally on Thusday it is getting sunny and warmer.

 

Peggy checking out the FL Sandhill Cranes on the Fish Hawk trails.

On Thursday I decided to rest and work on my blog while Kimberly left early for a long bike ride and Barry left after lunch for a short bike ride.

On Friday we wll all take another long ride through the trails in Fish Hawk Ranch.

The Alafia River should still be high enough on Saturday for another upper run. The temperature are forecast to warm into the mid-seventies with sunny skies.