I joined a book club back in November…believe it or not, this is my first ever book club. It’s called Nature Walk. You meet in a local park, walk around for about an hour visiting & getting to know each other, then sit down at picnic tables & discuss the book. It’s run by a librarian from Orlando Public Library & she is great. And so are the other women in the group. It’s not only nice to go to new parks, & to read book I might not have chosen or even heard of, but my point in joining the group was to meet people.
So, at Decembers meeting, I met Jackie. She’s a professor at one of the colleges here in Orlando & we discovered we both enjoy kayaking. Although….she’s an expert & I’m a newbie. She had some time off over Christmas break & invited me to go kayaking in Kissimmee, about 30 miles south of Orlando. I’ve never kayaked in a river or creek, just in lakes. I’ve never kayaked where alligators live. I hate dark water. It felt out of my comfort zone, but I was not about to say no. This felt like it was a super great opportunity to learn, get more comfortable with things I was not, & to spend time getting to know a new friend. And, I was super grateful Jackie was willing to take me out when she had no idea my skill level (or lack of), my personality, or really much about me. So, here’s to saying yes to those things that scare you & doing it with someone you barely know. Not advice to give a 10 year old, but wonderful for someone my age.
Jackie planned the whole trip, I loaded up my kayak in the back of the 4Runner & we met at Shingle Creek Park. We launched the kayaks & within about 10 minutes, I suddenly felt pretty comfortable. She was such a great guide…about the water, the birds, the wildlife, kayak knowledge & we also visited & told a little bit about ourselves. No one else was out this early morning.
We saw a ton of wildlife this morning….all kinds of birds, deer, an owl, an otter, & for the first time in my life….a white squirrel. Also, I saw a deer swim across the creek…I’ve seen a gazillion deer in my life (three attached in a sickening way to the front of two of my cars), but I’ve never seen one swimming (no photo of that).
The water was so calm & still.
Bard Owl
As we kayaked by a downed tree, I thought I saw a white squirrel. Not believing my eyes, we went back for a look. Sure enough, there it was, running up & down a tree to a nest. I took a lot of bad pictures, but this was the only one that was sort of good. You can see it’s white fluffy tail next to the trunk. Pretty cool!
We went as far as we could upstream, then turned around & went downstream. Upstream had been big & wide & easy. But once we turned downstream, it got much much more narrow. The X of trees marks the entrance to the narrows.
I just followed Jackie & tried to imitate her.
Once we made it to the end of this section & turned around to go back, the current was much stronger going upstream.
This section (where Jackie is about to go into) was so narrow, your boat would fit through but not your paddle unless you turned it vertical. In that spot the current was super strong due to the narrowness. I didn’t make it through the first time, & the current pushed me back a bit (you couldn’t paddle in the narrow part), but was successful on my second try.
What a good day! She said she’d never seen so much wildlife there before & never kayaked this water without seeing other people. As we were taking our boats out, three kayakers were entering the water & it was beginning to sprinkle. Looks like we had great timing on this trip.
I thanked her so much for inviting me to do this trip!
Then I made a quick stop in Kissimmee for a cuban sandwich, that was sadly one of the worst I’ve had. I’ll keep trying.
It was such a fun kayak trip & I’m grateful to have met Jackie. She works during the week, but we’re hoping to meet up on some weekends. My first foray into kayaking in moving water & I was super thankful to go with a new friend.