On Friday, December 8, 2023 we left Lake Louisia State Park in Clermont to drive a little less than an hour north to Lake Griffen State Park in Fruitland Park, FL for a 14-night stay. This would be our first time camping in Lake Griffen State Park and we were curious what it would be like.
Lake Griffen State Park is 620 acres in size with 40 campsites in a compact loop within a natural Florida environment. All of their sites have water and electric and some sites also have sewer service. They have a dump station but it is in a difficult location to use, depending on where your site is bringing you from. We didn’t have sewer at our site but we chose not to dump before leaving to avoid the difficulty of getting into it. We also knew we would have sewer at our next site and could dump there.
The park has two hiking trails totaling two miles in length and we hiked both of them many times during our stay. These trails afforded us the opportunity to see several different habitats including forest, sandhill, swamps and marshes. We were told we might see raccoons, bobcats, coyotes and bears, but we only saw one of those, a bear that was on a trail we were on our first full day. It was an exciting start to our stay.
This campground sits on the west side of Lake Griffin (hence the name), a 9,500 acre body of water that is the 8th largest lake in Florida. We took a pontoon boat ride tour on the lake and enjoyed the experience. The state’s second largest live oak tree is also in Lake Griffin State Park and it is a sight to behold!
Saturday, December 9th we ate breakfast and then decided to hike over to see the state’s second oldest live oak tree. However, before we got very far we saw a huge black bear about an eighth of a mile in front of us on the trail. Cindy was whispering, “Oh my god, oh my god!” while she struggled to get her phone out to take a picture. The bear spotted us and started to climb a tree it was next to, but then opted to run off into the marsh next to the trail. Fortunately, Cindy got a few photos before we lost sight of Ursus Americanus in the overgrown bushes and trees.
After that bit of unexpected excitement, we continued on the trail to see the state’s second largest live oak tree. It was amazing to see how tall and wide it was as we came around the curve of the trail with it looming so high above us. That sight alone is worth a trip to this park.
On Thursday, December 14th we drove back into Orlando to spend a few hours working in our storage room doing a small amount of culling and a large amount of rearranging. My back was screaming at my brain, “Why do you like to read SO much???” as I moved heavy bins of books around.
We were supposed to take a pontoon boat ride tour on Lake Griffin Saturday morning at 10 am. Mother Nature had other plans. A storm was coming in from the Gulf of Mexico with heavy rains and possible tornadoes. The boat operator called and said we would need to postpone until sometime the following week. That was fine with us as I have no desire to be on a lake during a storm. By 9:40 rain started sprinkling and at 11 am it became a steady downpour. Then it became harder at 2:30 pm and even harder at 4 pm. By 5 pm we were being assaulted by thunder, lightning and howling winds. It rained all night and into the mid-morning of Sunday before finally passing through.
Monday night we watched the final episode of the “Moonlighting” re-watch we had started a couple of months back. Both of us realized that when we first watched the show when it originally aired, neither of us had had watched it through to its rather boring later seasons. We remembered it had seemed to lose its way and that it was moved around on the airing schedule, so we must have both been part of the great mass of viewers who just gave up watching it. Accordingly, during our re-watch we got to see shows we had not seen and the final episode (because they knew it was the last they threw some of the old fun stuff back into it) was very enjoyable.
It was, however, especially sad to see Bruce Willis so jocular and full of life as a performer back then compared to the life he is currently living. I mean, he is the same age as I am. That could be me. Maybe it IS me and I just don’t know it.
Tuesday morning, December 19th we finally got to take our boat tour ride on Lake Griffin. The weather was beautiful. The first part of the boat ride was on the 1.5 mile stretch of the “dead river”, known by that name because there is no current in the water. Despite that rather lifeless nickname, this section is home to an abundance of wildlife and is very scenic. We enjoyed the tour and the captain was extremely knowledgeable. The lake covers 9,400 acres and its depth ranges from 6 feet to 30 feet, with an average depth of 12 feet. We saw an alligator, some blue herons, ibises, turtles and state inspectors in airboats out checking the lake for invasive species of water plants.
On Wednesday I installed new, heavy-duty stabilizer jacks on Nomad. The ones that came on the unit (2500 pound) were not very sturdy and were rusting. One had even bent. So I bought 9000 pound Libras, a brand I have seen recommended over and over again. The 9000 pound size is a bit of overkill, but I wanted to know they would last and give us a lot more stability when we’re set-up at a site.
It took a little longer than I had anticipated because I was jerry-rigging a tool for one I didn’t have. Then, as I was removing the last old one, one of the screw heads broke off as I was attempting to remove it and this in turn wrecked my homemade tool. So I had to drive up to Ace Hardware and get the actual tool, return, and finish the job. I was sore all night from crawling around under the trailer switching out the jacks. I’m getting too old for this $hit, lol!
Thursday, I finally got around to mounting the spare trailer tire back under the tongue of the trailer. I’d like to meet the nitwit who designed this way of carrying a spare tire. I’ve been keeping it in the bed of Voyager since Maine (September) because I did not want to go through the trouble of trying to get it mounted where it goes Why, oh why, did they not reinforce the back bumper and mount the spare there, like normal trailers? It’s almost impossible to do it by yourself, but I have done it twice now since we started traveling. Both times it has been a real back-breaker combining old, atrophying muscles and a minimal amount of ingenuity. I used a bottle jack and two jack stands to hold the tire in position while I threaded it onto the two bolts that hold it up snug against the underside of the tongue. It took me about an hour but I finally got it done. My body asked me all night why I was punishing it so much!
I was also going to install my new power tongue jack that Lippert, the manufacturer, sent me. You might remember that a couple of months ago I mentioned that there was some kind of white liquid oozing out of the jack. I contacted the manufacturer asking what it might be and what I could do to stop it before something went wrong with the jack. They asked me when and where I had purchased it so I sent them the receipt (we got it in Canada in 2022) and, as Gomer Pyle used to say, “Surprise surprise”, they sent a brand new one to Amber’s house in November. I had planned to install it the same day I was working on the spare tire, but I discovered I needed a contact ring to crimp onto the raw wire end they included in the package. So now, I need to go to a hardware store and get one of those to make sure my connection is tight and secure. More work for another day.
For the most part, we enjoyed our stay at Lake Griffin State Park. Friday. morning we packed up and headed back down to Wekiva Springs State Park for the holidays.
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