Day #78 – Fakahatchee Strand

Sarasota FL

The other day, we took a look at the owner’s manual for our new truck and discovered we had to drive, at varying speeds up to 55 MPH, for 500 miles, and then another 500 towing miles at speeds up to 50 MPH.  Who knew?!?  This meant we were forced to plan a trip of 500+ miles before we picked up the trailer.  Our friend Barb pointed out that a trip to the Keys would be about the right distance.

Due to budgetary and weather constraints, we decided to make a day trip to Big Cypress National Preserve (http://www.nps.gov/bicy/index.htm) in the Everglades.  We knew we’d fill in the remaining miles with errands around town.

I drove most of the way down, sticking to secondary roads where we could drive at slower speeds.  Our first stop was the Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park (http://www.floridastateparks.org/fakahatcheestrand).  This 5-by-20 tract of land is home to native royal palms, orchids and bromeliads, white tailed deer, black bears, Florida panthers, and snakes.  Many of the old logging trails have been maintained for hiking, but no camping is allowed.  The plan to restore the Everglades will have a major impact on this strand.  Even now, it is recovering quickly from a history of logging and drainage.  We had heard there was a boardwalk and we wanted to explore it.

We parked the truck and walked into the privately owned gift shop at the beginning of the boardwalk.  My eye was instantly caught by the sight of a Native American woman behind the counter.  Then, I saw a clothing rack filled with Seminole patchwork clothing – shirts, skirts, vests, and jackets.  I’ve read about this type of quilting and had seen pictures of it, but had never seen the real thing up close.  The artistry and workmanship took my breath away.  Every seam and corner was arrow-straight.  The colors were wild, but each whole garment brought order to the small sections of chaotic color.  I had always hoped to see this work somewhere in Florida, but never expected to find it by accident.  All the prices were way beyond my budget, and I was too shy to take a photo, but I enjoyed looking at every single piece in the store.  Kelly practiced infinite patience.


We experienced one Embarrassing Tourist moment.  A man of European descent, who had English as his main language, asked the sales clerk about a package of coasters.  I think he wanted to know whether the set had assorted images on the coasters.  He spoke to the sales clerk in a very loud voice and used broken, incorrect grammar to ask his question.  When she didn’t understand him, he spoke more loudly.  Finally, she understood what he was trying to ask and answered him in grammatically correct English, at a normal volume.  Later, Kelly asked her a question, in her usual soft voice, using correct English grammar, and got an equally quiet, English answer.

Our trip down the boardwalk was lots of fun.  Many people, walking quickly and talking loudly, passed us, hurrying off to the observation platform at the end of the boardwalk.  We heard two Barred Owls calling to each other across the swamp.  We saw an Eagle nest, tipped at just the correct angle to prevent us from seeing anyone sitting on eggs. (The trail guide indicated a nesting pair returned to this area yearly, and that it was the time of year for nesting.)  We saw two adult alligators and one baby.  The observation platform was small, but there were plenty of benches.  We watched Green Herons, Egrets, and a Little Blue Heron fishing.

Our walk took longer than we expected, so it was obvious that we weren’t going to get to the National Preserve Visitors’ Center before it closed.  We decided to mosey down the road anyway and see what turned up.

Every few miles, we saw small brown signs by the side of the road that said, “Indian Village.”  After passing several of these, I started to see a pattern to them.  Each was located behind a partial fence.  At the end of the entry road, there was a concrete building that looked like it might be a community center.  Around the building were other smaller buildings, all with thatched rooftops.  As we continued the drive, we passed tribal government buildings, a museum, and air-boat businesses.

I kept seeing Belted Kingfishers on the wires along the far side of the road.  After the eighth one, I stopped counting.  Either a couple of them were playing hop-scotch with me, or I saw more in one day than I’d seen in my whole life.  None of them did that helicopter diving thing, though.  Somewhere around the fifth or sixth kingfisher, Kelly took over the driving – she still thinks I can’t drive and spot at the same time.  (Too bad she never birded with my mother – I’ve seen her chase birds down unknown roads just to get a good look, and then get lost because she hadn’t paid attention to where she turned.)  We also saw two Bald Eagles, and a Crested Caracara.  At first we thought this was an Osprey, but it just didn’t look quite right.  We’d never heard of this bird before, but it was a perfect match to its picture in the bird book.  We also saw some Limkin and Tricolor Heron.  We saw a Reddish Egret with its neck feathers all puffed out.  Most of these were first-time sightings for me.

It was a looong day and we got back to the house very late, but we had a great time.  We both learned how to keep the truck between the lines.  We’re glad we’re going to be settling in Florida some day so that we can visit this region often and learn more about its ecology and culture.

For pictures of birds common to the area we visited, please see these links:
•    Birds of the Kissimmee-Okeechobee-Everglades Watershed - http://www.ces.fau.edu/files/education/resources/bird-id-sheets.pdf
•    Some Birds You’ll Find at the Everglades Birding Festival - http://www.birdadventure.com/festival/09gallery/index.html