31 January 2023, Southern Camping Trip Day 26

Highlands Hammock State Park

Sebring, Florida 

Mural in Lake Placid, FL painted on a wall of a Tractor Supply store.  The wall has built in speakers of the sounds of an actual cattle round-up (mostly cows mooing).

Marc-  We started off the day with a park trail walk finding a 1000 year old oak tree.   The photo is not great.  It really looks its age and look at that concrete patch (bottom right) that was placed by a "tree surgeon" in 1933.

1000 year old live oak.

Beautiful ferns on the Fern Trail.

Red- bellied woodpecker.

We left the park to go to see our friends Craig and Donna Lewis at Lake Placid.  They have come down to Florida from Myrtle Beach for a few months to stay warm.  They chose an excellent campground and town.  Lake Placid is also the town of murals.  Many of the town's buildings are painted with beautiful murals.  The town has modern stores as well as interesting shops.

Craig, Donna, Sue and Marc

30 January 2023, Southern Camping Trip Day 25

  Highlands Hammock State Park

Sebring, Florida

A turtle warming up in the sunshine.

Marc-  Our morning walk brought us back to two familiar places:  The Fern trail and the Cypress Swamp trail.  We saw several turtles on the fern trail and four alligators on the Cypress Swamp trail.  There were also birds - great white egrets, anhingas, red shouldered hawks  and vultures.  

fungi

Mama alligator and three kids.

Some of the birds we heard today, identified by the app called Merlin 

After lunch we took the Park tram tour over to the restricted sections of the park.  This area borders wet areas where many alligators are found as well as black bear, white tailed deer and panther.  We saw many alligators, turtles and two deer.  

A 16 foot long alligator.

This interesting plant is a type of bromelia:  an air plant that lives on other trees without disturbing the host.

Wild tangerines.

Turtles.

Viburnum

29 January 2023, Southern Camping Trip Day 24

 Highlands Hammock State Park

Sebring, Florida

Cypress swamp reflections.

Marc-  This morning we completed all of the remaining walking trails at this State Park.  The last trail around Blue Lake nearly did us in since half the trail was under water and the detour exposed us to some very hot sun.  It started off well with the trails near our campground.  We even went back to the Cypress Swamp trail and saw multiple birds and two alligators.

Pine Hammock Trail

Cypress Swamp trail

Egret

Anhinga

Ibis in the trees

Mama alligator (baby nearby)

Ibis

In the afternoon we headed South by truck and explored all the way down to Clewiston and Lake Okeechobee.  The seemingly endless orange groves just south of Lake Placid came first soon followed by the seemingly endless sugar cane fields near Clewiston.  Clewiston's largest industry is sugar and it's known as "Florida's sweetest town." 

The Lake Placid Library.  This town is known for its many murals.  

Baby oranges trees as far as you can see.

Sugar cane fields near Clewiston.

United States Sugar Corporation Train.

Channel to Lake Okeechobee.

We stopped over at Roland Martin's Marina in Clewiston and saw several trawlers doing the Great Loop.  Very nice marina protected by a Lock.

Boat-tailed Grackles in a tree at the marina.  

Sunset at Hammock Road.

Birds we heard today.

28 January 2023, Southern Camping Trip Day 23

  Highlands Hammock State Park

Sebring, Florida

Marc-  The highlight of today was our walking the Cypress Swamp Trail.  It starts off as a boardwalk but soon becomes a catwalk through the most unbelievable scenery.  The only downside of the catwalk is that you have to pay attention where you are walking.  We saw several egrets and two red shouldered hawks.

Cypress swamp boardwalk.

The catwalk.

Bald Cypress trees

Swamp Egret

We saw plenty of large live oak trees on other trails today.  The base of these trees is very impressive.

The oak trees here reach for the sky.

Catwalk painting

This is what is left of a palm tree stump.

The oak and palm tree swamp (note the floating growth).

This is what is floating. 

We finished off the day driving into town.  Not much to report except a farmers market where we picked up some excellent locally grown tangerines.  We drove through some of the extensive groves before coming back to the campground. 

27 January 2023, Southern Camping Trip Day 22

 Highlands Hammock State Park

Sebring, Florida

Marc-  Our southern journey today was uneventful despite crossing through the traffic nightmare that is Orlando.  This park is certainly about trees and the work of the CCC in the 1930's to create a wonderful park in the tropical forest.  An impressive Museum dedicated to the CCC and the Park Store are solidly built of native woods.  Sue and I did two of the shorter trails to take in a little of the park.

The wild orange trail did in fact have some wild oranges.

The wild orange trail led to the cultivated orange grove.

The tree to the right of the boardwalk has some interesting roots.  

Mindy can you help?

There are some very large and very old oak trees here.

Interesting root structure on this old oak tree.

Birds we noticed today.