Cedar Key & Hall Creek 2012
Richard Rathe, November 2012 (Birds, Camping)
My colleague Carlos and I took a quick overnight trip to Cedar Key and the primitive campsite at Hall Creek. We put in at “Bridge #4” at low tide and paddled through some very shallow water for the first hour or so. Once out in the Gulf of Mexico I had a chance to try out my new sail.
Carlos is an experienced fisherman and he did catch fish… At one little eddy pool (which we named “Trout City”) he reeled in seven or eight Sea Trout in less than thirty minutes! Four of these were keepers and we dined well when we got back.
The Hall Creek Campsite is an isolated group of trees on slightly higher ground next to a very narrow branch of the creek. It was overgrown by prickly pear cactus and appears to be seldom used. There are what I think are limestone outcroppings in the creek (watch out!) and this may in part explain why there is higher ground at this location. Carlos took two amazing panoramas with is phone camera (iPhone 5) and I took a few HDR sets of the setting sun.
As we paddled we noticed many Butterflies fighting the wind and heading out to sea. At the campsite we saw one of their refueling stations. They were everywhere in the warm afternoon sunlight. Monarch Butterflies make a four thousand mile journey to and from Mexico every year. Apparently those that make a left turn and wind up in Florida rather than Texas are doomed. But you can help admiring their perseverance! It is within the realm of possibility that some of them make the five hundred mile crossing. No one knows…
Finally there were the Birds… lots of them! The second day started out foggy and remained mostly foggy for the rest of the day. At one point we could see what appeared to be a large white boat on the horizon, but this turned out to be a small flock of White Pelicans resting on a sand bar. They are magnificent birds! I drifted along in front of them and got a few good digital zoom photos before they took off. Most impressive were about a dozen American Avocet in winter plumage feeding in the flats. They never got close enough for a photo.
