A weekend at Low Key Hideaway in Cedar Key

 

Location: Cedar Key, Fl

Date: 10/25/2013 – 10/27/2013

A few months ago we were looking for a weekend getaway location where we could camp with our RV and our daughters could stay in a little more comfort but still be close by. Last spring we camped in Cedar Key, but were not able to get into one of the Low Key Hideaway’s RV sites because they were full. So, we stayed next door at the Sunset Isle RV park. This time we did a better job of planning ahead and were able to get two motel rooms and an RV site at Low Key Hideaway.

Low Key Hideaway is in a beautiful location on one of the keys leading into the big town of Cedar Key. It’s right on the water where you can sit on one of their decks or venture out onto their dock to take in the beautiful scenery, One of their decks was about 15 feet behind our camper and we spent a lot of time hanging out there with our family. We all found it very relaxing. 

Although Julie and I didn’t stay in the motel room, we did check out our kids rooms (4 & 5) and found them very nice and comfortable. The owners of Low Key, Pat and Cindy, have a very “interesting” way of decorating and it works well. The room and surrounding gardens have an eclectic collection of “things” and there’s pieces to look at and take in everywhere, including the wall of super hero figurines. The rooms also have an amazing collection of photos from areas around Cedar Key and I believe they were all taken by Pat.

It’s also interesting to visit the on-site Tiki bar which is open most every day from later afternoon into the evening. The Tiki bar is a fun place to have a few drinks and intermingle with others staying at Low Key as well as many of the locals who stop by. The Friday night that we were there, one lady was cooking food on the grill and then bringing it in to share with everyone in the bar. The Tiki bar definitely has a good vibe.

One of the bonuses of staying in Cedar Key was the night sky. Julie and I like to take in the stars and “try” to identify planets, constellations, etc. Cedar Key, being far away from any city lights, had some amazing star gazing. The nights we were there had extremely clear skies and we hadn’t see anything like that in a long time. The milky way was very easy to see and we had a great time taking in the heavens above.

Just a note about Low Key Hideaway. It is an adult only motel and RV park. So, only those that are over 21 can stay here. But they do allow well behaved pets!  So, bringing Fido is ok.

Here’s the front of Low Key Hideaway and the pathway leading to the Tiki Bar.

 

Looking towards the RV sites from the dock.

 

The Tiki Bar and the dock out to the water.

 

Me and my two girls enjoying some beautiful weather and Cedar Key surroundings!

 

My daughter and a college friend posing for a picture on one of Low Key’s decks.

 

Here’s a picture of my wife and two of her sisters from Colorado enjoying a walk out onto the deck to enjoy the view.

 

We didn’t do much besides hanging around and enjoying our family time, but we did venture out to Cemetery Point Park to walk on the boardwalk leading through the marsh and wetlands.

 

The area behind the Low Key Hideaway was prime location for bird watching. This area is very shallow, with mud flats being exposed during low tide. So, this was an area that really attracted a large variety of birds. 

 

And of course being right on the water allowed us to view some beautiful sunsets.

 

On Sunday we checked out of our RV site and headed the 60 minute trip back home. We had loaded up our kayaks and brought them to Cedar Key, but it was a little too windy and we were too busy to do any paddling. So, since we got home and unpacked early in the afternoon, we decided to take advantage of the nice weather and get the boats wet. We did our old stand by/go to paddle of the Santa Fe River to River Rise State Park. We usually don’t see any other boats on the water when we do this section of the river, but today we saw about 10 other people out there. I guess we weren’t the only ones who felt the need to get out and get a little exercise!

 

Here’s a short video of our time on the water today. Most of it shows Julie pulling away from me and leaving me in the dust. She had more paddling enthusiasm than I had today..

Low Key Hideaway

Location: Cedar Key, Fl
GPS Coordinates: 29.152640, -83.030890
Date: 3/17/2013
Julie and my original choice of a place to camp in Cedar Key was at the Low Key Hideaway which is located on SR-24 about a mile from the “downtown” area. Unfortunately, the word is out about this special place and all of their four RV sites were full for the weekend. We are definitely going to try again sometime in the future and reserve a stay here. We were able to find an opening at the Sunset Isles RV park which is nearby (see entry here).
Low Key Hideaway had such a great vibe that it deserved its’ own blog entry. It’s such a gem of a place (ok, a little quirky!) and owners, Pat and Cindy Bonish, have done such an awesome job of changing this motel and RV park into a warm and welcoming place. Since we didn’t stay at the motel and couldn’t get an RV spot, I can’t really cover those areas, but we did spend a few evenings at the Tiki bar which is between the motel and campsites and we had a fantastic time.
I didn’t catch the name of the bartender who served us on Friday evening, but he welcomed us as soon as we walked in and quickly served us a cold beer. You’re free to take your drink and sit at some of the Adirondack chairs that are located around their gardens and watch the sunset over the water or walk out onto the dock and chat with some of the others who were here to relax and have a good time. It was fairly cool the time that we were there, but they had a warm fire in the wood stove in the tiki bar which made for a nice atmosphere.
The owners, Pat and Cindy, were hanging out at the bar with all of their customers and we enjoyed talking with them and hearing their travel stories and how it lead them to settle in Cedar Key and take on the challenge of building a successful business. 
Below are a few pictures of the Low Key Hideaway and the Tiki Bar. If you are ever in this area of Florida, do yourself a favor and spend some time at this place. I think you will be glad you did!



The Tiki bar overlooking the bay.

I found this sign amusing. It made me laugh every time I saw it. I’ll keep this in mind when the next big storm makes it way through Florida.







The dock at the Low Key Hideaway. It make for a nice place to sip your beverage and take in the surroundings.

The four RV sites. All are right on the water and have a great view.

Not many clouds to help the sunset color, but not too shabby, A good way to end the day.

Hiking Cedar Key

Location: Cedar Key, Fl
Date: 3/16/2013
When spending the weekend camping in Cedar Key, Julie and I rode our bikes around the island trying to find a few places to hike and take some nature photos. Maybe classifying what we found as “hiking” would be a stretch as the longest trail we found was a little over a half a mile, so maybe I should call it some nice “walks” through the woods and marshes around the island.
The first place we found was about a half mile from the campground. This trail, called the Railroad Trestle Trail” followed the old railroad line and dead ended at one of the many channels that cut through the island. They did a very nice job with this trail as they had information posted along the way listing all the native plants that are native to this area.


This is all the remains of the old railroad bridge that used to cross the channel.



The second trail that we found was called the “Cemetery Point Trail, which kind of makes sense as it is located right next to the Cedar Key cemetery. The majority of this trail was on an elevated boardwalk that made its’ way through the salt marsh and ended at a point of land where there way a nice playground for kids and a series of workout stations. This was a great place to check out the local birds and they were plentiful in and around the wetlands that border this park.

The boardwalk that leads through the salt marshes.

Below are some of the bird pictures I took wild walking this relatively short trail.




There was a lot of Osprey activity in this area (actually all over Cedar Key). They were very vocal and seemed like a little competition between some of them for this nest. We stopped and watched them for awhile and they put on quit a show,



The last trail that we found was the Whitman Trail at the Cedar Key Museum State Park. This is a nice little park that houses a museum showing the history of Cedar Key, an old homestead of the Whitman family, and a short trail out to the bay and though the tall pines that grow in this area. 

This is the Whitman home that was moved to this park and reconstructed,

This osprey had some “issues” and screeched the entire time we walked this trail. We weren’t sure what the problem was, but he (she?) sure did make a racket. 



This was a display on the trail that showed some of the wildlife that inhabit the area.

Here are the GPS tracks for the three “hikes” that we did while visiting Cedar Key.
Cedar Key Trestle Trail at EveryTrail

Cemetery Point Trail at EveryTrail
Cedar Key Museum State Park - Whitman Trail at EveryTrail

Weekend camping trip to Cedar Key

Location: Cedar Key, Fl
GPS Coordinates: 29.154790, -83.030698
Date: 3/15/2013 – 3/17/2013
It had been a few months since we had gone camping and we really needed to get out and enjoy this great Florida winter weather. With most of the Florida State campgrounds full and reservations hard to come by, we decided to give Cedar Key a try. We had first tried to get into one of the four RV sites at the Low Key Hideaway, but we couldn’t find a weekend that had an opening and work with our schedule. We did get a spot at the Sunset Isle RV park which is about a mile from downtown Cedar Key. This isn’t normally the type of place that we like to camp as we are not the “RV Park” type of people. We try to get away from it all and get out in nature, usually going to places like the Florida State campgrounds.
With that said, we found that we did enjoy our time at this park. We did get a spot on the water and there were several docks where you could sit and enjoy the surroundings. The people we met here were very friendly and although the sites were very close together, the park was very quiet and we had no problems with the close proximity of our RV neighbors.
Over the weekend we did a lot of bike riding around the island and found several hiking trails. There was also a lot of good areas for birding and taking some pictures. One of the highlights was the time we spent at the Tiki Bar at the Low Key hideaway, which was a fun place to spend a few hours.
Here’s some info on this park:
Site Number: 11
Rating (1 = low, 5 = high)
Campsite size: 2
Campsite space between sites: 1
Campsite privacy between sites: 1
Campsite level: 4
Campsite parking: 2
Campfire permitted: yes , but bring your own fire pit.
Campsite picnic table: small wood table on a concrete pad
Campground Facilities: 4. Very clean, private bathrooms, There’s also a small café on site which was doing a good business.
Campground access to hiking: 3
Campground access to water (kayaking, fishing, swimming, etc): 4.5
Campground access to biking: 4
Overall Campground rating: 3.5

The entrance to the park


Here’s our site, number 11 on the water.

A frequent visitor walking by our campsite

The many docks available for use by any of the campers staying in the park.

This little guys was coming in for a landing on the mangroves near our site

The bay behind the Sunset Isles Campground.

Sunset…

Cedar Key Paddle around Atsena Otie Key

Location: Cedar Key, Fl
GPS Coordinates: 29.137184, -83.029331
Date: 4/1/2012
I’m going back and collecting some of the trips I had been adding to Everytrail & Wikiloc and including them in this blog. 
Julie and I wanted to get out and do some kayaking so we decided to take the hour drive to Cedar Key and see what short outing we could do there. We put in at the Cedar Key public beach area and paddled the approximately 1 mile to the sandy beach just north of the old wooden pier. Docking our kayaks, we headed out on the trail across the Atsena Otie Key. There is an old cemetery on the south end of the island. Many old gravestones can be seen in this area. Back in out boats, we continued counter clockwise around the island (key). We decided to try and cut though the island instead of completely circling the island. The inland waterway was very calm, with lots of birds, including several bald eagles. We went at high tide, but still struggled at times over the many oyster beds in the area. You should check out the tides before you attempt to cut across the center of the island.
Atsena Otie Key was the original location of the Cedar Key settlement. There was a few businesses located on the island, with the most prominent being a pencil company who used the many cedar trees on the island for their product. In the late 1800’s a powerful hurricane hit the area and produced 10 foot waves which destroyed almost everything on the island except for a few homes. In the early 1900’s the island was purchased for a small sum of money  and turned into a wildlife refuge. Later the Atsena Otie Key was sold to the Suwannee River Management District which manages and protects the island at this time.
 
Here is one of the beaches on the East side of the island.


Here’s Julie hiking along the beach on the island


Looking back through the marsh towards the town of Cedar Key


We docked our kayaks on the North West section of the Island (key) to do a little hiking.


On the island there’s an old wooden dock that is still standing, but it’s it pretty rough shape. You can walk out on part of the dock, but there’s no using it for boating access.





There is a hiking trail that leads from the beach area to the south side of the island. This is the trail that leads to the old cemetery which still has many interesting tombstones.

These pictures are of the cemetery used by the old inhabitants for the island. It’s only about a quarter mile walk from the beach where we docked out kayaks.,









And finally, here is the GPS track of the kayak paddle and the short hike we took on the island.
Cedar Key Kayak at EveryTrail