Paddling the Santa Fe River to the River Rise Preserve State Park

 

Location: High Springs, Fl

GPS Coordinates: 29.852062, –82.610922

Date: 8/18/2013

 

For the third Sunday in a row we got out and did some kayaking. I think we’re going for some sort of record here! We packed up the kayaks and all the gear the night before so we could just hit the road as soon as we woke up on Sunday morning. Julie and I wanted to beat the heat and humidity of the day and that plan worked out well. It never got too hot while we were on the water.

Once again we did our old stand-by paddle of the Santa Fe river in High Springs. We put in the public boat ramp just a few hundred yards west of where Highway 41/441 crosses over the Santa Fe river. From there we headed up river to the River Rise State Park.  This is one of our favorite paddles as the majority of the time you are going through the preserve land and there’s absolutely no development. This is also a part of the Santa Fe river that gets very little boat traffic. Today we only saw two other kayakers and one canoe with a father and son fishing. And we only saw them as we were headed back to the boat ramp. One other good thing about this section of the river is that there is absolutely no trash or litter to be found. Only wish I could say that about some of the other areas that we have kayaked.

 

I had to slow Julie done some here. I don’t think she saw the no wake sign..

We continued to head up stream. There’s been a lot of rain in this area lately, so the current was running at a good clip today. We had a good workout paddling against the river on the way up to where the Santa Fe re-appears after traveling underground from O’leno State park. Having to work hard to make it upstream makes for a nice easy float back. It is about 2.3 miles from where we put in to the river rise.

 

Julie trying to leave me in the dust. Maybe it was something I said..

 

Here is a short video from our trip today.

 

Well, I can guarantee we won’t be paddling next weekend (which would make four Sunday’s in a row). Next Saturday we are heading up to Alaska to visit some of the National Parks, including the Kenai Fjords and Denali. We’ll be traveling using many different means of getting around the southern area of Alaska, from large planes, to small planes, to boats, to rafting and trains. That should make for some interesting adventures!!