Yet more storm-related fallout

Florida's peak-of-hurricane-season storm continuum maintains its rippling effect across Florida.  The Fay-Gustav-Hanna-Ike show could be why:

--east-central Florida fishing guides have not come across giant spawning redfish usually encountered in August in the Indian River;

--the Cubera snapper were finicky at the 210-foot-deep wreck near the Key Largo whistle buoy when they should have been gulping up whole live lobster used for bait;

--pier fishing for snapper and grouper has been especially good lately.

--it is difficult to locate bass in suddenly-flooded Lake Okeechobee, but when you do, they are huge.

--and lastly, why I was unable to paddle the length of north Florida's Wacissa River recently.

On a Labor Day weekend trip to North Florida, I eagerly anticipated exploring a river I had never seen before -- the scenic, spring-fed Wacissa, which flows ten miles south from springs near the town for which it is named to terminate at Goose Pasture just off US 98 near Crawfordville.  I figured, that with the recent rainfall from Tropical Storm Fay, the river would be flowing rapidly so that all I would have to do was steer my light, inflatable kayak. I arranged a shuttle for my car with Bob Stakes, a canoe/kayak outfitter in Wacissa. 

I was right about the river's strong flow, but failed to extrapolate that it had also flooded Goose Pasture, and the bumpy, unimproved access road leading to the takeout.

Bob and I ended up making a 70-mile roundtrip in two SUVs and wading big puddles in the Goose Pasture access road, watching carefully for water moccassins,  only to find the water was too deep for us to ford safely in our cars.  Along the wet, rutted road, we encountered a woman who busted a brake line when she ran over a submerged log.  A man with her was in the process of calling a tow truck.

So we drove all the way back to Wacissa, where I launched my little craft at a county park, paddled about four miles downstream, got rattled by a passing thunderstorm, and returned to the put-in.  A promised "blue spring" about a mile downstream from the put-in turned out to be a gray, sediment-clouded plume of dark water. 

"It's really beautiful -- most of the time," a passing paddler assured me. 

Well, maybe when it dries up again.  With the way things are going this hurricane season, we could have a long wait.

Comments

[Joe the Dog Lover]

I always use to watch Bass Fishing on ESPN back in the day when they were at Lake Okeechobee.

[Kate Johns]

With all the rain Florida’s been getting and how flooded all the lakes and ponds already are, I’m getting scared about what might happen if a hurricane hits my area. After the last big storm I was so devastated I couldn’t face the remains of my house. Luckily, a moving company in Orlando, http://www.jjmetro.com, offers emergency services. They packed up what was left of my belongings and put them into storage for me, while I was living elsewhere. It was a big help.