Shingle Creek to Makison Island - The summer was upon us, but the lake waters were still cool enough to refresh ourselves at will. The launch from Pleasant Hill Rd is pretty easy and the cars are safe in this urban setting. Once on the river, you are in a typical Florida black water creek, not wide, not much flow; homes to the south, thick woods and oak hammock to the north. The creek winds many times then you reach Lake Toho, which is a very large lake but it is 3 times longer than it is wide. Immediately upon entering the lake, there are 2 distinct islands to the southeast of you. The first island is not reachable unless you wanted to partake in some hacking and snake chasing. The further island, and larger is Makison Island.

It took little time to make our way to the western entry point of the island. The county does not have a dock, but has a fair size clearing and a sandy beach area for easy craft landing. The Island is surrounded by thick weeds and reeds making entry impenetrable except for this one spot. Once on land, the island is surrounded by huge and old live oaks and a mix of sable palm. There is a trail the takes you along the perimeter of the island through the oaks and then one trail that bisects the island. The interior of the island is mostly open grass with younger oaks starting to take over what was once someone's residence and probably grove. The first 100 yards, you run across the county's effort to create primitive camp sites. This would be a great place for a weekend camp out. There is also a large wooded shelter with a wooden floor that can be used to get out of the weather, in this case, the hot sun.

The group of us took 2 hikes, we went counter clock wise until we hit the bisecting trail. After a lunch and some chatting, most of us finished the perimeter hike. After island exploring, we took off in our kayaks and went south around the island. Little did we know that there was this huge long length of water weeds that extended way south, making the trip around the island probably twice what we expected. By late morning it was getting hot, so we made a bee-line to Shingle Creek and took those 40 some odd twists back to the take out.

Host: Rich Miller