Finally ….I get to go boating…..

A friend, Bess, has an airboat and I was invited to go along for the day.  How lucky can you get!!!

We launched at the S end of Lake George and after a quick check in the shallow grasses near the gates for gators…we headed towards Juniper Springs.

The nice thing about an airboat is you can run right along the shoreline. It’s much to shallow for most boats. So..I got to see things that I hadn’t seen before from Slow Motion, our 27’ Trawler, that requires at least 3’ of water or run aground. Bess had us in inches.

I thought this palm growing out of the remnants of a Cyprus root was unique.

You see a lot of palms like this…they’ve been knocked down during storms but continue to grow with the tops heading up.

Bess had been telling me about a tree that looked like a man waving….what do you think?

This video is about 10 minutes….not a lot of talking….but you can see the nice ride. Once up the creek a ways, the water was perfectly clear and only inches deep with a nice sandy bottom.  Airboats and canoes are about all that can get this far. We went up to the bridge then turned around. No boat other than canoes or kayaks beyond. Bess said that at one time lots of families came down to the water near the bridge and spent the day…they’ve since stopped them from using it, but you can go to the St Park and rent canoes for use on the waterway.

We stopped on a sandbar and had lunch. In the distance you can see a boat. The gentleman was pushing it in the shallows. They got as far as the bar we were on and visited for a bit then headed down stream.

You’ll see in the video that a lot of airboats use this. They bring canopies and chairs, water toys for the kids and grills and spend the day. Some even stay overnight.

So….enjoy a trip up Juniper Springs.

After Juniper Springs we headed towards Silver Glen Springs.  The 3 springs  are on the W side of Lake George. Juniper is near the S end. Silver Glen towards the middle and Salt River Springs is near the NW end. Good swimming or playing in the water in all 3.

Silver Glen is a favorite during the week and especially at Christmas and New Years, for us.

During the summer you can get hotdogs, Shaved Ice and other goodies as well as water toys.

There was a pretty good crowd….but I have seen many many more on holidays.

Here’s a short trip in Silver Glen Springs.

After we left the Springs we spotted these deer leaving the lake. I think they walk out to feed on the grasses.

From here we continued on up to Salt River Springs. Had a nice ride in and out and a good trip back down the W side of the lake.

We spotted this small gator sitting in the grass. It let us get right up close. I was surprised at how close we could get to a lot of the wildlife with the airboat.

I hope we get to take another ride before Bess tows the it back to Wisconsin. It is really a lot of fun. Amazing all the stuff you can see.

Thanks Bess….I’ll be looking forward to your return next winter…..don’t’ forget the airboat!