Wow!  Sitting on the bank of the Santa Fe River, I feel sure I can walk across it to the Suwannee River Water Management Lands on the Gilchrist County side.  The last six weeks have produced only two rainfalls.  Although they are torential enough for the metal roof to shed enough water to fill my 50 gallon barrel, the Santa Fe River level is as low as I've seen it in 20 years.

     The water level is low, but how clear is it?  Clear enough to see the shadows of the occasional fish swimming against the current.  I can watch from the bank bass darting after smaller fish, who swim in schools to protect themselves.

      I walked with my coffee, as usual, to the local Ichetucknee park in the cool morning.  It's not so cold that I want to stay under the quilt in the unheated house, but cool enough that I didn't want to plunge into the Ichetucknee at 9 AM.  To my surprise, and for the first time ever, I see two kayakers who are taking their tent down in our private park.  I mentioned to them that most people camp at the confluence of the Santa Fe and Ichetucknee rivers on the Gilchrist County side...just to keep them out of any trouble from an officious Three Rivers Association vigilante. 

     Back at my historic cabin, I prepared for my own kayak trip down the verdantly clear river.

     My kayaking friend came this morning and we floated/kayaked down the main river, not my usual run.  I'm so path oriented that seldom do I break away from my pattern of hydrobiking two miles from the cabin upriver to the treehouse, or two more miles upriver from that site to Sunbeam Spring.  Either it's that watery path or paddling up the Ichetucknee to the fallen tree which now blocks the river just below the US 27 bridge.  Or, too frequently I just put in at the Ichetucknee head springs and float all the way down the five miles to my cabin.

      It's been 15 years now since my friend Frank and I took my 15 foot ski boat and his 50 HP motor upriver from Sandy Point Marina looking for the Ichetucknee River.  Every Friday we brought our food to the boat; he'd work on the motor while I bailed the boat.  Then we'd motor up and down the river as far as the Ichetucknee, eventually finding properties to buy: one for him, one for me.

       Once we established ourselves on the river bank, seldom do we venture but a few miles up and down the two rivers.  Nostalgia or the need to diversify experiences called me to again float down to the US 129 Bridge in my kayak, my friend along side in hers.  We've graduated to human powered boats.

        The water is so clear that she and her red kayak make a perfect grey silhouette on the sandy white river bottom.  The cypress are just beginning to turn ochre, and green maple leaves have tips of red and yellow. 

         We watch the blue Ichetucknee ripple into the green Santa Fe river, as we pick up speed with those gallons of spring water entering the Santa Fe.  I've changed dogs since those days when Puppy rode in the boat with us.  My Girl, the perfect mix of Lab and Rottweiler, is a swimmer.  More than a swimmer, her loyalty to me enables her to stretch her endurance beyond any expectation of a 10 year old dog.  She swims across the Ichetucknee and behind, sometimes football fields behind, the drifting kayaks.  When she tires of swimming, she lopes along the bank.  I must continue to look back to see she's coming, and occasionally put onto a sandy bank to wait for her to catch up.  There she comes, either snorting in the water like a manatee coming up for breath, or with her tongue hanging out the side of her mouth as she races along the bank.

         Is it ten miles from the confluence to the bridge?  Not sure, but I could never swim or run the distance that dog conquers...and she's 10 years old.

          The sun is bright and warm.  Since I'm preparing for one of my month long stays in the NW, where sleet, rain, and snow are occuring as I write, lathering sun screen on my bare arms and legs is a pleasure in this most perfect Florida season.

          We stop where a railroad bridge had once crossed the river.  Or was it a one lane road, built up through the swamp?  When was it built, and when did it fall?  Ascending that point of land where the Santa Fe takes a 90 degree turn, we look across the hammock to see those fallen cement cylindars which once held up a bridge.  Perfect cement cylindars lie on both the Gilchrist and Suwannee County sides of the river.  Was it the road that linked Tallahassee and Jacksonville?  I'll have to find out.

          A grassy road twists and turns through the hammock beside the straight elevated bed once supporting some transportation of former days.  Like the clear waters, the clear autumn air allows unfiltered sunlight to bounce from dancing oak leaves.  Those substantial oak arms, extending parallel from robust trunks, host not only their leaves, but resurrection ferns and Spanish moss flowing in the gentle, still warm breeze.  Not another human besides ourselves, and no animal besides my dog, disturb this autumn splendor.

         Two hours from our launch, with several rest stops for My Girl to catch up, and even our little walk in the woods, we reach the US 129 Bridge. 

         There I find the couple who camped in our park.

          We return to my cabin to eat my squash casserole and spinach salad overlooking that verdantly clear river we love so much.

          Come join us soon.