Osceola National Forest

Monday morning we arrived in Florida! 

It didn't take long as the state line was only 16 miles or so south of Valdosta. Prior to leaving Valdosta we once again stopped to stock up at Walmart, have lunch and check the internet since we were parked beside the Sam's Club.

Once in Florida we stopped in at the large - and very busy - Florida Welcome Center. The reading material I walked out of there with was quite ridiculous - but - we are here for at least a month and want to see all we can see. Since Cassia was napping and Derek was standing watch with Roofous, I was able to take my time and enjoy my little cup of Florida orange juice. 

Although the wifi connection there was slow I was determined to get the Valdosta blog post up. I did but it took a lot of time and patience. Good thing we had a nice place to park and Cassia was happy playing with her toys.

Once that was done we headed to our destination - the Ocean Pond Campground in the Osceola National Forest. The campground is 13 miles east, 4 miles north and 1 mile west of Lake City. The linked page said that the sign was hard to see on route 90 but we found it no problem.

The entry sign into the campground.

The campground has water/elec sites for $18, water for $12 and primitive for $8. Being the thrifty people we are we took the primitive. I notice now that we didn't take any pics of the hook up sites which were paved and nicely landscaped. The primitive sites were well - primitive - but that suited us just fine. We liked being tucked in the back by ourselves.

The road into the primitive zone.

Our site - the last one #67.

We were thrilled to be back in the forest especially since Ocean Pond is away from the road and very quiet. We were also happy to be back to a campfire at night and outdoor cooking. 

Just behind our site was a trail. So first thing Friday morning we were on it. 

Roofous was so happy for the chance to run......

and so was Cassia! Mom in the back can barely keep up!

Roofous was so hot from running we came around the corner to find him cooling off in the puddle - he was pretty muddy when he got out!

Ocean Pond Campround sits beside well - a pond I guess - but I would call it a lake. It is very nice and I imagine that many that camp here do so for the fishing. For Cassia and I it meant spending some time on the beach. The sand was ok to play in - filled with grass and branches - but Cassia's first chance to get her shovels and sand castle equipment out. It doesn't look so good in the picture but we had fun. 

On the way we were also telling Cassia there was a playground. We are going to have to stop doing that until we actually SEE the playground. In this case it was a bit of a stretch to call it that but it had a slide and so it was enough for lots of fun. 

All aboard Matey!

The ship and slide. Mom and Dad also had to go down.

We really enjoyed our stay at the Ocean Pond for the few days we were there and would definitely recommend it.

We decided to head out today because our propane was low and didn't want to chance running out. We are finding it difficult to find propane while traveling - we wonder why so few gas stations sell it. 

I'll have to wrap up this post since my battery is almost done.

Thanks for visiting! 

Teresa

Today's Interesting Link: I don't really have a link lined up tonight and don't have much time and so I will give you the link for to BC Parks where we are during the summer months. Although we are seeing some beautiful places we know that we come from one as well - take a look!

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