Florida - Day 27 - to the Suwannee River

Suwannee River State Park, Live Oak

Sunday, 12 February 2023

Lake Seminole, that last night's campground sat on, is mostly in Georgia, as you can see on the map below.

The kittens continued to enjoy playing with the Milk-Bone box, so I hope it continues.

The lake marks the boundary for the time zones, so I went ahead and moved forward from Central to Eastern time, which meant we left the campground at about 9:00.

today's route
(the line that isn't on the interstate)

I still hadn't been to the state capital, so I planned today's route to dip down and take a look at the main buildings there.  But first there was more rural countryside to see.

Traveling through the small town of Sneads after leaving the state park, we passed a prison.  It turned out to be just one of quite a few we passed today; not sure why they have so many in this part of Florida.

Not long after crossing the Apalachicola River, we came to the town of Chattahoochee.  At a large grassy area in town, I saw 4 stopped ambulances with their lights flashing, and a helicopter just taking off as we drove up.  Clearly somebody was having some real trouble.  When I see scenes like this - or even hear sirens from an emergency vehicle - I think of the advice in For Whom The Bell Tolls.

We passed through various small/smallish towns in this relatively rural area.  At Quincy, we came to the Gadsden County Courthouse, which I thought looked pretty elegant.

Gadsden County Courthouse

And eventually I realized that I'd never seen a sign saying we'd crossed into the Eastern Time Zone.  Good thing I knew it on my own, because Florida didn't bother helping me.

Driving into Tallahassee, we crossed the Ochlockonee River, and I started trying to find someplace that would sell me propane.  I went to a U-Haul that I'd called ahead to be sure they had propane, but they told me I'd been given wrong information.  Instead, they sent me to another U-Haul farther down the street, but these second people told me they not only didn't have any propane but were in the process of closing down that location entirely.  I was really low on propane (which fuels my stove and frig and especially my heater), and the forecast low for tonight was 36°, so I felt some pressure to fill my tank somewhere today.

But I was mainly in Tallahassee to see the state capitol, which was actually hard to miss.

Florida's new capitol

Florida's old capitol

Both these photos are from the internet, because traffic made it impossible for me to stop, let alone park anywhere.  It's actually hard to find a photo of either building that doesn't include the other, as you can see in the photo of the old capitol.  That new building looms prominently behind the old one in almost every photo, and this photo here of the new one is the only one I found online that didn't also have the old one in shot.

The old building began use in 1845, which was actually a while ago, and it's been restored to the way it looked in 1902.  That dome is stained glass.  The new building, described in its own website as a "plush skyscraper," began use in 1977 and has 22 stories.  I'm sure the newer building is much easier to work in but to me there's no question which one looks more like a state capitol, let alone which one is more attractive (and less like a phallic symbol).

Florida is one of several states that has a tower as its capitol instead of something more traditional - Louisiana and North Dakota spring to mind.  Interesting, really, how a state's individuality is shown in its capitol building.

At a Tallahassee vet's office I saw a sign that I can't say I understand:

     "Buy your own flowers and

      Adopt your own cat."

Still staying off the interstate I turned northeast toward Monticello; I'd spent a night in an odd campground not far from there when driving toward Jacksonville in December.  

On the way I passed a sign for the Letchenworth-Love Mounds Archaeological State Park.  I'd never heard of these, and it turns out the primary mound here is the tallest in Florida at 46'.  Experts believe it was built by the Weedon Island Culture, which I've never heard of, and they lived during the period 200-800 CE (aka AD, I don't know why they bothered to make this change because both say the same thing).  Anyway, scientists believe people lived in this area for 10,000 years - an incredible period of time.

Driving in this area, I reached the conclusion that there are lots of horses and horse farms around here, though I only saw a few horses.  I based this idea on the masses of white-railed fences around big grassy fields that just looked like the classical horse farm scene.  And then there was the sign for Tally-Ho Estates.

It was noon by the time we got to Monticello, and I looked hard for a park but couldn't find one, so we just parked on the street in a neighborhood that had sidewalks.  We had lunch and Dext and I walked around the area a bit.  I saw a propane business, but it was a) closed on Sunday and b) not apparently set up for filling RV tanks.

The main roads in Monticello meet at a traffic circle, in the middle of which is the Jefferson County Courthouse.

Jefferson County Courthouse

They say they modeled it on Thomas Jefferson's home Monticello, and both the town and the county were named in his honor.

Leaving town about 1:00, along the road I saw a sign at a church that read: "Drive Thru Prayer Line."  Would that have been left over from COVID practices?  I didn't see anyone around.

Farther along we passed the Madison County Courthouse in Madison, and I showed a photo of that in my December post when we came through here then.  On our drive then, we didn't stop until Jacksonville, but today we had a different goal - the Suwannee River.

By the time we reached the state park, I still hadn't found any propane, so I asked when I checked in if they knew of anyone.  They didn't, but I got on the internet and found a Tractor Supply in the town of Live Oak, about 20 miles away, called, and they assured me they could fill my tank.  Google decided I couldn't turn left into their parking lot and insisted I drive a mile out of the way to make a u-turn.  I knew they were lying, and they were.  And the Tractor Supply people were telling the truth and did indeed fill my tank with much less drama than Google wanted.

Between Live Oak and the state park, I passed a feed mill for Pilgrims (est. 1878), and the feed mill supplies food for their chicken facility I passed on the way here.

After all this activity, we were in our campsite by 3:00, and I was tired.  But the camping area was very near a picnic area by the river, and Dext and I walked down there.

the Suwannee River

Looks peaceful, doesn't it?  And it also looked like a lot of water was flowing along there.