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Copyright: Joyce Rankin-Interactive Outdoors, Inc.
American Alligator
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Popular for fishing, canoeing, and wildlife viewing, the Myakka River flows through 45 square miles of wetlands, prairies and woodlands. In 1985, the Florida State Legislature designated the river as a "Wild and Scenic River." This special status allows preservation and management along a 34-mile segment. The majority of the watershed rests above the park in Manatee County, becoming more defined as a river once it reaches Sarasota County and the state park where it broadens and creates the Upper Myakka and Lower Myakka Lakes. For several miles between the lakes, extensive marsh habitat provides protected wildlife nesting and feeding areas. Below State Route 72 and Lower Myakka Lake, a 7,500-acre wilderness preserve encircles the serpentine channel where live oaks draped with Spanish moss cling to shore's edge. Sabal palms tower above providing perches for osprey and bald eagles. Miles of secluded waterway entice canoeists to explore the near-forbidden tract. Portaging becomes necessary in dry seasons and when the invasive water lettuce consumes the water's surface. Binoculars are necessary accompaniments for birders. Sandhill cranes nest along the water's edge, shorebirds feed in the shallows and wood storks engulf the treetops creating a fabulous and rarely seen rookery. The lower river gives way to mangrove-fringed areas where water levels are affected by the Gulf's tide. Here manatees occasionally coast through the grasses in search of food and warm waters. The state park offers a main boat / concession area but also has canoe launches from several pull-offs along Park Drive.
Directions from Sarasota, FL: Take Interstate 75 to exit 37. Travel east along State Route 72 approximately 9 miles to reach the main gate.
Seasonal Information:
Normally Open:
Year-round .
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Date: 1/19/04
Filed By: Shawn Beightol
(North Bay Village, FL)
Time of Day: 230 PM
Length of Time: 3 days
Difficulty: Moderate
Number of People Encountered: 0-10 ppl
Recommend to a Friend: Highly
Report: I now have a new favorite Florida River. Somehow I knew I would love this river as I passed over it for the last 20 years back and forth to the Tampa Bay area, looking down this shallow creek bed from HWY 70... She's initially forbidding, amazingly diverse, rugged (the upper 15 miles), teeming with life and solitude. She holds fossils, fish, waterfowl, waterfalls and rapids (both man-made and natural), pine and oak forests of a beauty I've not seen in Florida south of Gainesville, human history, deep extinct springs, HUGE alligators, and a definite cracker undertone.
The upper 15 miles, off limits and fenced over with forbidding signs ("no trespassing," "stay clear," "keep out," "violators prosecuted to full extent of law"), under-traveled and thus overgrown at parts (attached pictures are from upper river, camera stopped working in Sunday's rain...ok now) was a challenge worthy of Hercules. For the State people: but IT WAS NAVIGABLE! and it should be opened up to the public. I intend to invite the news media in Manatee County to consider why their portion of the Myakka is off limits... did the State and ranchers/property owners make a deal on down-river lands? Sarasota wanted Wild and Scenic designation and access to water on the ranchers' properties to supply the growing urban demand. Ranch land was donated on the lower Myakka by property owners (is there a connection between them and the upriver property owners?). Did that come at the expense of the Manatee County taxpayers unwittingly (giving upriver property owners freedom to fence, to "privacy," and perhaps more significant, freedom to pump water and interfere with the hydric cycle without repercussion)?
The signs must come down. They frighten off would-be explorers who are protected by federal law to travel this river. Let them line their property parallel to the river, but they should not cross the river as they currently do, impeding and blocking the federally protected river navigation (including 1 barbed wire fence in the river entirely across the river).
The most beautiful river I have seen south of Gainesville is the lower portion, starting at HWY 780 and proceeding through the park, down through the Myakka Preserve. This exceptional paddle could be done in 5 hours (3-4 from HWY 72) taking the paddler and his/her family & friends to the most beautiful woodlands, forests, glades, vistas, and campsites around and within such easy reach.
Coming through the marsh grasses south of HWY 72 (twisting and turning through narrow corridors lined with the biggest gators around - but these were not human-conditioned, i.e., they swim away from me, not toward me, though I'd be more cautious rounding blind turns during mating/nesting season to allow them time), I entered Lower Lake Myakka. It started quite shallow (as did Upper Lake Myakka's river entrance), which provided an interesting spectacle of gators ploughing for 50 yards or so toward deeper water to submerge.
The Northwest side of the lake holds what one local described as an "extinct spring," going down a couple hundred feet (designated "deep hole" on topo maps). Beginning along the Southwest side of the lakeExiting the lake begins one of the most scenic stretches of glade forest imaginable (though I saw signs that this is underwater in rainy season). Here also are a number of old camps, including, according to a local, a grave marker made of cocquina concrete to honor some lost cracker soul. The many, many gators lining the shore here looked like a gator drive-in.
Leaving the preserve, you encounter a roaring noise...as you draw closer, you realize that you are about to go over a falls. A quick portage and look around reveal this to be a man-made (but beautiful) falls, perhaps from a mill years gone by. Carrying on, you will eventually cross the remains of another, weathered down to become an exciting rapids run. Further down, this thrill would be repeated over naturally occurring limestone rapids. These shallows hold fossils from a time when they were prowled by huge sharks and marine mammals, begging to be snorkeled in the spring and summer.
Eventually, the river matures. She loses the early rugged, rough edges. She loses the fast flow and eddies, the solitiude. She acquires the mature, tannic colored, pollen adorned and placid character of Florida's rivers as they prepare to become estuarine. Cracker homes and docks appear, built by people who, in the past, made their living from her waters and beyond.
This lower paddle is a challenging 1 day paddle. Better would be to do it as an overnight trip and spend the night after an easy half-day's paddle in the most beautiful woodlands around. Come the rest of the way down to Snook Haven just after I75 and have a real, Florida meal (gator? fish? hush puppies?). Live music started after 4 PM and the sights, smells and sounds were quite relaxing after a good workout
Conditions: Upper river - dry, obstructed, fenced off
Lower Myakka River - beautiful, plenty of water, scenic, clear route
Water Availability: low in upper river
plenty below upper lake.
Recommended Clothing: rain gear for rain with cold fronts. long sleeves and pants during winter, shorts for sunny period of day. hat.
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