Fisheating Creek and Another Fantastic Airboat ride

Friday evening Billy and I went over to the "fancy" RV resort that has a restaurant named Sherry's Hide Out.  Billy had a very good meal of grouper and I had a Caesar Salad.  A party of 7 older men and 6 older women came in right before us to enjoy the fish they had caught that day and had the restaurant prepare for them.  We were amazed to see two large aluminum dishes piled high with fish served to their tables.  The rv park (http://morganrvresorts.com/pages/northlakeestates_homepage) was huge with carports for their golf carts, flowers planted around their rv's, and white picket fences.  I don't want that much organization in my life.  To quote Jimmy Buffet "I want my Junior Mints!"

Last night Billy and I visited Chappy's Convenience Store down the road.  It is the closest source for groceries and they have a very good butcher.  We left with two beautiful ribeye steaks which Billy expertly prepared on the grill.  It was a pleasant ending to an otherwise cold and dreary day that I had spent sewing.

At 10:00 am this morning Billy and I helped Ray Freeman and "Froggy" put the two air boats in the water across the street from our campground.  We took a ride through Fisheating Creek into Lake Okeechobee where it flows.  I even got to drive the boat.  IT WAS GREAT FUN!  Fisheating Creek is undoubtedly one of the prettiest streams in FL.  Tea-colored water journeys swiftly through thick cypress swamps and beside hardwood hammocks only to open into small lakes where wildlife abounds.  This area, especially the upper creek, is an area little disturbed by humans.  We love it.   Now managed by the state of FL, Fisheating Creek had been in the hands of  ranchers who left the river as it was, and no development occurred.  The turkeys, deer, wild hogs, alligators aplenty and more birds than I can identify live and thrive there.  We saw many large alligators and I saw the fastest land moving alligator I have ever seen.  We stopped off where the remains of a wild boar (Ray said it was probably an alligator's dinner) were scattered along the bank.  The name Fisheating Creek is derived from the Creek Thlothlopopka-hatchee meaning "the creek where fish are eaten."  Early inhabitants, known as the Belle Glade people, began building mounds and other earthworks along  the banks of Fisheating Creek between 1000 and 500 BCE.  They subsisted by netting fish and harvesting turtles, snakes, and alligators.  For these early people the creek was also a canoe highway leading to Lake Okeechobee and its natural resources to the east and other settlements to the west.

During the Second Seminole War (1835-1842), a cabbage palm palisade at the site was named Fort Center for LT  J.P. Center.  Oscen Tustenuggee, who had organized many war parties, and his two brothers Micco Tustenuggee and Old Tustenuggee and their wives lived in villages along the creek.  The fort was reactivated at the start of the Third Seminole War in 1855.  At the conclusion of the war in 1858, many Indians had been removed from FL.  In 1881, the federal government found 37 extended families living in and near Fisheating Creek.  By 1930, cultivation of sugar cane, cattle ranching, and establishment of a refinery forced the remaining Seminoles to move from Fisheating Creek Wildlife Management Area..  That is probably more than you would ever want to know about Fisheating Creek, but I find the lifestyle and history here fascinating.  I am told that Billy and I must enjoy a bowl of Swamp Cabbage Soup before we leave here.  We arrived back at the motor home to find that the "Grapefruit Fairy" (our neighbor) had stopped by.    Life is Good Today and we are going to rest our sunburned faces.  Thanks for stopping in.