First Two Weeks at Stephen Foster
Category: Volunteer At A Florida State Park
Only Two Weeks Left At Big Shoals
Only two weeks left at Big Shoals State Park and then we move down the road about 6 miles to Stephen Foster Culture Center State Park for the first 4 months of the new year. It has been so peaceful here. Yes, we get a couple of visitors each day and more of the weekend. We have even gotten a couple of visitors who asked questions or just wanted to talk for a few minutes. The work is not difficult and basically only needs doing a couple days a week. All the other times we just are available for the visitors and to close the gates at night. So if you are thinking about volunteering here we hope you will consider it in the future.
The good is definitely the peace and quiet here. The only bad we could say would be the sewer situation. You will have to buy about 80 feet of sewer hose to dump your black water and you can use a regular garden hose to dump your gray water. It would be nice to have a little storage building to use while we are here. But you can use the volunteer washer/dryer at Stephen Foster State Park for FREE. You will have the use of a Gator to run back and forth along the paved trail between Little Shoals and Big Shoals area as well as to explore the various trails while you are here. It has been nice here.
We are looking forward to transferring to Stephen Foster on January 1st. We know that it will be more work, more people and they don’t have sewers on site for the campground hosts either. We may not come back to Big Shoals as we have so many more places to explore. Nor, will we come back to Stephen Foster after we leave there at the end of April for the same reason.
We hope you and yours have a safe and happy holiday season. See you next year!
More Rain Ugg
More Rain…Ugg! It rained a lot before we got here and it is raining more still. We have had a couple of days of freezing weather this past week that, hopefully, killed off most of the mosquitoes. In the past several days, our park ranger, Catherine, just informed us that we have gotten another 4 inches that has soaked into the ground but the forecast for today is for another 2 to 4 inches of the wet stuff. Of course, it will get colder here and the sun will come out just in time for our first Thanksgiving holiday that we will not go home for.
Mom and I have decided just to hang around this quiet, little park, and enjoy the sunshine and cook our turkey breast with a couple of our traditional family side dishes. That means no table filled with desserts that my grandmother has been baking for the last 10 days. This year, most of our family members will be spending Thanksgiving with the in-laws and Christmas at granny’s house. My aunt Sherry, from Denver, will be with my grandmother this Thanksgiving and they plan on a quiet little dinner as well. Of course, we will call everyone to wish them a Happy Thanksgiving and catch on all the latest family gossip.
Our First Press Release
Our First Press Release for our first book we have written for Full-Time and Part-time RVers who would like to try volunteer workamping in Florida.
Our First Month at Big Shoals
Our first month at Big Shoals State Park has been uneventful and some would say even boring. But the weather is getting cooler and we are having a relaxing time. There are quite a few visitors that come every weekend but not so much during the week. We have been having problems with keeping the equipment going and we are no mechanics. The park currently only has one park ranger and waiting on a park services specialist to be hired. The park has a lovely picnic area right next to the river high on a bluff with picnic tables, barbecue grills and one fire pit.
There is a canoe/kayak launch down a sloping path that is overgrown with roots and has railroad ties as steps every so often. There a platform and some steps leading down into the river. There are no canoe/kayak racks for paddlers come down the Suwannee River before the park. Mostly, they come to launch to go the white water rapids area. The river is currently high and running fairly fast. With all the rain we have had over the last 4 weeks all the trails are wet with some even flooded in places. The 3 mile lone paved Woodpecker trail has to be blown off every week but we have only managed it one time since we have been here.
Happy Day It Is Done
Happy Day, it is done and available online at Amazon. We have been working on our eBook for full-time RVers who would like to volunteer in one of our many Florida parks including the State Parks, State Forests, Florida Wildlife and Water Management Areas as well as our Florida National Parks, Forests and Seashores. We hope you will try our eBook and give it a review on our Amazon page. We even went ahead and created an author page. We hope to use the proceeds from the sales of this eBook to allow us to keep going to various Florida public parks and volunteer.
If our eBook really starts to sell we will be able to donate a portion of the proceeds to various Florida public lands to keep them going, update equipment, maintain facilities and possibly fund more places to be set up for volunteers all year round. So far, we have only been able to volunteer at Florida State Parks but are working on assignments at some of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Management areas, county camping parks and even a couple of the Florida State Forests. They offer a different volunteer experience than the Florida State Parks we have visited and volunteer for so far. These experiences will be great to experience as well as to report to our readers.
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