A kayaking friend in JAX, Stephanie, called to say she had arranged for us to camp on her friend's property on the Peace River in Arcadia.
Whaaat?!!!
I had my truck loaded before she stopped talking.
We arranged to meet him at his house so he could show us the area that was best for primitive camping. He drove us in his Jeep through orange groves and woods and fields, on paths that ranged from slippery sand to slippery mud to slippery weeds. I finally had to swallow my pride and mention that my back tires were...well...bald.
"Oh, you'll have no problem getting down and I can pull you back up when it's time to go."
Good enough for me! I retraced the path in my Ford Ranger from the highway to the banks of the Peace River and I didn't get stuck until I got to the "campsite". No problem! I had 2 days until I had to worry about that.
The primitive camping I've done has always been on a broad sandy river bank or long sandy beach or open rocky areas in the desert. This was my first time confronting knee high weeds on soggy muddy ground but once we trampled some of the weeds flat, it created a nice little area to colonize.
Food and fire always helps. The first night I grilled steaks over hardwood charcoal and served with fried potatoes and various other sides.
It didn't take Stephanie's dad, Gordon, long to start hauling in the bass so the second night, Stephanie cooked the fish and served it with fresh asparagus and blue cheese crumbles.
We might be primitive but we don't mess around.
It was a fossiling dream come true to be able to walk from my tent right into the river and start digging in gravel. There wasn't a lot of big rock there but plenty of little shark teeth and Pam found a tooth from a type of llama that roamed Florida during the Pleistocene epoch.
After a few hours of digging, we stepped right back into our campsite and settled in for dinner.
Sweet!
Friday I dug all day. I dug until Jack had to leave in the early afternoon and I dug until Pam had to leave in the late afternoon and I was still digging when Stephanie brought me life sustaining chardonnay that got me through until dusk.
Note the severely pruned hands as I display my usual "Heartbreak Half."
Stephanie may not be a convert due to time and distance constraints but she acknowledged the addictive quality of the hobby and now has a good start to a fossil collection.
I convinced her to sit back and be towed to the campsite and she said, "I guess I should troll since you're towing me with a trolling motor." No sooner did her lure hit the water than she had a bass on.
By the second morning, the honeymoon has worn off. Everything is gritty and grimey but we enjoyed a last breakfast of eggs from my hens, the leftover potatoes, and venison sausage from the landowner.
Time to tow the Ranger back to the highway but we have an open invitation to camp there so I'll be investing in some new tires STAT!
As usual, I was fairly clueless about where to dig so after some exploration, I returned to the area where I had my very first Peace River visit and success almost exactly one year ago and found lots of little tidbits. I'm still waiting for my season to kick into gear but it's a good start.
Turtle scutes, horse tooth, 3-toed horse tooth, giant armadillo scute, gator teeth, stingray dermal scutes, bull shark, hemi, lemon, and mako teeth, etc. The bottom tiger shark tooth is one of the nicest I've found.
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