River Junction Campground at Withlacoochee State Forest: January 29 - February 12, 2022

 Here is the rig at the campground:

The temperature dropped to 22℉ the first night we stayed at the campground. We covered the water hookup with a plastic bag that first night and that prevented freezing of the water filter. Like other FL campgrounds we have stayed at there we hot showers but the bathhouse was not heated. So when the weather was cool we waited until the afternoon when the temperatures had a chance to rebound from nighttime.

The campground was situated along the Withlacoochee River near Silver Lake. Silver Lake was near one end of the River Junction Recreation Area and the campground was at the other end so we didn't have the nice views of the lake nearby. Here are pictures of Silver Lake and the boat ramp. The person in the background near the boat ramp is fishing from the shore.

There was another recreation area called Iron Bridge nearby, about 3 miles away, that we walked to one day. This recreation area was also on the Withlacoochee River but it did not include a campground. It was still somewhat picturesque, particularly the visible root structure of some of the trees on the shore. The river eroded away some of the dirt near the trunks and it made one of the trees look like it was bending into the wind with the roots being blown behind it. The shading in the picture masked some of the effect that was more pronounced in real life.

The unpaved road (not really a dirt road but a sand road) the recreation areas were on also went by the Florida National Cemetery. For some reason, the cemetery's I've happened upon like the one in the Apalachicola Forest catch my interest and the Florida National Cemetery fell into that category. This cemetery was quite large as opposed to the family one in Apalachicola so that probably partly piqued my interest. So one day I detoured off the unpaved road and rode around the cemetery. It is supposedly one of the busiest in the US. The land for the cemetery was donated by the forest. When I first entered the cemetery from the rear, since the unpaved road was just a boundary and not an entrance, unbeknownst to me I was looking at the back of all the tombstones instead of the front (who knew they could be double sided?). So the side I was looking at either had numbers or the name of a deceased female. I was thinking maybe the areas of the cemetery are segregated by gender and the ones with just numbers were the remains of an unidentified soldier. Thelma Brown was the name on the tombstone shown on the lower right.

Eventually I went down one of the aisles, turned around and ended up seeing the "front" of the tombstones and then the picture (pun intended) became clearer. The other sides all had names, they were all male as far as I could see (although I didn't bother checking every one) and listed a military rank. The side I originally looked at was the military man's wife when he had one and just a tombstone number when he was unmarried or at least that was my conclusion.

As I mentioned the cemetery was large so it had many sections. So most of the tombstones were granite and upright but I did see at least one section where the tombstones were marble or inset into the ground.

The cemetery also had columbarium sections for cremated remains.

Lastly, there were vacant section for future burials as well as an area under construction. For the picture of the construction area at the bottom I entered the construction area to get it. For some reason, the cemetery staff were none too happy about that and asked me to leave the area, of course they were very nice about it. I mention it so you appreciate the lengths I go to for this blog 😊.

Under the small world category: After our visit to River Junction, we went to Jane's parent's on Super Bowl Sunday. Her brother from Colorado was visiting at the same time. One of the items on her brother's agenda was to visit their grandparent's grave which just so happened to be at the Florida National Cemetery. After hearing that I was glad I at least visited the cemetery even though I didn't visit their grandparent's actual grave. Jane's memory of her grandparent's resting place was foggy and she hadn't put the two together until her brother's visit stirred the connection.

Our next stop is Flying Eagle Preserve which falls under the Southwest Florida Water Management District's purview. It will be the closest to boondocking we have gone so far. Only a portable potty and non-potable water are provided.