Candid Florida

Buying tupelo honey roadside

If you’ve ever driven US 98 between Perry and Newport en route to Tallahassee and points west, chances are you’ve seen the tupelo honey man set up at the Bloxham Cutoff.  It never fails – every trip, I see him there.  So I did stop and buy a honeybear full of the golden stuff.

The tupelo trees are in full bloom now, so beekeepers along the Apalachicola River valley are busy with production. If you’re ready for a taste of this mild but distinctive honey, you don’t have to go to the source (although it’s fun) in Wewahitchka, a small town between Blountstown and Port St. Joe where the bulk of the apiaries are.

Instead, you can pop into a produce stand, or meet the tupelo honey man – a personable fellow who’s happy to tell you why you should be having a little tupelo honey every day.

Black Hammock Fish Camp

One of the first genuine Florida adventures I was introduced to upon arriving back as a resident after a long absence was the crazy quilt of outdoors and dining that is Black Hammock Fish Camp, not far from Orlando along Lake Jesup in Oviedo.

The restaurant is down-home and tasty, featuring farm grown alligator and seafood. At the time I visited, you had to slip and slide down a sand road, much like driving in snow, to get there. The road’s since been paved but rambles through old orange groves in a blissfully agricultural district of Seminole County.

Beyond the restaurant, it’s a complex of entertainment and outdoors: a marina and boat ramp, waterfront tiki bar and shop full of trinkets and Ts, an alligator pit, and airboat rides on Lake Jesup. Now I’ve experienced for a fact that Lake Jesup is full of alligators. So if you’re hankering to see some, either hatchlings in a tank, gator tail on your plate, or the big guys in the lake, this is the place to be.

Black Hammock Fish Camp
2356 Black Hammock Fish Camp Road
Oviedo, FL 32765
407-365-1244

Sour cream and onion flavored crickets. Soda that comes with a warning that you’ll poop blue after drinking it. Stacks and stacks of exotic beers and ciders floor to ceiling. And all of it jam-packed into a historic wrapper, a general store in downtown Fort Pierce. It’s weird, wild, wonderful and whimsically unexpected. Don’t miss it! They serve deli and bakery items, but you’ll have a hard time finding it behind all the beer and candy. Good luck! Open Mon-Sat 8:30-6:00 @ 100 Avenue A, Fort Pierce.

Toilets have been going green for years, but this one spotted in a local government building is a new one for me…pick your flush! One drop for Number One, three drops (why not two?) for Number Two. A new twist on low flow.

Spongeorama, along the Anclote River

Okay, it’s a bit dated and kitschy, but there just ain’t nothing else like it. When in Tarpon Springs, you must make a point of visiting SpongeORama!  The film (watch it and you get a discount in the shop) sets the tone for the extensive displays on the history of sponging in Florida, which appear to date back to my youth (the museum opened in 1968) but, despite their age, give a detailed overview of all aspects of the industry and Greek culture and life in Tarpon Springs. Did you know, for instance, that red tide walloped the commercial sponging industry back in 1957? It’s not a new phenonmenon. After you’ve soaked in the history (be sure to stand under the fans), take a gander at the wide variety of sponges available for everything from artists brushes to keeping you clean in the bath. Buy a sponge, support a native Florida industry!

SpongeORama
510 Dodecanese Blvd, Tarpon Springs
(727) 943-2164

Cooters at Cooter Park, Inverness

Have you driven US 41 through Inverness anytime lately? If not, you’re in for a treat. Seems several years ago the city took on a serious cleanup and park creation project right along the downtown pondfront at the municipal complex, and the end result is Cooter Pond Park, notable for its big stack of faux cooter turtles at the corner with US 41. The boardwalk complex, which zigzags over the sizable pond, is an ideal place for birding.

I’ve been there several times since it opened, and it never fails that I encounter some large bird – a red-shouldered hawk this last visit – on the boardwalk railing by the gazebo. Look down into the pond, and you’ll see the namesakes of this waterway, docile and placid, and you might scare up a few gators, too. The boardwalk is a good half-mile-plus round-trip from the city lot, and offers little games and puzzles for the littlest ones.