Florida 2025

We won the lottery! In June of 2024 we entered a lottery for the chance to stay at Sweetwater cabin in the Ocala forest of Florida! We secured the chance to reserve the Sweetwater cabin for the week of April 25th through May 2nd. I drove down Thursday after work and Friday morning to meet Rachel, Aunt Stephanie and the kids at the Orlando airport at 2pm on Friday.

We drove up the hour and a half from the airport to the cabin with a quick pitstop at Aldi. We did have a brief hiccup with the wrong gate code; however we quickly were able to get the right code and get settled into the cabin. We stayed at the cabin and explored the spring, and some pork chops and rice for dinner.

Saturday April 26th:

On Saturday we went to Alexander Springs about 20 minutes away. It was a park close by with a swimming area and a small beach. We set up on the beach in the shade and spent the day playing the sand and swimming in the spring. We set up a picnic for lunch.

That evening we attempted a canoe trip up stream on juniper stream. However navigating the small stream with a big canoe after sharing a bottle of wine was not an easy task so we did not make it too far. We ended up relaxing at the spring with the canoes.

We had an excellent salmon dinner that night.

Sunday April 27th:

On Sunday we had another relaxing day and headed to clearwater lake recreation area. This was a small lake with a beach and a nice spot for swimming. We had a similar day where we spent the morning relaxing in the water and playing on the beach. We also had a visit from a softshell turtle!

That night we again relaxed by the spring at the cabin and had shrimp tacos for dinner!