Kayak meet-and-greet with an Endangered Species

Clay and I decided to check out this park the morning of my summer trip back to see friends and family.  I was all packed and ready (well, packed...but way over the 50 pound limit) so we decided to go for a morning kayak run before I headed out for a week and a half.  We crossed another park off the list and had a very interesting trip.

 

 

It was so peaceful and quiet that morning. I was playing around with the GO PRO on this trip as well so you'll see a variety of pictures. The park is close to a point where two rivers meet: The Suwannee and Withlacoochee.  There was also an Endangered Species we met that day that we had NO clue even existed here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We paddled up and down the Suwannee and then went up the Withlacoochee and made a quick pit stop for a little bit. There was a natural spring and we stopped to take it all in.

 

 

 

So after our little break, we got back in and continued paddling up the Withlacoochee (pictured above) for a little while. We were talking about upcoming plans and all of a sudden I hear a loud noise behind me like a branch just fell off a tree and into the water. WEIRD. We rarely hear sounds like that when we're out. We kept paddling and eventually turned around, still talking, when Clay yells, "WOAH...did you just see that?" and of course I was looking at him so my frantic answer was NO! He quickly explained the area on the right where a big fish jumped out of the water and made a huge splash. 

 

Now, I'm pretty good with being in dark waters but once he said this, I started panicking a little bit. We moved to the left side of the river, away from the "fish splash zone" and I was scanning the surface for any signs of it coming up again.  Clay was ahead of me as usual and all of a sudden it happened again, about 10 feet from my kayak, and I literally saw this HUGE 4 foot fish jump up and splash back down. I paddled as fast as possible and continued looking behind us, afraid it would land in the boat or something next time!

 

Of course our GO PRO ran out of battery but here's a photo

I found online that was EXACTLY what I saw: 

 

After we got back, Clay started researching online and found out that our new fish friend is called a Gulf Sturgeon and is actually an Endangered Species. They swim up the rivers from the Gulf and inhabit cool waters during the summer. They can live up to 40 years, get up to 8 feet in length and weigh over 200 pounds! Isn't that crazy? We couldn't believe that we were THAT close to one! Definitely learned something new that day.