Ellie Schiller Park and Three Sisters Springs

I woke up at 4 am and went into Cindy’s office to read and do my morning language lessons. Mary got up at 6 am and had tea as she read and caught up on what had happened in curling matches the night before at the Olympics.

Underwater viewing window at Ellie Schiller

Mark got up and made bacon, sourdough toast and omelets for breakfast. We took the dogs on a short walk around the neighborhood after breakfast. We could tell that both dogs are showing their age. Mark said that they can no longer tolerate a longer walk every day, so they do shorter walks every other day now.

We watched a little more of the Olympics on television then had a snack before going out. I got binoculars and a camera from our car then moved it into the space under Jimmy’s house next door. We took Mark’s pickup and drove to Ellie Schiller State Park. The park sustained a lot of damage from Hurricane Helene in late 2024 and is still rebuilding some of the exhibits. The park was offering free admission today, so we walked around and looked at the exhibits. We especially enjoyed the underwater viewing in the clear natural spring where we saw snappers, snook, gar, needlefish and other native fish species. There were several alligators sunning themselves and a number of manatees in the warmer water of the springs.

Manatees at Three Sisters Springs

After leaving Ellie Schiller State Park, we drove the short distance to Crystal River where we visited Three Sisters Springs. We had never been to this park but had kayaked within a few feet of it on the Crystal River several times. The National Park pass got us in the park half price and, as local residents, Whittingtons got an additional discount on admission. A boardwalk surrounds the spring where many manatees congregate to escape the cold water in the Gulf of Mexico. The crystal-clear water in the spring made the large manatees very visible and easy to photograph. Because it is a holiday weekend, the area had more visitors than a typical weekday, but it didn’t seem crowded.

After watching the manatees, we walked a mile long trail around the park and back to the truck. We drove to Home Depot where we bought a 12-foot 4x4 to replace the support for the sign at the entrance to Standish Road.

Back at the house we had a lentil curry soup that was very good along with a Caesar salad followed by one of Cindy’s homemade walnut brownies. As we were cleaning up after dinner, Whittingtons' neighbors, Kenny and Jodie from Minnesota came over to play cards. A heavy rain produced 2 ½ inches of rain within a couple of hours. The heavy rain and thunder frightened the dogs who hid in the bedroom. Since I don’t usually play cards, I went up to our room to read and catch on this journal.

Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park

We took the dogs for a long walk through the neighborhood early in the morning. Mary and Cindy saw an otter running across the road not far from the house. Mark made excellent breakfast burritos after we got back from our walk.

Since we were unable to get into the Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park on Friday because of the huge number of school buses, we decided to arrive at the park when it opened on Saturday. Our first stop in the park was the spring which brings fresh water up from 80 feet underground. A large school of crevalle jack fish were circling in the water. There were also some large snook and a few other smaller fish. Several large manatees were swimming in the relatively warm water, escaping the colder salt water of the Gulf. We went below the observation deck to the underwater viewing area and watched the schools of fish swimming among the manatees.

Manatee in Homosassa Springs

We walked along the stream flowing from the spring and saw hundreds of manatees in the shallow water. There was an area where tour boats were taking snorkelers to interact with the manatees. There was also an area where injured manatees were held for recuperation. It held several manatees including one that was huge.

T

Black crowned night heron

he park has displays of flamingos, herons, egrets, pelicans and other waterfowl, shorebirds, and wading birds. There were barn owls, barred owls, ospreys, and bald eagles. Enclosures held a wolf, fox, otters, and a Florida panther. All the birds and mammals at the center have been injured and are unable to survive in the wild. We laughed because a lady was at the park photographing birds and had an app playing bird calls. Several times we thought we were hearing a wild bird when she walked by us. We left the park around noon and returned to the house for a lunch of the leftover chili and cornbread.

White form of Great Blue Heron

In the afternoon we repaired the latch on the gate between the house and garage. The screws weren’t holding in the hollow plastic posts, so we had to run to Ace Hardware for an all thread to drill through the post with locking nuts on each side with an aluminum backing plate.

We also checked the crab trap and pinfish trap in the canal. The crab trap was in bad shape and needed to be trashed, but we baited the fish trap with some rib bones to see if we could catch baitfish.

We decided to drive the short distance to the Withlacoochee trailhead that we visited on Friday. We hiked the shorter Hog Pond Loop taking us to three deep flooded quarry pits. We saw several large bass swimming in the clear water and considered returning sometime to fish. We saw a man with his dog fishing in a quarry pit. He told us that he caught at least 50 fish within an hour the day before. Today, he said was slower with only 6 or 8 fish per hour.

The sun was starting to set as we were leaving, but the trail back to the truck is only about a mile, so we got back with no problems.

Mary, Cindy, and I took the dogs for a short walk while Mark made rigatoni with Italian sausages and cherry tomatoes. A garden salad was on the side. As always, everything was quite good.

After dinner we streamed a few episodes of Last Man Standing then turned in early since we have an early departure on Sunday morning.