The Flamingays present to our readers Mary Ann Carroll, the only woman of the African-American “Highwaymen” artist movement in Florida. This group of artists all either taught themselves to paint or mentored each other in the craft and as far as D-Bag and Shooglet are concerned have set the standard against which all Florida Landscape painters shall be measured.
Troy Springs State Park
674 Troy Springs Road
Branford, Florida 32008
5 bucks a carload/dropbox style
FINDABILITY:
yeah, we passed it. Even though I have been there 3 other times, its still hard to remember that after you pass Ichatucknee springs, about a half hour later you gotta keep your eyes peeled for that little brown sign that says “troy springs ———>1.3 mi.” urging you to take a right off of the main drag (HW 27). Its kinda in the middle of nowhere, between High Springs and my favorite Florida town name, Mayo. Anyways, after taking that right, you have to go to nearly the end of that road and take another right on troy springs road. After that, you are good to go.
FIRST IMPRESSION: The first time I went to Troy Springs, it was to meet a group of friends who had arrived before me. There were only a few cars in the parking lot, and many nice picnic tables and large trees providing shade. The Spring is not visible from the parking lot or picnic areas, so I was anxious to get down the snakey wooden walkway and see what Troy had to offer! I was NOT disappointed! Green and Blue shades of brilliance were broken only by scattered piles of limestone jutting out of the water 30 yards out. The circular spring mouth was inviting and my friends were sitting in inner-tubes smiling at me. HOME! and we were the only ones there! or so we thought…Troy Springs,at about 70 feet deep, is frequented by SCUBA DIVERS! We almost had a conniption fit trying to get out of the water when the spring started to bubble furiously and in multiple places. I thought it might by a swamp-monster on its way to get us but alas, it was just a few friendly divers who were coming up from troy’s depths.
** here we can see Amy, Leah, Susie and Laurie I think, kinda hard to tell.
ACCESSIBILITY: meh. Not the best. There is a beautifully constructed winding boardwalk alllll the way down to the spring but it stops appruptly at the spring mouth, creating a deck that you can look out over. To get into the actual water there are 3 short stair sets, 2 lead to ground on either side of the spring, and one set leads directly into the spring. It’s sad they couldn’t have continued with their lovely ramp down into the water. The set of stairs that leds into the spring is slippery. On either side you have to transverse limestone and cypress knees to get to what little “beach” there is. The good news is there is a bit of a sandy slope going into the water around the edges so you don’t have to just jump in if thats not your jam.
**This is on a more recent trip to the springs. Tessie and Dinah step off the stairs that lead into the spring to jump off the natural limestone diveboard.
SAFETY: There were only a few people I have encountered at this spring, as it has very recently been made into a state park, and the word must not be out yet. Everyone seems friendly, and the divers loved to tell about what they saw down in Troy’s mysterious dark hole. The bathrooms are boringly binary. We met a few local Mayo-ins and they were super nice and friendly to me and others I was with. I would say, as always, go with friends and go during a weekday as it is much less crowded.
***mancho jumps from the limestone
FUN FACTOR: Super fun! There is something that this dude called a “wormhole” which is basically a super fear factor because you have to dive down and under this hole in the limestone and then the force of the spring moving towards the Swannee(and your furious swimming) pushes you out the other side. The wormhole is probably about 5 feet long, so not too bad and I did it! I was scared my belly was gonna get stuck half way through and I was gonna drown but I had spots who were waiting to push or pull me out if I didn’t come up (highly recommended) and I went through swiftly! Totally awesome, but also scary.
**ariel view of Troy emptying into the Suwannee
Also, there was a park ranger who told us about the sunken shell of civil war battle ship you can see when the water is lower. We went out and walked on it and its covered in green algae and feels erie to me. The Suwannee is nice for when you get too cold and you need to take a dip in what feels like a bathtub, compared to the springs. All in all, really fun… mainly because its not crowded and you can jump off limestone into the mouth of Troy as many times as you want without waiting. Also super beautiful because of the surrounding cypress, and cypress knees.
OVERVIEW: I love this place. You can swim out to the limestone island and bask in the sun, surrounded by the bounty of the Florida Aquifer. You can jump from the ledges that jut out over the mouth, you can wander along the shore, brave the wormhole, play find the battleship, you can just kick it on the deck and observe. Go soon before the spot blows up and becomes too crowded!
xoxo
Shoogafish
(the above picture is called “Double Tree” by David Moynahan. Click on the photo to link to his website/photblog)
TIGHT FLORIDA LANDSCAPES!!!
This photographer (according to D-Bag’s mom who has been BLOWING UP HIS EMAIL with the most beautiful North Florida landscape photography of all time) used to visit D-Bag’s parents in his childhood home in Lloyd, FL (halfway between Tallahassee and Monticello). There are tons of pictures of the Aucilla, Wacissa, Wakulla, Sopchoppy, and Chipola rivers, all a stones throw from Panhandle-dwellers like D-Bag and Shooga-wooga.
Let’s BE REAL. y’all know FLORIDA IS OFF THE CHAIN!!!!!
Safe Sex for Seniors (by safersex4seniors)
(D-Bag on an airboat ride in the Everglades Holiday Park)
D-Bag is currently sitting in his pastel-painted bedroom with rickety plywood walls that costs $250/month and wondering what the fuck kind of turn his life is taking. The Mamas and the Papa’s are streaming from Grooveshark (a Gainesville, FL-based website) singing about their decision to move from the “dark and dirty” north cuntry to live in a land where the sun shines every day. Using Mama Cass logic, what sense is there in leaving a sultry paradise in favor of Baltimore, MD?
On D-Bag’s mind are the countless freshwater springs throughout Central Florida that he promised himself he would visit whenever he had breaks from nursing school. He ponders all the fantastic queers who live in rural places like the homos that run the Taco Bell in Starke, FL, and gave him a “senior discount” when they saw the pink triangle on his side-cocked baseball cap (Shooglet INSISTS that baseball caps must be cocked “up and to the side” and will not let D-Bag deviate from this imposition). He is still fixated on the epic, failed swampwalk in Big Cypress Preserve that left his bare feet sliced by limestone hidden in knee-deep mud and the skin between his toes torn to shreds by sawgrass to the delight of the leeches attached to his heels. He has been planning his triumphant return but he now doubts that he will ever march that beginning section of the Florida Trail to completion.
D-Bag fights the impulse to apologize or rationalize this exodus from his subtropical homeland. For all of Florida’s natural beauty and cultural richness, there is a dark cloud tracing her coastline and blanketing the high-and-dry inland. Ultra-conservative economic policies seem designed to prevent the poor from encroaching on the space that is inhabited by wealthy outsiders and Old Florida aristocrats. Legislative theocrats (who won the right to not pay sales tax on luxury yachts during Closet-Case Charlie Christ’s regime) have even lowered the glass ceiling for upwardly-mobile working class professionals like nurses who make 80 cents for every dollar that a nurse makes in another state. However, D-Bag knows that even in the face of this economic diminution, nurses pull it together to acheive amazing success and he will never be 100% sure that he is making the right decision to leave.
D-Bag’s previously undiscovered ambition has driven him north to start his new career at an internationally-acclaimed academic medical center in Baltimore. Some people have tried to comfort him with statements like “Baltimore is kind of like the South.” While D-Bag refuses to defend the borders drawn by the confederacy in their frantic attempt to uphold their slave ecomony (don’t let Old Florida traditionalists try to tell you that they seceded for ANY other reason), Baltimore still does not FEEL to him like the South. The air doesn’t feel right entering his lungs, the sun’s warm caress is replaced with a benign yet harsh glare, his lips and fingers crack under the bone-dry autumn-through-spring air.
But D-Bag knows that the South, and Florida specifically, is not the only place where beauty lives. D-Bag can be mesmerized by vast forests that turn brown when the sun dips far lower in the sky than he is used to. He cherishes the pockets of urban beauty, struggle, and art that challenge the monolithic view of poor Baltimore neighborhoods as cultural and economic wastelands.
So all this is to say, dear readers, that although you may not approve of or understand D-Bag’s decision to relocate (you may be especially perplexed considering the all the Florida-pride-bordering-on-nationalism spouted on this blog), he has his reasons. But as he promised before he will not abandon the cause. He will continue posting dispatches from exile in the blustery north cuntry and will let his longing for Florida’s swamps, beaches, and springs fuel his quest professional achievement, allowing him greater flexibility and geographical balance in his future. Goodbye for now, Florida.
This photo was taken on the back roads drive between Gainesville and Tallahassee. D-Bag wanted to do something magickal with this road-killed gaytor but it stunk too bad.
Tananarive Due is yet another reason to be proud of being a Floridian Flamingay. Her parents—John and Patricia Stephens Due (R.I.P)—have called Quincy, FL, home for quite some time. Dr. Patricia Stevens Due and other civil rights activists from Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University (FAMU) were brutalized and arrested for staging sit-ins at a Woolworth’s lunch counter on S. Monroe St. in Tallahassee, a block from the capital building (where the capital boner now stands).
(This photo was taken from a website under the caption: “The Taint of Florida”)
Tananarive Due’s tight activist pedigree may be linked to how awesome she writes. To learn more about Dr. Patricia Stephens Due and Tananarive Due, read the mother-daughter memoir Freedom in the Family and then loan D-Bag a copy cuz he’s TOO BROKE TO BUY IT.
(D-Bag had the honor of hearing the elder Dues speaking about their involvement in the civil rights movements as well as bragging about how awesome their daughters are. Dr. Patricia Stevens Due passed away on February 7th, 2012)
But Tanarive Due is not just cool cuz she has cool parents. Her book that I am supposed to be reviewing right now—My Soul to Keep—is an epic fantasy/suspense masterpiece that also tickles the boundaries of horror. At the center is an immortal hottie and serial monogamist originally from Ethiopia who has to abandon his wives and children every 20 years when they start to question why he hasn’t aged. Due plays with historical revisionism by offering the story that he invented jazz and had his hand in other important movements over the centuries. The current story takes place in contemporary South Florida.
(The author, Tananarive Due)
Florida’s geographical highlights include a thrilling car chase on Florida’s Turnpike (made me immediately want to eat at the Miami Subs that used to be at the Okahumpka Service Plaza) and a riggedy-raw disemboweling that takes place on a remote hammock in the Everglades.
The other protagonist, Jessica, wrestles with accepting her husband’s unbelievable secret while other immortals of his same sect try to kill her for what she knows. This shit gets intense. I find Due’s characters comforting as none are all good nor all bad. Her characters can be both villains and heroes at once, forcing us—her dear readers—to constantly question our loyalties and struggle with our hopes for the ultimate outcome. Will Jessica join David in immortality—discarding her own humanity—and take their daughter along for the endless ride? If not, will she survive five more minutes on the damn turnpike?
I highly recommend this book to lovers of Florida and lovers of supreme fantasy and suspense novels. Also check out Due’s insanely mesmerizing horror novel, The Good House, which takes place in Washington state but is still rooted in the beauty and traditions of Florida and Haiti.
Some historically accurate pictures of what D-Bag and Shooglet’s Florida ancestors may have done to kill time.
Sunset over an old pickup at newnans lake. Currently the most beautiful spot I’ve come across in alachua county. If I could I’d just be chillin out here all day. I need a canoe!
Welcome folks to the first installment of a project that has been long in the making! Since I, Shoogarcandy, moved back to my water-pocked birthland, I have vowed to create a guide for other humans to use to navigate these sparkling beauties that we are surrounded with.
A little on Florida Springs in General::
Florida is graced with over 700 freshwater springs, ONE OF THE LARGEST CONCENTRATION OF SPRINGS ON EARTH. I hope to visit all the ones that are accessible to me by the time of my death. Living in Gainesville has allowed me great strides along my journey, as we are literally surrounded by Them. I like to think of the aquifer as a mystical water world and here in Florida our limestone is so thin and prone to cavities that this magic rises up every chance it has, out of the ground in hundreds of places, giving us an unusual glimpse into mother earth’s innards.
FANNING SPRINGS STATE PARK
18020 NW Us Highway 19,Fanning Springs, FL
6 bux per vehicle, 2 if your on bike or foot
FANNING SPRINGS. Whenever I visit a Spring in Florida, I make note of a few things. Here are those things in no particular order.
FINDABILITY: we definitely passed it at first, even though this sign looks REALLY big, I think its at an odd angle. So look hard, go slow. get directions from the Florida State Parks Website (listed below).
FIRST IMPRESSION: Crowded. At first all we saw was the parking lot and picnic areas. PACKED with people. We did come on a weekend, I beleive it was a Saturday, so that was to be expected, but this is the most crowded I think I have ever seen a Spring though. REALLY TRULY MAGICALLY BEAUTIFUL. Yes, I know what your thinking, aren’t all the Famous Florida Springs this pretty? Well, No. This one is Special. Its that feeling where you can hear the kids squealing, and the water splashing, but you cant see the water yet cause its such a far way down and then you crest the hill and BAM! more turquoise and green that your eyes can understand. this Spring basin is HUGE. It looked like a really large circular swimming pool to me. This BadBoi pumps out about 65 billion gallons of water a day, and it feeds right into the historic Swanee river.
**D-bag seen here in red, and LaRoux, with the green and yellow noodles there, were my Queerhorts in this adventure.
ACCESSIBILITY: pretty dern awesomely accessible! There are ramps ALL THE WAY from the parking lot to the spring, making it possible for a wheeled chair to travel all the way to the water’s edge. There are hand rails/gates that line the pathway, creating a safe way to get down into the water for those that require something to lean on. There is a “kids” area, which is a roped off portion of the spring basin, that allows for shallow play. This area also has a ramp going into it.
In the foreground you can see the ramp that leads gently into the chest-deep water, and in the background that sandy-colored part of the spring, the kids section with a ramp also connected to it.
SAFETY: I personally felt pretty safe. D-bag felt a little off when some chilmascbros made an annoying comment about his delightfully short bathing attire, and so as in typical Queerdo form , I then accompanied him to and from the bathroom and picnic area from then on out. STICK TOGETHER!
FUN FACTOR: This was seriously some of the most beautiful underwater scenery I have every seen in a spring. We were sharing a mask, and every time I got a hold of It i would float atop the mouth of the spring and watch as these people created art out of rocks, stacking them delicately and beautifully, 30 feet below me. This spring is crystal clear. Free from toxic algae that more and more springs are beginning to suffer from in the wake of Florida’s degradation. This is a must see.
Here is the diving platform, where you can plummet about ten feet into the icy mouth of Fanning Springs. Also in this photo the boardwalk is visible, this creates a separation of the Swannee from the Springs State Park property. Don’t try to go in the water over there, you will get yelled at. I tried it. You can canoe up to that boardwalk and tie up your boat though, which i thought was cool.
OVERVIEW: I really loved my experience at this spring, and I returned again a few weeks later. I would recomend going with a few people at least, bringing snacks(none for sale) and going on a weekday. (may be less crowded) Let me know how you enjoyed this review! what other info should I include? what springs would you like me to review? want to add a springs review? LET SHOOGAPOPS KNOW!
Hello pals, creepy strangers, Florida lovers and queers alike, Shoogcane does apologize for thier lack of posts this last week. I traveled to my designated gay utopian metropolis as D-bag puts it, to recharge my batteries and reconnect with my beloved Queerdos in Philly, which ruled.
For the past month I have not been feeling so hot, just like a bad cold mostly, but when I got home from Gay-cay and my throat began to feel swollen, I thought I should take my sicky self to the doc’s office. I kinda hate the doctors office for obvious reasons, read:(fat-hate, gender binary-love) so I was feeling anxiety in the waiting room as I stared blankly at the television screen that was showing an image of fish in a fish tank. My assigned name was called and it took by suprise, but I hopped up and proceeded to climb onto my old nemesis, the scale. We used to have major avoidance issues, but now we are friends. I guess I just stopped caring what he said about me. Anyway, I was still feeling anxious and self conscious walking into the exam room, but when I turned the corner, I was greeted with thisss!!!
SCORE! The Great Florida Spirit knows how to make me feel comfortable anywhere I go, even when I am confronted with the most challenging of situations! I felt right at home amongst those wading flamingays, and my blood pressure showed a normal reading( very unusual for me at the doc office) AHHHHH, the ways in which life blesses you with surprises. Happy to be Home!
