Wonderful surprise – Ocean Pond cg
If you live near Jacksonville or Gainsville, FL, are you a lucky person. About a 45 minute drive north from Gainsville and 45 minutes west of Jacksonville is, in my opinion, the sweetest campground in Florida – Osceola NF’s Ocean Pond campground.
Who would have thought there would be such a lovely national forest campground tucked into the pine forest along this stretch of Rt. 90? Ocean Pond itself was a pleasant lake, aAlmost 2,000 surface acres of bright blue water contained in nearly a perfect circle. The campground is located on the north side of the lake, where the shore gentle slopes into the deeper depths. This provides several place were you can safely play in the water. The forest comes down to the Pond’s edge with some Cypress trees actually growing up out of the water – good place to moor your boat.
The campground itself offers three different camping experiences: there are the sites with electric and water hookups located in a park-like area; then there are the water hookup only sites separated from their neighbor by a privacy hedge of natural flora; and, last is what the Forest Service calls “primitive” but I call fabulous sites. These sites have no trimmed grass or hookups. They are just tucked into the native woods and its like entering another world.
I’ve mentioned before Fred and I are opposites that make one great whole and Ocean Pond campground is our kind of place: there are the hookups for Fred and the deep woods for me. Plus there are flush toilets, hot showers, rv dump station, coin operated washing machines and driers (unique to the Forest Service campground inventory), fabulous birdwatching, fishing and boating.
Okay, Salt Springs campground in the Ocala NF will always amazing but Osceola’s Ocean Pond campground is were I would head for the next time I’m in Florida.
Welcome to Ocean Pond
Water’s edge at Ocean Pond cg
Nearby Civil War battlefield
Snow egret
