The Braden River
Bradenton, Florida
Above the dam
About half a mile south of State Road 70 there is a dam that keeps the upriver water fresh and creates an oustanding bass fishing lake that for years was known as Jigg's Landing, with a marina, tackle shop, bar, cabins, the whole works.
Recentlly Manatee County purchased the property and will be developing a public recreation site.
Above the lake the Braden River is a normal small, twisting river for a few more miles upstream, and it runs by the historic Linger Lodge. It is a pretty little river, with homes on one bank, lots of vegetation and the normal share of gators, but not nearly as nice a paddling river as the lake is a bass fishing place.
Lost Creek and Lakewood Ranch
The river is tidal below the dam, and about 4 1/2 miles North of State Road 70 it goes under State Road 64 at the Braden's confluence with the Manatee River, about 7 1/2 miles from the Gulf of Mexico.
South of the Bridge, on the East Bank of the river, is a small boat ramp that is perfect for canoe and kayak launching. It is in a RV Park, by a tackle shop. The charge is $3.00 per boat. If nobody is in the store when you get there, pay when you get back. Just park your car in a spot where someone else can still use the ramp.
I paddled the 4 1/2 mile stretch from SR 70 to SR 64 during high tide in August in a 16 foot Mohawk canoe with Josh, my 12-year-old "Little Brother" in the bow.
In addition to the tidal influence on the current, there was also wind from the North. It created a choppy surface all the way to the Manatee and it took us almost 2 hours to get there and eat lunch,.
After lunch we paddled back, and we had a frustrating experience.
I'm having some memory problems with my old computer, (getting a new one in less than a month) so for now I can't show you an aerial photo I found of the area on the internet. It will explain what happened to us.
I suggest that you locate one of any area you plan to paddle that is full of mangroves. I didn't get my photo until after our trip.
We enjoyed the downriver trip, passing some beautiful homes, some ordinary homes, and many mangroves. We saw many fish, birds, and one splash sure sounded like an alligator, which is apparetnly quite possible in brackish water.
Coming back, however, I was not careful where we entered the mangroves, and I missed the actual mouth of the river. We searched for over an hour and a half among the mangroves, and we could not find the channel and kept running into dead ends.
(You have to remember that I learned to paddle in the Midwest, where there are no tidal influences and no mangroves that I know of, so I think my Boy Scout instructor would be compassionate. My early paddling buddies, however, would not be so kind about my not being able to find a channel.)
The aerial photo shows clearly that if you don't take an immediate left (East) turn after coming under the bridge, you will not be on the river. You will just be paddling on choppy water among mangroves and getting nowhere.
The wind was picking up, and there were storm clouds with lightning potential headed our way from the East. I was nervous about the clouds.
Josh was even more nervous.Frustrated and embarassed that I couldn't find our way, I decided to stop at a home and ask for help. An understanding man voluntarily took us back to where we had left the car, and we drove back to his place to get our canoe.
It is a scenic trip, and I'll do it again soon in my kayak. Maybe even tomorrow. But I will never paddle a mangrove-infested tidal river again without getting an aerial view first.
another lesson learned on
the Braden River
Lost Creek and
Lakewood Ranch
By Bob Cork
Incrimination and Redemption
Part I - Incrimination
February 4 2006
Lost Creek was called that because most of the time it was a dry, sandy and rocky gully that was laden with appliances, logs, bottles and cans as it meandered through Terre Haute, Indiana, on its way to the Wabash River.
Lost Creek passed under North 13th Street four blocks from our home. Before it went under another bridge it dumped into a large gravel pit, from which the creek flowed again, never dry, another quarter mile to the Wabash.
Soon after a heavy rain flooded Lost Creek we enjoyed using cans to catch small fish that became stranded in pools of water, fish that had journeyed upstream from the Wabash after the rain, thinking, perhaps, they had found heaven under shaded trees, only to have it turn quickly into hell.
Once when we waded in lost creek puddles my friend cut his foot on broken glass and then got a tetanus shot. Another time my father found me, with a friend , on a log, floating down the creek between the gravel pit and the river. It was March, the water was cold, we were stupid teens.
Large pieces of trash, like bedsprings and appliances, were thrown into the creek from the North bank, because many houses in a neighborhood of poverty were small and not well kept and some people were careless with trash.
Others were proud and determined despite their poverty. One of the boys, Gregory Bell, graduated from Garfield High School, served in the Army, graduated from Indiana University, won a gold medal in the 1956 Olympics in the long jump, and then became a dentist.
Several of us who lived South of Lost Creek played in a vacant lot where there was a large tree we climbed and long grass where we hid when we dug foxholes and pretended to be soldiers. We called our playground DACY hill, the four letters being those that started our last names.
The owner of Dacy Hill put up a big sign that said the property was for sale. Eventually two new brick homes were built there, taking away our playground and adventureland..
I was not in favor of progress, however. Two days after the sign appeared I took it down, broke it into pieces, carried them across a stubbled cornfield and threw them into Lost Creek.
Tom, my loving little brother, told my father what I did.
I don't recall the specific punishment, but I do remember that I had to go with my father to find the sign pieces, which had disappeared into the hands of an enterprising trash-picker.
I also recall that I was taken to face the owner of the property where we played, and who was also, therefore, the owner of the sign.
I was reminded of all this because Saturday, Feb 4, 2006, my current "Little Brother," 13-year-old Josh Lopes, was sick, so I went canoeing by myself in the afternoon.
An e-mail correspondent from Georgia had asked me if I knew of a place where he could launch his kayak into the Braden River, upstream a few miles from Linger Lodge, the famous restaurant, lodge and campground that still attracts people to the woods from many miles afar.
As I left Linger Lodge and entered the "wilderness" area, the first wild critter I saw was a large black feral pig, that I yelled at three times in order to get it to move so I could get a better picture. It did move, but not so I could get a better picture.
I paddled up the narrow river, and was immediately enchanted by moss hanging from trees. The first thing I thought was that this looked a lot more like a Jungle Cruise than the one near Orlando that has been recently diminished by efforts to make Disney politically correct.
I cruised past a few riverfront properties, but soon I was in the woods and on the water with few of mankind's activities or lodgings to distract me. I heard no warning shots of "fore."
I did notice occasionally, however, through trees, the roof, or the top of a pool cage, of a spread obviously occupied by people of affluence. This was obviously the right side of Lost Creek.
I also noticed the scarcity of wildlife. I saw two herons, and one distant egret, and one vulture overhead. But there were no turles, no fish, no alligators. It was a little chilly, but I thought that shouldn't bother cold-blooded critters.
The sky was blue, the bushes green, sand bars were visible in clear and shallow water, deadfall trees had been left in place. It was scenic for photographers but challenging for solo paddlers..
I paddled more than an hour, once in a while seeing a portion of a rooftop, but never hearing a sound other than branches swishing slightly in the breeze.
I passed under a narrow bridge, but the sides were solid, there were no paths for access to the road, no signs that boys had been camping under the bridge to fish all night. There were no charred remains of campfires, no bobbers and lines tangled in trees, no forked sticks in the ground for holding fishing poles.
Soon after passing the bridge I noticed something out of place, lodged in brush. It was green and yellow plastic, three or four feet in one direction, slightly less in the other. It looked like part of a jungle gym, and it had apparently been discarded by someone who thought this was Lost Creek, where trash would eventually get carried off downstream.
The river continued shrinking, and eventually I came to a brook babbling over rocks and entering the river. I heard it before I saw it, and it reminded me of little creeks entering bigger ones in Connecticut, where I often watched beavers. On this little brook there was no evidence that beavers or boys had ever tried to build a dam.
Soon I came to another bridge, pulled the canoe up on sand and crawled up the bank. There were no footprints or bike tracks. There seemed to be a trail through brush, and I walked up it, and found myself next to a "no trespassing" sign on a well-manicured lawn in Lakewood Ranch, the mammoth new community for people who have escaped or avoided poverty.
The river became shallow and narrow, less than ten feet wide. I paddled over a quarter of a mile with the river never wide enough to turn the canoe around on water. When I came to clearings in the brush, there were no signs that boys had been there.
As I paddled toward Linger Lodge I realized I had seen not one gator, not one snake, not one turtle, not one unsusual bird. No armadillos in grass, raccoons by water, deer standing among trees and watching. Just one pig, a docile one at that, apparently without fear of becoming bacon.
When I got back to the campground where families take vacation weekends I noticed a boy, about ten years old, fishing from the bank with a spinning rod and reel. Two girls about the same age were playing nearby, practicing to someday be ballerinas.
After taking my canoe out of the water a small frog, no bigger than a nickel if spread out, jumped onto my gunwale. I snatched him and walked toward the little boy.
"Catchin' any?" I asked, and he said he wasn't. I noticed he was using a "minnow" type lure, and I asked him if he would like to have a little live frog I just caught. I waited as he ran to his grandfather's trailer and brought back a small tackle box.
The girls and I watched as he cut off the lure and carefully tied a hook to the line. I complimented him on the knot he tied, then slipped the little frog on his hook for him. He skillfully flipped it out on the Braden River. He thanked me and I left.
After loading my canoe on my little Subaru wagon, I turned right instead of left on Linger Lodge Road, and made my way into Lakewood Ranch. I drove for a while among luxury.
I noticed signs that said "Braden River" on the two bridges I had paddled under, but I couldn't see the river from my car, just as I couldn't see cars from the river. Not even bicycles.
Finally, still within Lakewood Ranch, I crossed a more distant bridge, on Greenwood Blvd. I walked to the concrete rail. The Braden River was seven or eight feet wide, no more than three inches deep as it flowed over sand.
I would be telling my friend that there was no place above Linger Lodge where he could launch, unless he was skilled at carrying a kayak across a fairway and through the woods.
I thought of the backyard gym that had been tossed in the creek like an old mattress. That reminded me of Lost Creek. Some people, despite status, just don't care.
But I also realized that a boy who is upset with losing a special place for climbing trees and digging foxholes won't be tempted to steal a sign, break it into pieces, and throw it into the Braden River, because this isn't Lost Creek.
On the other hand, maybe it is Lost Creek, because the boys of prosperity who live on its banks can't seem to find it, and they probably wouldn't know what to do with it if they did. Maybe they can't climb trees and never dug a foxhole.
Recently there was a story reported about a Lakewood Ranch High School senior who quit the basketball team in January, even though he was a starter, so he could pursue a career as a model, and the story was about his recently becoming a wealthy poster boy for Abercrombie & Fitch.
He will come back to Lakewood Ranch for graduation, because he has been "keeping up" scholastically through a special program set up by proud teachers.
Giving up his starting position on the basketball team before the season was over, before the tournament started? If he had done that in Indiana he would have been dumped into Lost Creek by team-mates. Not hurt, just dumped, like all the other stuff that wasn't wanted or needed anymore.
* * *
Part II - Redemption
February 18 2006
Josh and I launched at Linger Lodge on a much warmer Saturday afternoon than two weeks ago. Immediately I knew this day would be diferent, because there were turtles all over the place, of all sizes, and I saw fish jumping. I decided that air temperature does make a difference.
The black feral hog was in nearly the same grazing place, and he was near the water, facing us directly, posing for the picture I missed the last time. This time I did not have my camera ready.
I also noticed, under the first bridge, a new sign of Spring. There was a white rope hanging from the bridge, one with several knots in it, designed for swinging out over the deep pool and dropping in. I was relieved to discover there are normal boys in Lakewood Ranch.
Just before we reached our destination we saw a gator, about 8 feet long, slide off a sandbar and skim across the river, with eyes and spinal ridge out of the water.
We noticed, on top of a steep bank, four male golfers, ready to use their drivers. I spoke to one of them. Either he did not hear me or he did not care to hear me. Maybe he was concentrating.
We arrived at the plastic jungle gym. We beached the canoe, and I waded out to the brush where it was snagged. It was heavy, it was bigger than I remembered, and I decided it was wading pool, maybe a sandbox.
We loaded it, upside down, in the beached canoe. Josh seemed to be proud of our easy conquest. At the time we did not realize how tough it was going to be to get it downriver.
Just before reaching our quarry we had encountered a problem because the water level was lower than when I came solo. There was a log across the river, and the water going over it was not deep enough to float a loaded canoe, so on the way upstream I put Josh on the bank, pulled the canoe parallel to the log, got out and sat on the log, straddling it, pulled the empty canoe across to the other side, stood on the log and got back in the canoe, then paddled over to the shore to get Josh.
It was more difficult coming back, because the pool made the canoe heavier, but I did the same thing. In this picture I am sitting on the log, my legs dangling as gator food, and I have already pulled the loaded canoe over it. This was just before I stood on the log and got back in the boat.
Now here is the best shot, and this was the best part of the trip. With the wading pool upside down and in front of me, I could barely see the top of my bow paddler's head and, without stretching, I could not see the river ahead of us.
On an earlier outing I taught Josh how to alert the stern paddler to upcoming obstacles by saying "deadfall to starboard," or "brush to port," or "tree trunk dead ahead."
He rememberd the lessons. All the way back he was telling me what the obstacle was, where it was, what we had to do, when I had to turn the canoe, and when I should straighten it again. I was very proud of his navigation, and he was too.
I was planning, after we got back to Linger Lodge, to tie the wading pool on top of the canoe, on top of my car, and dump it in a conspicuous place in Lakewood Ranch, as payback for someone of that community who littered the river.
Then we saw four lady golfers at the same tee where we had seen deaf men. The ladies waved and took our picture without us even asking. I shouted up the bank, telling them we had taken the rubbish out of the river. They were proud of us, I could tell, and that puffed us up.
They agreed to e-mail me the pictures they took. Here they are, with Josh and I coming, then going, with our wading pool on the boat. (thanks to Judith Sarakatsannis) After I got the pictures I learned that the four lady golfers, vacationing here, and are retired school teachers from Kentucky. That explained their friendliness.
Soon we came across four boys in their late teens who were making a tool shed or clubhouse out of what looked like orange crate slats, on the river bank behind a home where one of them probably lives. I couldn't imagine the poster boy for Abercrombie and Fitch building anything like that. They were friendly and even complimented us on our good deed of cleaning up the river.
I decided, after meeting a few good young men and a handful of friendly lady golfers, that some of the people of prosperity who live near or in Lakewood Ranch must be normal after all.
I also realized it would be my bad luck to get arrested for littering if we did dump the pool in a very public spot. I settled for leaving it for the maintenance crew at Linger Lodge, after the manager on duty insisted I let them take care of getting rid of the eyesore.
I think Josh was glad I changed my mind too. He would not have enjoyed getting arrested and then getting thrown out of Dodge.
He wasn't excited about bringing the wading pool back after he saw how big it was, but he was glowing at the end of our paddling trip, feeling good about what we did, how well he navigated our little boat and how pleased other people were that we helped clean up the river.
It was a good day for brothers to paddle.
* * * * *
