Mount Kalaga and Ambrosia are the parts of Leonida that surprised people. Nobody expected a Miami game to have pine forest, crystal springs, cattle ranches and a sugar mill, but the second trailer and the Extended Look show all of them, and all exist in the Florida tourists never see. This trip is for the person who has done the beach and wants the interior: springs and forest around Ocala on day one, then a long drive south through ranch and cane country to the big lake on day two, ending within two hours of the South Florida airports. It works in either direction.
Go from November to April. The springs hold 72 degrees all year, so the swimming is the same in January as in July, but the air is cool, the bugs are down, and the cane harvest is on, which is when Ambrosia looks like the game. Avoid summer weekends: the popular springs hit capacity and close their gates by mid-morning, and the afternoon storms are dependable.
Day 1: Springs, forest and the big lake
Morning. Start at crystal springs, Silver Springs State Park, ten minutes east of Ocala. The glass-bottom boats have been running here since the 1870s and are still the way to see it: you drift over a spring vent pouring out water so clear the boat seems to hover. Entry is a few dollars a person and the boat is extra; the short tour is enough. Watch the riverbank for the wild rhesus macaques, descendants of a 1930s tourist stunt, and do not feed them.
Afternoon. Head east on SR-40 into the pine forest, the Ocala National Forest, the largest sand pine scrub in the world and the closest thing Florida has to the trailer’s endless pines. Pick one spring inside it: Juniper Springs, with its seven-mile canoe run through wilderness (reserve a canoe), or Alexander Springs, a wide, clear swimming pool with a sandy floor that is easier with kids. Both charge a modest day fee. The forest roads between them are straight, sandy and empty, trees closing in on both sides; this is the drive Mount Kalaga is built on.
Evening. Come out the east side of the forest to the fish camps on the big lake, Lake George on the St. Johns River. Astor, on the river just south of the lake, is the classic: a marina, a couple of fish camps and a waterfront restaurant serving fried catfish and gator tail at sunset. The St. Johns flows north, one of the few big rivers in the country that does, and the traffic is all bass boats and pontoons. Drive back to Ocala for the night, about 50 minutes.
Day 2: A swim, then south through Ambrosia
Morning. Head 30 minutes west of Ocala to swimming holes, Rainbow Springs State Park at Dunnellon. The headspring is a huge blue pool you can swim in; a separate entrance downstream rents tubes for a slow float in season. Be there at opening. Ginnie Springs, the private, party-flavored alternative near High Springs, is 90 minutes north and better saved for a spare day. Leave Rainbow Springs by 11; the afternoon is long.
Afternoon. Take US-27 south down the spine of the state, then SR-70 east into cattle country. Florida is one of the biggest cattle states east of the Mississippi and Okeechobee is its working heart: ranch gates, cattle egrets, and one of the largest livestock auctions in the Southeast, open to the public on sale days (check which days). From Okeechobee, US-441 runs down the east shore of the big inland lake. Lake Okeechobee is enormous and almost invisible from the road, because a 30-foot dike wraps the shore; pull off at Port Mayaca or the Pahokee marina, walk up the levee, and the horizon opens like an inland sea.
Pahokee and Belle Glade are the start of cane fields and burning season. From October to spring the fields are burned before harvest, smoke columns stand on the horizon, and ash the locals call black snow drifts over the towns. It is the trailer’s Ambrosia, exactly. Drive the back roads between the fields with the windows up, and give way to the cane trucks.
Evening. Finish at the sugar refinery in Clewiston, which calls itself America’s Sweetest Town. The mill’s stacks and the smell of boiling cane tell you when you have arrived. You cannot tour the mill, but the town museum tells the story and the lakeside marinas do dinner. Clewiston is about two hours from Fort Lauderdale, Miami or Palm Beach, so this is a natural last night before a flight, or a first night if you run the loop in reverse.
Practical notes
Where to base yourself. Ocala for night one, near the historic downtown square or on the SR-40 side toward the forest. To break up day two, Clewiston and Okeechobee both have simple lodging along the main roads.
Getting around. A car, and a full tank leaving Ocala on day two; US-27 through the middle of the state is long and the towns are small. Day two is around 250 miles. If that is too much, drop Ambrosia, spend the second day in the forest, and save the lake for a Vice City trip; Clewiston is two hours from Miami.
What it costs. This is the cheap end of Leonida. Lodging $100-160 a night. State park entry under $10 a car, glass-bottom boat $15-30 a person, canoe or tube rental $20-40. Meals $12-25 a head at the fish camps and diners. Fuel is the main line on day two.
The thing people get wrong. They look for the mountain. There is no Mount Kalaga; Florida’s highest point is a low rise in the far Panhandle, 345 feet up, and the Ocala forest is flat. What is real is the forest, the springs and the sand roads, and those are worth the trip on their own.