Swimming with manatees, beach drumming and an island of monkeys: two days in Crystal River, Florida

CRYSTAL RIVER, FLORIDA – It’s late afternoon and I’m nursing a cup of coffee on the patio outside my room at the Plantation on Crystal River.
It’s mostly cloudy but I can see some breaks off to the west. The lazy person in me wants to stay and drink my coffee. The photographer in me says, “Hey, sunset!”
The photographer wins. I walk out to my rental car and make the 15-minute drive out to Fort Island Beach, a pretty spot on the Gulf of Mexico. I’m expecting maybe a handful of folks on a Sunday night, but I find the parking lot is overflowing.
I climb out of my rental car and find a group of perhaps 40 or 50 people gathered in a large, rather ill-formed circle. Some are playing stand-up drums, some are banging on small bongos and a few are slapping their hands on overturned buckets.

Locals dancing at the Fort Island Beach drum circle in Crystal River. I loved their free spirit. JIM BYERS PHOTO

In the middle of the circle, as it were, a middle-aged man and an elderly woman dance in time to the music; dipping and swaying and shuffling their feet in the sand as the rhythm echoes into the dimming sky.
One of the drum circle organizers, a former New York cab driver named Steve Schwartz, tells me the group meets here the second Sunday of every month for fellowship and music.
‘I came out one day and there were six or eight people drumming and I thought it was great,” Schwartz told me. “But the organizers moved to North Carolina just as I was getting excited about it. So I started our own with a couple of local ladies.”
Schwartz, who’s wearing a t-shirt with the image of an alien on it and the words “Just Visiting This Planet,” tells me the drum circle is partly an homage to the sun. He mentions some other spiritual connections but, as a frustrated drummer who quit his lessons in junior high school after a few months, I’m more interested in the beat than the background.

Sunset at the Fort Island Beach Pier in Crystal River, Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

I mention that I took lessons to one of the drummers, and they slide a spare bongo over to me so I can tap out my own rhythm. I’m loving every second of it but figure I need to get up and get some photos of the drummers and the sunset on the nearby pier, so I quietly slip out of the circle after a couple minutes.
Schwartz is now parading about in the middle of the circle, doing his own dance. After a few minutes a woman of a certain age appears in the circle, spinning quietly and waving a thin scarf in the evening breeze a la Fleetwood Mac’s Stevie Nicks.
I snap some pics out on the pier, then come back for more of the drumming. It’s a joyous affair that definitely warranted my short drive out to the beach, and I wear a large grin on my drive back to the hotel.

Swimming with manatees at The Plantation on Crystal River in Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

Crystal River is perhaps best known as the only place in the world where tour groups can legally set you up to swim with manatees. You’ll find the creatures in other parts of Florida, but I was told this is the only place where you can sign up for guided visits in the water.
I get up on a chilly morning at the Plantation on Crystal River and watch a video that outlines the do’s (paddle quietly to the manatee swimming zone and give them room to swim around you) and do not’s (they’re wild creatures, so no petting or touching), then head out on a boat for a four-minute ride into the bay.
There’s a natural warm spring quite close to the resort, and that’s what manatees (and northern tourists) love it at this time of year.
We swim for more than an hour, being careful not to pursue the manatees but allowing them (as we were told) to come up to us and gaze into our swim masks if that’s what they choose.
They’re magnificent creatures, large and clumsy from afar but very graceful in the water. At least a couple of the manatees have their curious babies with them on the day we’re here.
Earlier in my trip I spend a great morning out on the Withlacoochee River with the folks from Wild Bill’s Airboat Tours.

A beautiful morning on the Withlacoochee River in Inverness, Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

As Captain Doug Riggs gets our boat ready, the mist is rising and swirling over the top of the river, as if in some kind of French impressionist painting. A small blue heron sits motionless on the river bank, and a white ibis flutters its wings and sails away over a patch of bright yellow flowers.
Riggs motors the boat through the shallow, dark water as he points out plants and birds. It’s a little cool for alligators on this day but we spot tons of birds, as well as turtles.
He also points out the little bumps on Cypress trees and explains how early settlers almost destroyed the trees by overlogging; not realizing that groups of cypress trees are really one large organism and that destroying one tree has an effect on the others around it.
Riggs also tells a fun story I’d heard before in Florida, about how Henry Ford once used the Spanish moss that hangs from Florida trees to stuff the upholstery in his Model A or Model T cars. People complained like crazy as Spanish moss is home to all sorts of critters, some of which are fond of taking small bites out of human flesh.

Doug Riggs offers up wonderful boat rides with Wild Bill’s Airboat Tours in Inverness, Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

I tell Riggs a joke I’d once heard, about how the bugs were so bad that people went around saying North Americans were “itching to get into a new Ford.”
On the way back to the dock, Riggs lets the engines roar a little on the airboat and we slide around on the river, hollering and hooting as we go.
Not far away you’ll find the Chassahowitzka River, where I take a magnificent kayak trip with Dave Perry from Hunter Springs Kayaks.
We paddle past a pack of manatees huddling around a natural spring near the dock, then paddle into a sublimely quiet little bay surrounded by towering palms, live oaks and deciduous trees showing off a palette of pale yellow and burnt orange leaves; surprising colour for central Florida to my way of thinking.
We make our way over a wide part of the river and slide past a muddy river bank, where a small, blue heron nonchalantly watches a dark brown otter scamper along the water’s edge. I’ve somehow never seen an otter in the wild and I’m enchanted with our brief encounter.

Kayaking on the Chassahowitzka River in Homosassa, Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

One of the top attractions in the area is the Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park, where you’ll find an amazing array of wonderful creatures; Florida panthers, majestic bald eagles, flamingoes, black bears and goofy-looking pink-coloured Roseate Spoonbills with their flat, hourglass-shaped beaks. Over by the hippopotamus enclosure I try to take a photo of a squirrel with a nut in its mouth. He drops the nut as he scampers up a palm tree, then turns back and gives me what appears to be a dirty look, as if to say “Look what you made me do, you jerk.”

An angry squirrel at the Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park. JIM BYERS PHOTO

As I make my way down to the Homosassa River I find the adorable town of Homosassa, with a pretty old church and a funky-looking art gallery (sadly closed on the day I visit). There’s also an abandoned mill with tons of atmosphere and a small café that also serves as a kind of museum for printing presses and old typewriters, called the Olde Mill House Gallery and Printing Museum. The owner, Jim Anderson, worked in the printing business for years and has collected an astonishing variety of old machines, a few of which I may have worked on during my early days in journalism. I only have a couple minutes, but I fall in love with the place and decide I greatly admire Anderson’s passion for a bygone craft.

A Roseate Spoonbill at the Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park. JIM BYERS PHOTO

The Homosassa River is home to a tiny scrabble of land that’s home to a group of wild (well, semi-wild) monkeys. The story goes that they lived on a nearby preserve of some kind and had to be moved. Someone in the area decided to put them on a small island that had been created in the river. And there they are; a small band of multi-coloured monkeys that scramble around a treehouse and a set of ropes and pulleys.

Someone has placed a rickety old boat on the east bank of the island and christened it the U.S.S. Primate. It’s only a few feet from the mainland, but monkeys apparently aren’t much for swimming, so they stay put. There’s no natural food source on the island so the monkeys depend on humans to paddle over and drop off their breakfast and dinner.

Monkey Island in Homosassa, Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

There are some hotels and restaurants along the river, including Crumps Landing, a massive tiki bar on the water that also has a large playground for kids to use while their parents are indulging in an adult beverage or two. I arrive on a day when they’re closed but manage a few snaps of the sun going down over the river.
Definitely a town I need to come back to.

A waterfront gazebo at The Plantation on Crystal River. JIM BYERS PHOTO

SLEEPING

The Plantation on Crystal River is a beautiful, 232-acre property with spacious rooms and a terrific layout. I had a very large, modern room with a small patio out back and a mini-fridge, as well as a big-screen TV and a comfortable chair. The restaurant, West 82 Bar and Grill, serves a nice buffet breakfast with great bacon and nice sausage gravy, along with healthy alternatives. There’s a nice pool down by the river with a hot tub and a tiki bar, as well as games, a spa, fitness centre, tennis, croquet, sand volleyball, bike and kayak rentals and more. They also offer boating trips, including sunset cruises, and have a lovely, 27-hole golf course. The nine-hole course is free to play and they have a free shuttle to the beach.

DINING

Katch 22: Located in the small town of Lecanto, a short drive from Crystal River, this is a sophisticated dining spot that’s making a big splash in the area. The restaurant features a sleek interior design and a chef, Richard Wiggins, who’s worked at top hotels around the United States. I had marvellous scallops with bacon, pistachios, carrot puree and tiny slices of jalapeno, along with a massive portion of sweet, tender short rib. They make everything in house except one dessert, Wiggins told me.

A beautiful and tasty serving of scallops at Katch 22 in Lecanto, Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

Greenhouse Bistro: The emphasis in this Homosassa restaurant is farm-to-table, and they do a great job. I had a lovely salad with local greens and sweet Dijon dressing, and a good, large portion of Chicken Marsala with tons of mushrooms. Good wine list, too. There’s a cool interior design, with old signs, tiki gods and more. I sat out on the covered patio for a bit more air.

Seafood Seller and Café: This is a casual, Cajun spot in Crystal River with great prices and very good food. I enjoyed a nice seafood gumbo at lunch and terrific crab cakes; with almost nothing but crab, a bit of onion and just the right amount of Old Bay seasoning. They have a nice-looking Key Lime pie for dessert but I don’t need anything that heavy. Instead, I get them to give me two (the regular order is six) small beignets, one topped with raspberry and the other with chocolate. Usually the sauce is served on the side but the chef is nice enough to drizzle mine over the top of the beignets for a nice photo.

Lovely beignets at Seafood Seller and Cafe in Crystal River, Florida. JIM BYERS PHOTO

My trip to Florida was subsidized by Visit Florida and local tourism groups. They did not approve of or review this story prior to publication.

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