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As we walk along the trail at Oakland Nature Preserve, I remember how much fun it is to see what non-Floridians find interesting in Florida.

Last week we met up in the Orlando area with some friends from Ohio. On their last day, they wanted to hike Disney Wilderness Preserve, but they weren’t open. Rick Kilby, my Orlando-based podcast co-host, suggested Oakland Nature Preserve as an alternative.

Oakland Nature Preserve

While the preserve’s been on my radar for a while, I’ve never walked the trails there. One, it’s not a dog-friendly sort of walk, and I usually travel with Calypso. Two, it’s far enough outside Orlando that it’s not the sort of thing you do impulsively if you’re staying in Orlando proper (I will once again repeat that “Orlando is an hour from Orlando”). Barry and I biked past it last year when we rode the West Orange Bike Trail, but we had too much we wanted to do before we had to return the bikes and didn’t stop.

But on this day, we had some time before their flight home to Ohio, so we made the trip.

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The trails there are easy enough for most people to walk;  a well-cleared path leads to a boardwalk out to Lake Apopka. And while I spent my time hoping to see a snake or unusual bird to impress the Ohioans, they seemed happy enough to look at the… duckweed?

Yup. The little green dots in the water. I know the name from a college course, Identifying Florida Biota, but any other knowledge has long since fled my brain. I looked it up later; according to the U.S. Forest Service, duckweed is the “smallest known flowering plant,” something my college professing likely mentioned, making it a pretty nifty little flower and making me feel bad for dismissing it so quickly.

There was plenty to see along the Boardwalk trail

We walked on and saw a raccoon — unusual for the daytime — and some gators. Perched on a tree, almost hidden by Spanish moss, we saw a blue heron, and in the water below a gallinule made its way through the duckweed (hence the name!). We could hear countless other birds. In all, a lovely walk in a small bit of woods.

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At the end of the Boardwalk trail, at the edge of Lake Apopka, the Preserve has a pavilion with gliders and benches. It also has a timeline of how, in the 1880s, human influences started compromising water quality in the lake. By the 1950s, farming runoff and sewage discharges had substantially degraded Lake Apopka.  In the 1960s, after numerous fish kills and seeing how poor the water quality had grown, locals organized to start correcting the damage.

The State of Florida passed the Lake Apopka Restoration Act in 1985. Among other things, it created a “restoration council.” In 1988, the State allowed the St Johns River Water Management District (SJRWMD) to regulate the discharges into Lake Apopka. Almost 40 years and $200 million later, water quality has improved.

Here’s a full timeline of Lake Apopka’s degradation and restoration.

Of course, Rick is quick to point out later, as development along the lake shore increases, that water quality is at risk.

That’s why places like Oakland Nature Preserve matter as much as they do. It’s not reasonable to un-ring the bell of development. You can  vote — with your actual vote, your dollars, and your actions — to support land acquisition and preservation.

In Oakland, taking a walk in the woods makes for a great start.