Paddling with Shurr Adventures
The mangroves that we saw at power-boat speed in the Ten Thousand Islands looked like identical, homogeneous, round, dark green clumps – not very interesting to look at and not much to explore. Paddling among the mangroves yielded a different picture! It turns out that the mangroves themselves are fascinating plants, and our time on the water certainly felt like an adventure into the wilderness – glad we had guides to help us along!
The first morning of our trip, we got up early and met our Shurr Adventures guide in a crossroads parking lot. The East River was just a few miles down the road, and the kayaks were soon unloaded! Our guide was a bit apprehensive to find out he’d be leading a couple of naturalist-types, but he seemed pleasantly surprised to learn that we already felt comfortable in the boats. He got us out on the slow-moving river (in the dry season, the 
current wasn’t very apparent) and immediately set out to find us some alligators! It was definitely a new experience to be that close, nearly at water level, with those powerful creatures, and we got some tips on how to avoid irritating them, along with a few facts about their biology. On our half-day trip we were able to see a few different ecosystems in that general area, from the shallow mangroves to a marl flat, to the pine savannas in the distance. This was a great introduction to the systems that we would be exploring for the next week!
National Park Service guided trip on the Nine Mile Pond Canoe Trail
We got out in boats again towards the end of our trip, joining a seasonal ranger from Everglades National Park in a group paddle at Nine Mile Pond. If you are able to, I strongly recommend getting in on one of these trips, as they provide all of the necessary gear and it is entirely free of charge (advance sign-up is required). By this point in our trip, we did not learn much that was new to us, nor did we see anything we hadn’t seen before, but it was certainly a pleasant way to spend the morning. Nine Mile Pond is also a different ecosystem from the East River – it is not an estuary but entirely fresh water, and mangroves don’t naturally occur there; instead they were blown inland in a strong hurricane a couple of decades ago and have thrived since then. The trail therefore also passes through sawgrass prairies, one of the main freshwater ecosystems of the park. The five-mile Canoe Trail (we did half of it) is well-marked with PVC posts, and is therefore definitely very do-able on your own, even if you are not an experienced paddler (but again, the free Park Service program is a great deal if you don’t already have a boat!).
Unsettling 