Paddle Boating into the Past with Toho Riverboat Adventures
Apr 30, 2024
Zee Michaelson & Jay Lawrence
Embark on an auditory voyage with me, Z Michelson, as we traverse the hidden aquatic wonderland of Lake County, Florida. Venture beyond the gleaming allure of theme parks to a serene realm where shimmering lakes beckon adventurers and calm rivers tell tales of history. Feel the thrill as I recount steering a pontoon boat across Lake Harris, untethered by the confines of roads, amidst a landscape dotted with over a thousand lakes. The Harris Chain of Lakes unfurls before us, revealing the beguiling allure of the 'dead river' and its tranquil waters perfect for fishing and jet skiing. It's a testament to the natural beauty that flourishes when you dare to explore the path less sailed.
Stepping aboard the Pearl of the Lake with Toho Riverboat Adventures, we're treated to tales spun by Captain Stitch, who unravels the storied past of the paddle boat and its pivotal role in the heartbeat of St. Cloud and Kissimmee. With the sun dipping below the horizon, our conversation sails through time, touching upon the cargo of sugar, cattle, and citrus once vital to these towns. Moreover, the promise of an upcoming dialogue with Jennifer, who's embarking on a bone-chilling expedition to the icy climes of Antarctica, hangs in the air. Join me as we etch the passport of our imaginations with indelible memories and set our sights on the boundless horizons of travel.
Embark on an auditory voyage with me, Z Michelson, as we traverse the hidden aquatic wonderland of Lake County, Florida. Venture beyond the gleaming allure of theme parks to a serene realm where shimmering lakes beckon adventurers and calm rivers tell tales of history. Feel the thrill as I recount steering a pontoon boat across Lake Harris, untethered by the confines of roads, amidst a landscape dotted with over a thousand lakes. The Harris Chain of Lakes unfurls before us, revealing the beguiling allure of the 'dead river' and its tranquil waters perfect for fishing and jet skiing. It's a testament to the natural beauty that flourishes when you dare to explore the path less sailed.
Stepping aboard the Pearl of the Lake with Toho Riverboat Adventures, we're treated to tales spun by Captain Stitch, who unravels the storied past of the paddle boat and its pivotal role in the heartbeat of St. Cloud and Kissimmee. With the sun dipping below the horizon, our conversation sails through time, touching upon the cargo of sugar, cattle, and citrus once vital to these towns. Moreover, the promise of an upcoming dialogue with Jennifer, who's embarking on a bone-chilling expedition to the icy climes of Antarctica, hangs in the air. Join me as we etch the passport of our imaginations with indelible memories and set our sights on the boundless horizons of travel.
Speaker 1:
Welcome to the Z Michelson Travel Podcast. This podcast is devoted to the travel industry. Z says let your imagination run wild and start dreaming about where you want to go. And dream big, reach for the stars, and if you only get to the moon, at least you enjoyed the trip. Your guide to travel is Z Michelson, a travel advisor, and sitting at the controls is Jay Lawrence, your concierge of podcast travel. Now here's Z.
Speaker 2:
That's me, that's me, it's Z Hi Z, and that's.
Speaker 3:
Jay Hi Z. Wasn't there a soft drink named Hi Z?
Speaker 2:
No that was Hi C, hi C, hi C, Hi C. Yeah, I used to drink that years and years and years ago. Is it still out? I don't even know if it's still out, I don't know. I don't know either, but you know what I do know.
Speaker 3:
What do you know?
Speaker 2:
That we've been. We're brought to you by Collage Travel Media Network.
Speaker 3:
Yes, and what does Collage Travel Media Network do?
Speaker 2:
It is home to my podcast, of course.
Speaker 3:
Yes.
Speaker 2:
It's home to collagetravelradiocom and zmaxradiolive.
Speaker 3:
All right, you mean the streaming radio.
Speaker 2:
Streaming on the internet 24-7.
Speaker 3:
We talked to someone the other day. They said how do you find a radio station today? And they said if it isn't streaming?
Speaker 2:
I don't hear it. And here we are. Here we are streaming, we're streaming everything we do these days.
Speaker 3:
Yes, and podcasting and, of course, you're a travel advisor. Thus we have the Z Michelson Travel Podcast.
Speaker 2:
And you know we're going to stay close to home now on this one in this podcast. We're going to talk about some of Florida's best waterways.
Speaker 3:
And what would that be?
Speaker 2:
Well, they're fun to visit and they're fun to sail on.
Speaker 3:
Why Aren't we a land of a thousand lakes?
Speaker 2:
Well, it is all about us this time, because you and I had went on the beautiful Lake Tahoe earlier. So before we let you hear from the captain, let's talk about Lake Tahoe.
Speaker 3:
Please, what is Lake Tahoe? Lake Tahoe, tahoe. Yeah, it's T-O-H-O.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, we're going to talk about that. We talked about Florida. Florida is more than just Disney and Universal. People say oh, we're going to go to Florida, we're going to go to Disney. We're going to go to Disney, we're going to go to Universal, we're going to go to Daytona Beach. Well, where we live, Lake County, Florida, is known for being the land of a thousand lakes.
Speaker 3:
Just a thousand lakes, just like you said In the county, in the county, and you know I was saying for the whole state, but no, it's just for the county.
Speaker 2:
Just for our county. We're spoiled and it's over 202 square miles of water. Wow, that's a lot of water. You can swim in most of these lakes and fish as well. Like I said, most of these lakes.
Speaker 3:
Well, any body of water in the state of Florida usually has a creature called an alligator.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, but some of the lakes are closed because some of the alligators are pretty big.
Speaker 3:
You cannot swim in Lake Apopka, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:
That's a no-no, but you see people year-round boating, jet skiing, fishing. And Lake Harris is the largest lake in our area and it's located entirely within Lake County. It's 13,788 acres. Wow, it's really big. You don't realize it when you're standing there looking out at it. I've, you know, I've been on boats on Lake Harris.
Speaker 3:
Have you.
Speaker 2:
Yes.
Speaker 1:
Yes.
Speaker 2:
Okay, and it's. It's the real Florida, you know, when you look at this, and is one of the seven lakes that make up the Harris chain of lakes, and that's a lot. Now, you know, I didn't know what a Dead River was, did you? Tell me, and maybe I do well, a few years back, there was a restaurant called Dead River Vicks remember, yes, and it was at the end of the Dead River.
Speaker 2:
So what it is is it's a tributary off of the lake right into a river that ends, I mean, it just stops, so it's a dead river. So that's what a dead river is it just goes and stops.
Speaker 3:
Boy, you've really defined it quite well, just stops, it's dead. Yeah.
Speaker 2:
But I thought that was kind of weird. What's a dead river?
Speaker 3:
And I did a boat trip. A pontoon boat oh, pontoons, A lot of people have pontoon boats in our area and it went from Harris Lake into Mount Dora.
Speaker 2:
Right, so it was on the chain of lakes.
Speaker 3:
Yes, yeah, and going through that channel. Yeah, that goes from one chain.
And you got to go putt, putt, putt. You can't go fast.
Speaker 2:
Not with a pontoon.
Speaker 3:
No, well, but it was because of the waves. You can't make a wave, right You're?
Speaker 2:
not allowed to have wakes.
Speaker 3:
Wakes. Thank you.
Speaker 2:
Thank you. You're not allowed to have wakes and you have to learn how to drive on one side of the road or the other, which was funny because somebody handed over the steering to me and I don't know, have you ever driven a ship or a boat? No, I don't know. Have you ever?
Speaker 3:
driven a ship or a boat. No, I didn't Okay. A ski, jet, jet ski, jet ski. Done that Done that Well.
Speaker 2:
On the boat it doesn't feel right Like when you're driving it. You're driving with a steering column, a steering wheel, but you don't feel anything under your body. When you're driving on the road, you feel the road but you don't really feel the river and you can't stop. You know there's no brakes, right, you just have to slow it down and put it in reverse. Yeah, put it in reverse. If you're trying to stop, stop, but I mean it's interesting. But our lakes and our riverways are some things to see Very, very nice.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, some things to see Very, very nice.
Speaker 2:
And you know, now, before we get into our little Lake Tahoe adventure, let's do a travel tip, all right? Well, because we're talking lakes and rivers, if you want to swim or enjoy water sports, safety should be your first priority. Be sure to wear a life jacket. If you're not a strong swimmer, I do recommend that. And be careful with children. Children, you know, have to have these life jackets on, and inexperienced swimmers, like my husband, is an inexperienced swimmer.
Speaker 3:
I believe I would qualify there.
Speaker 2:
And so is Jay. So you definitely want to wear your life jackets when you're on board of these pontoon boats and things like that. You can follow any special rules, guidelines regarding water activities at the lake, including designating swimming areas Be aware of that and boat speeds, which we just kind of talked about a little bit. Not making a lake, you know, a wake, but here in Florida. There's one other thing you need to be mindful of what's that?
Speaker 2:
And that's the gators. Now, gators usually do leave you alone, but, uh, if you ask me, I'm not going to be swimming side by side with a gator. Right, they can have as much room as they want, but gators will find themselves in weedy patches, and that's another thing you have to be careful of when there's weed patches because they might be hunting for some food. They're in there resting, or you might get knotted up in these weeds.
Speaker 2:
Oh yeah, yeah. So you got to always be careful. So watch your rules, watch your regulations and enjoy good water safety.
Speaker 3:
So if you want to see a gator, you go to Gatorland.
Speaker 2:
That would be the easy way to see them, that's the easy way.
Speaker 1:
yeah, that would be the easy way to see it. That's the easy way, yeah.
Speaker 3:
Gatorland is one of the oldest attractions in the state of Florida.
Speaker 2:
So there you have it Now. Lake Toho yes, we were on Lake Toho, yes, so I'm going to give you some background about this lake.
Speaker 3:
Okay, where is it?
Speaker 2:
It's way over there. It's in Osceola County.
Speaker 3:
Okay.
Speaker 2:
And Lake Toho is short for a name that I'm going to mutilate and I apologize. It's called Toho Pecaliga, got that, toho Pecaliga? And, that being said, it's also called Toho Pica, which makes it shorter, and, of course, lake Toho, lake Toho, that's much easier, much easier. But what does all that big word mean? What does it mean? It says we will gather together here. That's what it means, which is kind of cool. The West Lake, or simply Toho, is the largest lake in Osceola. Okay, and if people aren't familiar with the area, osceola is right outside of orlando I was just going to say where it's kind of like south of.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's not far from orlando at all. And again, people visiting disney and universal should be aware that we have all these beautiful lakes oh also, if you know, if you've ever heard of the town called Kissimmee?
Speaker 3:
Right, okay, it's a little east of Kissimmee.
Speaker 2:
Right, it's right near there as well.
Speaker 3:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
Which? Where does Disney always say they are?
Speaker 3:
At Kissimmee.
Speaker 2:
It's Kissimmee.
Speaker 3:
Kissimmee, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:
Okay, so now, if you're going that way, the primary inflow is Shingle Creek, which rises in Orlando. It covers 22,700 acres and spans 42 miles. Wow, so it's not a little lake.
Speaker 3:
No, it's much bigger than Lake Harris Right, and it's like how many miles it's 22. 22?.
Speaker 2:
Right, but now it's known for its excellent wildlife viewing. So if you're into bird watching which I'm not into bird watching, no, but it's known for its excellent wildlife viewing. So if you're into bird watching, you know which I'm not into bird watching.
Speaker 1:
No.
Speaker 2:
But it's great for bird watching, which we've seen that day when we were out, and bass fishing opportunities, which we also seen. A lot of bass fishermen that were going out on the lake that day Because we were leaving a little bit later in the day. I'm getting all choked up.
Speaker 3:
You Choked up. I can't believe it.
Speaker 2:
Now, what I found interesting was that the lake wasn't that deep.
Speaker 3:
No.
Speaker 2:
The average depth is about 13.2 feet. Some areas can be up to 18 feet, so it's not really that deep. I mean my swimming pool in New York was 12 feet deep.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, but of course it's over my head.
Speaker 2:
A little over mine too, yeah, but there was a lot of weeds.
Speaker 3:
Right.
Speaker 2:
If you remember, that's where the bass fishermen were going when they headed out. We saw them in the weeds there. But before we get into the conversation with the captain of the paddle boat, we are about to give you a trivia question. And that would be you're pointing at me and you know, I know you like elizabeth taylor. So this question is which california lake was the backdrop for elizabeth taylor's 1951 film a place in the sun?
Speaker 3:
jay is thinking.
Speaker 2:
Is that your thinking music? I love it. Now, I didn't see this movie. Did you see this movie?
Speaker 3:
I'm going to say Lake Tahoe.
Speaker 2:
And you'd be absolutely correct.
Speaker 3:
Because we're talking about Toho.
Speaker 2:
And this is Tahoe. Yes, oh, you're so clever putting those two together. But Lake Tahoe is colder than Lake Toho. Oh yeah, yeah, the temperature in Lake Tahoe is pretty brisk because it's up in the mountains.
Speaker 3:
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:
So you got it, jay, you won. Ding, ding, ding. There's Jay's little bell, All right. There's jay's little bell, all right. And I know, I know that when we went on to the little paddle boat it was really exciting. There was about 60, 65 of us on that on that boat, yeah, and you got the opportunity to talk with the captain, yeah.
Speaker 4:
I am Captain Stitch with Toho Riverboat Adventures and you guys are on the Pearl of the Lake Awesome. So how did the boat get here? So we brought her down from Lake City, minnesota. We traveled via the river system, so Lake City Minnesota is on the complete opposite side of the country as us. So we went down the Mississippi River, up the Ohio River for a short bit, down the Tennessee River to Alabama, and then there's a very small river called the Ten Tom or the Tom Bigby River. We went from there down to Mobile, alabama, and then we had the boat taken out of the water and some pieces taken off of it for a truck ride here to St Cloud, florida. We used to have these boats here 100 years ago, so it's bringing history back into our town. It's a really cool thing.
Speaker 3:
And what was the shipping town? It's a really cool thing.
Speaker 4:
And what was the uh shipping? What was? Why were all those boats here then? Oh, so here they. We had boats here. So we are the headwaters of the Kissimmee river. So we used, uh, those boats back in the days, helped build St Cloud and Kissimmee. The. The river itself was one of the few ways to get up in here. All of this was swampland over a hundred years ago, not very travelable of course, before cars and all of that stuff, those riverboats, and we had dredges, river like steam dredges that came and they cleaned the rivers out and made it to where the riverboats could come in. We had a sugar plantation right on the water that the riverboats would bury sugar and sugar cane north and south. We had cattle and, of course, florida for citrus. So it was, it was very crucial for us and actually it was one of our heads. It was a big start for here and I said our town so it was a big deal. We haven't had a riverboat here since 1930s, so we're a hundred years in the making now.
Speaker 5:
Then I met the co-captain and the co the flight, I mean the ride yeah, we. So. We were supposed to be out for two hours, but everyone's having such a good time. We want to see the sunset together, so we extended the time 40 minutes. Yeah, so we'll get to see the sun. Yeah, we're gonna see the sunset on the water. It's gonna, but there's not many clouds, so we're gonna be able to see it and it's gonna be very beautiful. And the wind also calmed down, so we'll going to be able to see it and it's going to be very beautiful, and the wind also calmed down, so we'll have more smooth sailing for the rest of the trip.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, yeah, and it was a beautiful trip, for sure, and it was a beautiful sunset and now that was the Pearl.
Speaker 2:
Right, that's what Captain Stitch said. It's the Pearl and absolutely you can go on the Pearl. Pearl is available to board and go out on these sunset tours.
Speaker 3:
And afternoon cruises, yep, they have those available as well.
Speaker 2:
And it's a nice size paddle boat yeah, very nice size. So we enjoyed ourselves on that ship. We enjoyed it it was a nice trip. It was nice and relaxing.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, mm-hmm yeah.
Speaker 2:
You know me, I love the water, I'm a big water baby, you were on the water.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, there was one other thing I wanted to say about that, and I can't remember what it was you can't remember what it was, jay, you had such a good time.
Speaker 2:
It was good. Yes, you had great hamburgers too on there. Oh, that was it it was. Yeah, the food was good you had good, you had a good little meal on there as well. Yeah, so we had a very enjoyable time on the pearl on lake toho.
Speaker 3:
And we might say there were a lot of other travel advisors on the trip as well.
Speaker 2:
Right, there were travel advisors and travel vendors with us. It was a mix and mingle, so we all kind of got together and chatted.
Speaker 3:
Saw Jennifer.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, we haven't seen Jennifer in so long and she was on the ship. She'll be coming and talking with us soon about her new thing that she's doing. And again she told me again she is going to go down to the Antarctic again.
Speaker 3:
Again. Yeah, that's one of her places.
Speaker 1:
That's her place to go.
Speaker 2:
That's her favorite place in the world. So, yeah, we're going to be talking with Jennifer again. So we got a lot of fun things that we've been doing and we're going to be doing some more Jay. We're going to be doing some more Jay.
Speaker 3:
We're going to be doing some more. I understand we're going on some more trips.
Speaker 2:
We are Now. You know what, what? We've had a lot of fun today, yes, but there's so much traveling to do and so little time to do it in, so tune in every week for more travel, information and insights just like this, and plain fun, which we do have.
Speaker 2:
And, by the way, you know I heard our music playing in the background when you talked with the captain. Yes, so collage travel radio and ZMAX radio plays that music. Yes, so, yeah, that's a great thing. Please follow me and like me on Facebook. Do you have a favorite location or an interesting travel tip? I really would like to know, because I know some people have some great tips. So let me know at ZMichelson, at gmailcom, and Z, of course, is spelled Z-E-E.
Speaker 2:
I'm very excited to let everybody know that my podcast can be heard on your favorite podcast player. Feel free to give me a review. I'd love to hear what you have to say. Thanks for listening today. Traveling truly opens up the world to you. You learn all about the different cultures, lifestyles and, of course, our favorite food. Then you realize we truly are all the same. So dream, dream big, reach for the stars, and if you only get to the moon, at least you made the trip. If you're looking for great places to travel, to visit my website, zmichelsontravelcom, and Z is spelled Z-E-E. This is Z Michelson. Making your travel dreams come true.