Stretching from the St. Johns River near Palatka to the Gulf of Mexico, the Marjorie Harris Carr Cross Florida Greenway is a mile-wide recreational corridor that contains equestrian, mountain biking, hiking, and paved trails. The Florida Trail traverses a large portion of its length between Silver Springs and Dunnellon, with a more northerly segment popping out of the Ocala National Forest at the Rodman Reservoir.
Trails along the Cross Florida Greenway provide backpacking and day hiking opportunities on both linear and loop routes.
Florida Trail, Baseline to Marshall Swamp
Along this woodland in Ocala, enjoy a swath of true urban wilderness, a mile-wide corridor edged on both sides by subdivisions and strip malls. Both remain gratefully out of sight and sound as you walk along the Florida Trail in the Baseline section of the Cross Florida Greenway. Now I’m not a fan of paved [...]
Florida Trail, Buckman Lock to Rodman Dam
Paralleling a segment of the failed Cross Florida Barge Canal, this mostly linear section of the Florida Trail sticks to a high berm created when the canal was dug. Nicely shaded for much of its route, it’s a gentle walk with the occasional scenic view of the waterway and the forests on its north side. [...]
Florida Trail, Land Bridge Trailhead to Santos
As the Cross Florida Greenway sweeps through Ocala and along the edge of Belleview, it provides access to a series of forests broken by unobtrusive road crossings in the heart of horse country, canopied roads that are a joy to drive between the two trailheads. Bordered by horse farms, this section of the Florida Trail [...]
Florida Trail, Marshall Swamp
Tarzan’s signature cry once echoed along the crystalline Silver River less than a mile from this section of the Florida Trail, which leads you through a dense, dark floodplain forest beneath a canopy of deep green palm fronds and ancient live oaks. Between 1932 and 1942, Johnny Weissmuller swung from tree to tree for the [...]
Florida Trail, Pruitt to Ross Prairie
As a protected corridor south of Ocala, this section of the Florida Trail is the westernmost segment on the Cross Florida Greenway, showing off the unusual terrain created during construction of the Cross Florida Ship Canal in the 1930s. It’s one of the few places in Central Florida you’ll find switchbacks along a hike, and [...]
Florida Trail, Rodman to Lake Delancy
One of the most awe-inspiring sections of the Florida Trail, the segment between the Rodman Dam (more properly known as the George Kirkpatrick Dam) and Lake Delancy immerses you into longleaf pine forests that seem to go on forever. Providing a fine balance between the Big Scrub habitats and the breathtaking old-growth longleaf pines, it’s [...]
Florida Trail, Ross Prairie to SW 49th Ave
As a protected corridor south of Ocala, this section of the Florida Trail on the Cross Florida Greenway offers delights you just can’t imagine from the roads that bisect it—CR 484 and SW 49th Avenue. It may look like your typical forest of scrubby-looking turkey oaks, but once you get inside it, what a surprise. [...]
Florida Trail, Santos to Baseline
In its mile-wide sweep across a swath of Central Florida, the Cross Florida Greenway hits an interruption just a few miles to the north of Belleview. The community of Santos was “in the way” during the construction of the Cross Florida Ship Canal in the 1930s, and emptied of its African-American residents; only the name [...]
Florida Trail, SW 49th Ave to Land Bridge Trailhead
This short segment of the Florida Trail on the Cross Florida Greenway offers easy access to one of its most popular destinations—the Land Bridge over Interstate 75. From the highway, it looks somewhat odd, topped with trees, and is certainly a notable landmark for visitors driving south through Ocala. But the nation’s first Land Bridge [...]
Holly Hammock Hiking Trail
At the Ross Prairie Trailhead of the Cross Florida Greenway, there are two loop trails you can access – and this is the shorter of the two, taking you on a journey into the quiet woods of Ross Prairie State Forest, just south of the Greenway. The grasslands of Ross Prairie sprawl in arms and [...]
Ross Prairie Loop
Starting at the Ross Prairie Trailhead, the 3.5-mile Ross Prairie Loop offers an overview of Ross Prairie, a sprawling complex of grasslands and ponds nearly three miles long. Edged by sand pine scrub, longleaf pine forests and oak hammocks lush with ferns and orchids, this unique ecosystem is a highlight of a visit to the [...]
Silver River Connector
Gushing more than 550 million gallons of water out of a cluster of springs each day, Silver Springs is the birthplace of the Silver River, a wild and scenic waterway that my paddler friends like to describe as “6 miles upstream and 1 mile downstream.” A tangled jungle of floodplain forest edges the meandering waterway [...]
