"Great Outdoors Restaurant"

Great Outdoors Restaurant is in my opinion the greatest restaurant in the area. It's located in the historic Opera House right on Main Street in the heart of downtown High Springs. The Opera House was built in 1895. The resturant that it boasts today was purchased in 2005 and the owners have stayed true to the original style of the building and it's historic charm while installing a state of the art kitchen that serves some of the best food around.

This award winning restaurant offers steaks, seafood, salads, great appetizers, dessert, and a full liqour bar. The restaurant is broken up in four different sections. When you first walk in you are engulfed in the beautiful and charming dining room. Then next to that is the Spring House Tavern, which is the bar side where they offer 1/2 off wine nights on Thursdays and $1 drafts on Sundays. Then you have the patio. It's an art in and of itself. If you weren't blown away by the sophication and attention to detail of the main dining room and tavern, the patio is exceptional. It's really neat in it's own right.  The food is Heaven. I could eat their food on a broken picnic table and it would be just as glorious. Which by the way, they do take-out! The fourth part of the restaurant is the Opera House (upstairs) where you can reserve a date to hold private events, but we'll get to that later.

I've had their steaks, salads, seafood, and dessert; and I've never complained about a darn thing. Some of the food is the best I've ever eaten. This is coming from someone who can cook up some mean food and has tasted some of the best food the world has to offer. Which I believe is saying a lot. The prices aren't cheap, but they also won't break the bank. Dinner menu prices range from about $13-$30 depending on what you fancy.


They have an extensive wine list, but I'm more of a beer person. Who am I kidding? I'm a wine person too. They have many to choose from and they also have three private label beers: Tail-Gator Pilsner, Naked Ed Pale Ale, and Three Merry Widows. Tail-gator Pilsner is our favorite! Super Yum!

They feature live music on the patio several nights a week. We love to go and order a few drinks and appetizers and hang out on the patio listening to the local music scene. Check out their Events Calendar. A great way to spend the night!

They also hold private events in the second story opera house. I believe it can hold about 125 people. Great for business or elegant affairs.

Overall, Great Outdoors Restaurant is perfection! From the design, to the food, to the atmosphere, and the people. With every surface being a feast for the eyes, I like to think of it as "sophisticated nature".

O'Leno State Park: Great Camp Sites

O'Leno State Park has so much to offer. We knew this when we booked
four campsites and came from all parts of the state to have a good time. There were around twenty of us. Each family had their own tent and we converted the center campsite into the cook station/hang out station for the weekend, complete with a fifty foot tarp and camp fire ring.

O'Leno State Park was one of the first Florida State Parks. The old suspension bridge built in the 1930s is still there. The park is off US 441, about 6 miles north of High Springs, FL.

Unfortunately, the river at the park was too low and stagnant. This is the part of the river that sinks. It goes under ground for about three miles and resurfaces in the River Rise Preserve State Park a little ways down 441. When the river is flowing more furiously, you can hike a little ways from the swimming area to the river sink. It's really cool and almost looks like a whirlpool. The water gets sucked down and filtered through the lime rock for about three miles and rises straight out from underground to continue the Santa Fe River. It's really neat to see. The sink part is a little more interesting than the river rise. We've gone to the River Rise State Preserve before and it just looks like water coming out of the ground, almost like a shoreline, nothing special to look at, but at the same time, really interesting to see. It's amazing that the river can float underground for miles and resurface and go for miles and miles more above ground before it meets up with the Swannee River.

We set up camp and had a great time. The campsites we had were centered right around the playground which was perfect for all the kids we had with us. The bathrooms were clean and only a few steps from the campsite. The campsites were fully equipped with water and electric. RVs are welcomed and they also offer cabins and primitive campsites.

The next morning my husband and son took a walk down to the river and went across the suspension bridge onto the other side where they spotted a doe and a few babies feeding on the vegetation less than twenty feet from them. My son loved watching them. The park is also known for gopher tortioses. They even have gopher tortiose crossing signs throughout the park. We even saw one crawling down the main road. So cute!

Down by the river they even have a bigger playground and pavilions. This is where they rent kayaks and canoes. There's even some historic builings in the park.

Rum Island

Since the river was closed to swimming, we all headed out on our second day to Rum Island. It has a spring, which is perfect for kids, since it's swallow most of the way out. The kids love playing there, plus it's one of the only free springs in the area. The water is so refreshing. The park is named for the island across from the spring. Since the water in the river that separates the spring from the island was so shallow, a few people from our group were able to walk right across to the island, where a bunch of people were hanging out. Rum Island is a favorite of the locals and tourists alike, yet it remains a local secret.

We camped out another night and packed up and headed home the next day. It was a blast and we can't wait to do it again. Since the campsites are only around $20 each, it's totally affordable, family fun!

Pavilions

Suspension bridge over river

Swimming Area with Bridge

River at Night