Prairie Creek Preserve - The Lost Longboarder

Florida is a pretty flat state so the hiking is different than what we were used to out west. We found that longboarding on scenic trails, such as the Prairie Creek Preserve path segment, was a great way to cover some ground and see some of the beauty that Florida has to offer!

Path Info:

The Paines Prairie Creek Preserve path segment that we cruised is part of the larger Gainesville-Hawthorne State Trail. There are several parking areas to access different points of the trail. We parked at the trail access point in Rochelle.

Directions to Rochelle Trailhead: From downtown Gainesville, follow E University Avenue before taking a slight right just after Auto Zone onto SE Hawthorne Road. Stay on here for about 7 miles and then turn right onto CR 234. After 0.7 miles, slight right onto CR 2082. After 0.5 mile the parking area will be on the left.

Distance: The length of the entire Gainesville-Hawthorne Trail is 16 miles.

Surface Type: Asphalt

Longboarding from Prairie Creek Preserve

We parked at the Rochelle parking area and picked up the trail near the Prairie Creek Preserve sign. This is at the 6.4 mile marker on the larger Gainesville-Hawthorne Trail. We took the trail east from here through the nature preserve. It was an awesome ride that was very scenic, passed several hiking trails and some wildlife. The pavement was nice and smooth, not quite butter, but it was great with soft wheels.

The path is around 10 ft wide and runs through a number of forested trails, swamps, clearings, and even by a lake.

A cool feature of this path is the mile markers. It nice to know how far you have gone, your whereabouts on the trail and can even help you figure out your average speed. We cruised the path for 8 1/2 miles out and back, totaling about 17 miles. It took us about 3 hours so we got about 6 mph average.

The jungle environment makes for great scenery while your cruising this path. The trees are so gorgeous, green and lush. Obviously, Florida is hot and humid so it was great to have shade provided by the canopy above. On our ride we saw some wildife – a turtle, snake, some HUGE cows with horns, some squirrels, and some lizards. There were also a few stops along the path with benches and hiking trails.

The swamps were low while we were there, but I’m sure its cool when there’s more water and some gators. I enjoyed the ferns and huge palms the jungle had to offer. It was a really nice green ride… 😉

The path is pretty flat with some very gradual elevation changes. It crosses a few streams over wood plank bridges along the way. They were really loud and bumpy so I walked over them.

The path also crosses a few other country roads. Some of the roads are fast open roads and the cars zooom by. And some of the other roads are small sand roads.

This was a fun cruise, a good workout and great way to cover some ground!

Thanks for Reading!

Here’s a picture of some the boards that we cruised with: my Loaded Vanguard, BOHO Boards pintail, and our Lost Coast Longboarding Classic Blue Streak pintail. You can pick up one of our boards HERE at our store! Thanks for your support!

For more awesome longboarding paths check out these articles: