Touring and Camping In Florida?

[Supermale]

I was wondering if anyone knew any good areas in Florida around the Orlando area that are worth a 50+mile ride and are welcoming to throwing some sleeping bags on the ground and crashing for the night - some friends and I have biked to Cocoa Beach from Orlando before and slept on the beach but there was nothing to do and we're looking for something more inland - ideally northwest. Not interested in paying to camp at a park either. Would like to hear about anything because I'm trying to setup a map of possible destinations to build routes out of, thanks!

[-=£em in Pa=-]

PM a lister named RWTD he is the KING of FL riding routes !! :D

Im sure he could give you some great, useable advice.

[RWTD]

No need to pm me and I don't know if I'm a king lol but I did do a three week touring/backpacking trip to north and central Florida this spring and remote camped every night(once in a primitive campsite the rest stealth or backcountry camping).

My recommendation around Orlando would be the Ocala N. F.,The Van Fleet Trail/Green Swamp area or Withlacoochee State Forest/State Trail area.All would be fairly easy to primitive camp if you just push the bikes into the woods around dusk(avoiding swampy areas obviously).The ONF ,which I'm most familiar with, has a number of designated primitive areas with road access(Grassy Pond is real nice) .Only problem is this time of year heat,humidity and bugs are serious considerations so unless you intend to wait for cooler/drier weather I would not just throw a sleeping bag down somewhere(you are likely to get eaten alive) but take a shelter with plenty of mesh(for ventilation).And you are unlikely to even need a sleeping bag this time of year I just use a bedsheet during the summer.

Here are a few links with info on these areas:

http://www.dep.state.fl.us/gwt/guide/regions/crossflorida/trails/ocala_nat_forest.htm
http://www.fs.fed.us/r8/florida/recreation/index_oca.shtml
http://www.fl-dof.com/state_forests/withlacoochee.html
http://www.dep.state.fl.us/gwt/guide/regions/crossflorida/trails/with_state.htm
http://www.dep.state.fl.us/gwt/guide/regions/westcentral/trails/general_james.htm
http://myfwc.com/recreation/cooperative/green_swamp.asp

My favorite area on the spring trip was actually the Apalachicola N.F. exploring its endless remote dirt roads but it is a ways from Orlando. I will probably do another trip north later this year focusing on the Green Swamp,Withlacoochee S.F. and other areas I missed this spring.

[-=£em in Pa=-]

^^^^ Just out of curiousity,
Do you have a blog ??

[RWTD]

I don't really have a blog but for awhile I was posting my trip reports on the southern forum of backpacker.com mostly in two threads linked below (one for Lake O trips and one for exploring the rest of SoFl wetlands areas).This format worked well for reporting and discussing trip reports or planning and discussing trips and was very motivational for me to do more trips as well.I meant to start a new thread for the 3 week spring trip (and I still want to get my thoughts/recollections of it down in writing)but a report of that entire trip has just seemed like too much of a chore so far.And since then I have been slacking on both overnight trips and reporting on my long rides etc. but mean to startup both more overnight trips and reports of them again in the near future.Perhaps, I could post them to this forum as well .I actually use to post trip reports over in the touring forum a few years ago(and a report of my first tour with some excellent photos of SoFl areas can be found in Dwagenheim's old journal over in the trip reports subforum of touring).
http://forums.backpacker.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/692107219/m/3881032511
http://forums.backpacker.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/692107219/m/387109349