p56 June 2015

Buffalo roam at Paynes Prairie state park south of Gainesville, Florida.  Wild horses also graze on the prairie on the north half of the large park.  The south half of the park is a forest with many trails, a campground, a museum, and a 3 story observation tower overlooking the prairie.  On the north border of the park is the hawthorne paved bicycle trail running east west for 16 miles plus an extension into Gainesville and side trips to overlooks, so that you can do over 40 miles total for the day.

 

 

In the 1980s the Dudley family donated acreage of their farm and its buildings to the state of Florida for a state park near Gainesville.  The state restored the buildings and opened it as a state park.  The Dudleys had moved to the farm in 1852.  The home and buildings are from the 1880s and included a separate kitchen and dining building, a general store, smokehouse, outhouse(3 holer), barns, and stables.  A garden is maintained as well as chickens and turkeys.  Special festival days are planned during the year.  The family got its first tractor in the 1930s.  All farm equipment was pulled by mules before that.  Electricity made it to the farm in the 1940s and plumbing finally got put in the house in the 1950s.