Choctawhatchee River

We traveled the Choctawhatchee with Jim Godwin, from the Alabama Natural Heritage Program and Weezie Smith, a legend of a botanist who out did all of us camping and canoing. Jim found snakes, turtles and a baby sturgeon as we spent five days exploring this river system. The upper parts near Newton were really clear with a strong current and high banks covered in ferns and liverworts. However for the next two days the river was so choked with trees and sand from the highly erodable soils we lost the clear water and had a hard time traveling downstream. At High Bluff we encounted the biggest sand bar I have ever seen on any river anywhere. It was humbling. Downstream we passed beautiful fern covered bluffs and huge cypress trees lining the banks. The Choctawhatchee is one of six shared water resources between the states of Alabama and Florida. The stream originates in Southeastern Alabama and terminates into the Gulf of Mexico in Florida. It is one of the longest remaining free-flowing (undammed) rivers in Alabama (the Cahaba and Sispey River Swamp being the others). The Choctawhatchee is considered the third largest river in Florida behind the Apalachicola and Suwannee rivers (in terms of annual discharge), and the site of Florida's second largest floodplain. Florida recognizes the Choctawhatchee as an Outstanding Water along its entire length due to its "natural attributes worthy of protection." (For more information, please visit Rivers of Alabama)