"Lake George Hideaway's" Mailing address is in Pierson, Florida, "The Fern Capital Of The World". The very small farm town of Pierson is about 4 miles away and is known for it's numerous fern groves. Pierson is about as far from a tourist destination as you can get.
Although the house has a Pierson address, it's closer to, and really has much more in common with the town of Astor, located about 3 miles (as a crow flies) south. Situated on the beautiful St. Johns river, Astor is all about fishing and boating. While it certainly isn't a big city, there are restaurants, a grocery store, boat dealers, bait shops, etc.
About 3 miles north of Astor, as the St. Johns river winds it's way north, the river opens up into Lake George. The second largest lake in Florida, Lake George covers some 46,000 acres, measuring approximately 6 miles wide and 14 miles long.
With most of the property under a canopy of cedar and oak trees, and with the many ferns and exotic plants, the yard has a park-like atmosphere. There are no other houses directly adjacent to the house, across the street or across the canal. In fact, there are only a few places on the property that you can even see another house at all.
The house is situated on 300 feet of canal front. Although the canal is accessable by the general public, it is a fairly rare sight to see another boat in the canal. There are no other houses on this short (about 400 ft) finger of the canal system.
In the winter months it is possible that you might see a lone fisherman wetting a line from the bank on the other side of the canal on weekend mornings. A few of the locals know that some of the best Speckled Perch fishing in the area is right here in the backyard.
The house is only about 300 feet from the lake, and it's about a 1/4 mile boat ride through the canal to get to it.
The canal is deep enough for most fishing boats. We have had a 27 foot Searay cruiser stay here with no real problems.
A surfaced, private boat ramp is a couple of hundred yards away, and is available to you to launch your boat. We have launched a 24 foot pontoon, and our 24 foot Carolina Skiff there many times with no problems, but that's about as big a boat as you will want to launch there.
IMPORTANT UPDATE: In times past the access road to the private ramp was easily accessable with any vehicle about 98% of the time. Lately, it has not been kept up nearly as well, and is only usable with a 2 wheel drive vehicle about 20% of the time. You will want to allow for the possibility that you may have to launch or pull out your boat down in Astor at either the public boat ramp or one of the fish camps.
This is a modern, fairly new home that is very clean and nicely decorated throughout. There are two large bedrooms available for your use.
You should know that this home's main purpose is not as a vacation rental, but as a weekend/ part time home for us. We use the home almost every weekend that it's not rented, and also live here part time over the summer and holidays when my school teacher wife has time off. Because of that you will probably find the place to have a little more "home like" atmosphere than your average, sparsely decorated and minimally equipped rental.
Note: To be clear, unlike some of the rentals in the Astor area, this is a conventionally constructed house, not a mobile home. It is located in a nice, clean, residential neighborhood made up entirely of houses (no mobile homes or campers), and although there are only 2 bedrooms and 1 bath available for use, this is a large roomy house with approximately 2500 sq ft under roof to wander around in.
We call this one the "Hummingbird Room" because of the wallpaper trim. Bright and airy with a queen sized bed, It's certainly not the most manly room there ever was, but the women all seem to really like it.
This one we call the "Nautical Room" for obvious reasons. It has two twin beds and a nice view of the canal from either window.
The large bright living room has a 27" television with satellite receiver (HBO and all the standard channels), VCR (lots of movies on hand for those rainy days), and a small stereo/cd player.
The living room looking the other direction. The framed charts are of the St. Johns river from end to end and serve as both decoration and a source of reference.
The dining area with another nice view of the canal.
This is probably where you will spend the most time. The large, screened in back porch is decorated with lots of old authentic "fishin' stuff" and overlooks the backyard and canal. Sit back in one of the teak Adirondack chairs, or have a seat at the rustic, one-of-a-kind oak table. What a wonderful, relaxing place to eat breakfast or just hang out after a long day on the water.
Feel free to click on the pictures taken around sunset at right to view a larger image.
One of our newest additions is the 5 person hot tub boasting 45 jets to help relax you after a rough day of having fun.
Another new addition is the garage conversion to a game room. The blacklights and posters give it a 60's vibe with the working juke box playing the rock n' roll we all grew up with. An 8 foot pool table will give you something to keep you entertained in the evenings or those rainy days, and everybody loves the antique (over 50 years old) Shuffle Bowler. Also in the room is a working pay phone, working traffic light and a Coke machine.
The pool table, juke box, and Shuffle Bowler are all set for free play, so play them all you want, and the payphone operates just like a normal phone. The Coke machine is the only thing that requires money. (Please understand, the Coke machine's primary purpose is atmosphere and a cool place for us to keep our drinks when we use the place, not making money from tenants. Click on the picture at right to see larger image.
Just bring food and clothing. Pretty much everything else is provided.
These are just a few of the many household items that you will find for your use during your stay: