If you're in Steinhatchee, Florida & cross the river into Jena in Dixie County, you'll come across County Road 361. If you follow it heading south, you'll pass by a few houses in a mostly rural area. After about 7 miles, you'll pass through the small community of Rocky Creek. As you pass over the bridge crossing Rocky Creek, you'll notice a sign that says "Halfway to Nowhere": it's the only hint of what's just down the road!
For the next 6 miles, you won't pass a single house or business; the lines on the pavement go away & the asphalt becomes very old for a few miles, then turns into a dirt road, then becomes an old asphalt road again, before turning to dirt yet again. About a mile after the last segment of pavement ends, the road just dead ends, right in the middle of a large marshy area.
You've just found "Road to Nowhere Point!"
Segments of the road leading up to "Road to Nowhere Point" are wide & straight for a few miles at a time, almost reminiscent of an airport runway. That's because this old stretch of County Road 361 is hiding an old secret: it WAS used as a runway; but many of the planes that landed there did so by moonlight or signal flares, because the planes just happened to be loaded with drugs!
The controversial "Road to Nowhere" was approved by the Dixie County Board of Commissioners some time in the 1960s. In the years following, smugglers took advantage of the long stretches of this straight road that was easily accessible from the Gulf, landing planes loaded with drugs that were then transferred onto vehicles that would be carried to many different metropolitan markets! There are a couple bridges along County Road 361 on this particular stretch; the abutments on either side of the bridges were low enough for plane wings to safely pass over.
One plane actually crashed during a storm in late February 1983 trying to land on the "Road to Nowhere," killing one man and injuring the pilot. The plane scattered about 600 pounds of marijuana across the marsh! The article describing the crash also says "The road has become notorious as a landing site for drug smugglers who often put down by moonlight or signal flares."
This certainly wasn't just a problem isolated to just Dixie County; smugglers would take advantage of the hundreds of miles of isolated coastline throughout Florida; this particular road just made for an easy route!
Today, the area sits inside Big Bend WMA; there are a few boat & canoe slips next to the bridges that cross over a few creeks; this is such a picturesque area, so it's no surprise this is a popular spot for kayaking & canoeing. The events of the past that took place here aside, this may be in the middle of nowhere, but it's a beautiful area that's definitely worth stopping by!
2 май 2021
