A Piece of Old Florida to be Preserved in a Botanical Garden Along the Peace

I probably spend more time in the "Old Florida" wetlands near Punta Gorda than most people who live in the Isles of Punta Gorda which were once part of it.  I've been continually drawn to the marshes and the land where intersecting streams have cut out islands of sea grass and woodlands with eerie often bare tree branches wrapped in gossamery moss.  Part of that past still winds through Punta Gorda itself and can be caught behind the homes of its main streets.  But to see more of it in its entirety you must go east or south.  And even there much of its beauty is hidden.

For instance, just east of Punta Gorda along the Peace River there is land originally platted for a town that really never materialized fully.   If you take Olympia in Punta Gorda east and keep going until it morphs into Route 17, and hang a left near the Thai Restaurant on a street labeled Riverside Drive, you can see, as you peak down the lanes next to the magnificent homes that start lining the right side of the drive, the marshlands and dangling tributaries of the Peace River and eventually the full Peace meandering to Punta Gorda and beyond.

Much of this land is part of a section of Charlotte County called Cleveland.  At just about the time that Issac Trabue was developing what is now Punta Gorda, a man named Alfred Holleyman was creating streets that last Tuesday, the Charlotte County Commission  approved for vacation to clear the way for  preservation and development of a piece of "Old Florida" into a botanical and sculpture garden that will give everyone access to an incredible wetlands environment now locked, at least on the land side, to the general public by private ownership.

The 25-acre wetlands garden has been the long term project of Roger and Linda Tetrault who have cobbled together parcels of this seductive place, part of what is left of wild Florida.   What they have envisioned will provide for those living and visiting in or near Punta Gorda what we have experienced in visiting Corkscrew Swamp near Naples, and the Botanical Gardens in Sarasota and Naples, only better, a river runs by it.  Plantings, which include a canapy of Oaks surrounding a walking lane, have begun.  Piers that jut out into the Peace River and boardwalks across title creeks  that enhance viewing of nature and its wildlife are underway.   A large palm frond sculpture is already visible from Riverside Drive.

The first phase of the gardens is expected to open to the public sometime in 2015.  The entire property will eventually be totally deeded to the county and leased back to and operated by a non-profit foundation.

For more information on this project: http://www.peacerivergardens.org/