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Goat Creek, south of Palm Bay, FL
This page Copyright 2000 Alfonso Vazquez-Cuervo - See Terms of Use

Our Route Summary

  • Submitted by: Al Vazquez
  • Date Submitted: 3/2000
  • Email: alvazquez@kayakguide.com
  • Location: South of Palm Bay FL
  • Class: Typically flat water creek
  • Distance Paddled: 2 miles round trip
  • Water: brackish
  • Wildlife: Many Bromeliads and flowers, Herons, alligators, mullet, Mangroves

Entry and Exit

  • Directions: Entry/Exit beside the US 1 bridge over Goat Creek on the south west side. The bridge is several miles south of Turkey Creek (Palm Bay) just north of Malabar and Sebastian. An optional entry point is about 200 feet south of the mouth of Goat Creek on the east side of US 1 on the west bank of the Indian River at a small sandy beach.
  • GPS: N 27 deg 58.096' W 080 deg 32.656'
  • Fee: none
  • Description: grass bank at bridge roadside
  • Parking: Adjacent, grass
  • Facilities: none, but numerous nearby

What We Saw

Goat Creek is s nice easy paddle first along country homes and later through a small creek that feels more remote than it is.

Just after the launch, you'll pass under a small railroad bridge, then a two lane road bridge.

Unfortunately, on this last paddle, we were stopped just beyond "Wart Hog Stump" (pictured above) by a recently fallen large tree that blocked the creek about 9/10 mile into the trip. It's a hard portage, but the creek continues nice, narrow, and remote beyond this point. We decided not to continue this time as the water was very low anyway.
We did see abundant bromeliads like the one pictured at right. These are independent plants that live on shady trees. They do not harm the host trees.

The hanging moss you'll also see is in the same Epiphyte family of "air plants". Epiphytes are plants whose roots grasp tree branches and absorb nutrients from leaf matter and water dripping off the canopy and even from insects that fall into the cavity the leaves make (in the case of bromeliads) and decompose there. Mosses, lichens, orchids, bromeliads, and ferns are all types of epiphytes.

Such plants are also found in abundance on the Sebastian River.
Alligators can also be spotted from time to time on the creek according to locals.

We also saw a number of blooming flowers on our March paddle.