Tail of the Gecko

 Mid December, stuck in Florida. 

Yeah, it's great to be able to ride twelve months. It's not so great being stuck in Florida for seven of them. An opportunity though to visit some old riding tracks.

This past weekend one of those past riding tracks that I decided to visit was Tail of the Gecko, a track I haven't been on in over ten years. 

At 12.8 miles, Florida’s Tail of the Gecko is similar in length to North Carolina/Tennessee's Tail of the Dragon (11 miles), but it naturally falls way short in the “curves” department, in fact 291 curves short. I counted ‘em, 27 curves on the Gecko. Actually, in the land of long straight roads, 27 turns for that length of pavement is a rarity, indeed.

It’s still an interesting and fun ride through some remote and extremely “narrow” west central back roads. Much of the paved surfaces are so narrow they can’t even accommodate two cars; no problem on the motorcycle, although you probably won’t even encounter a car. It's more likely that you'll encounter large farm equipment since farms are about all that's back there.

Overall too short and too remote for us locals, I can't recommend the Gecko as a stand-alone motorcycle destination. Heck, it's a 100 mile round trip for me just to get there and back from Plant City. Rather, I see the Gecko as a terrific opportunity for those touring through west central Florida on nearby Interstate 75 to stray off the highway for a short break and enjoy some fun back road action. 

Accordingly, I've built an approximate 48 mile GPS route for our files with entry and exit points on Interstate 75 that travelers can follow to visit the Tale of the Gecko on their next trip though west central Florida. Enjoy!

Tail of the Gecko .GPX