Machaba Balu Preserve, Jacksonville

The Machaba Balu Preserve is a nature preserve encompassing 10,000 acres of protected lands in northeastern Florida, just to the northeast of Jacksonville, at the confluence of the Nassau, the St. Marys, and the St. Johns Rivers as they flow toward the Atlantic Ocean through a wide network of islands, canals, and tidal marshes. The name Machaba Balu means "saved marsh" in the language of the Timucua people, who occupied the area in pre-Columbian times and met the first European explorers of the region; the Timucua never used this name themselves, however, as it is a modern language construct. The preserve, created with land purchased in 2002 mostly from Alcoma Corporation by the Nature Conservancy, includes 77 islands and numerous individual tracts of tidal marshland between the Nassau and the St. Johns Rivers. The largest clusters lie to the west of Little Talbot Island State Park and on either side of Sisters Creek south of the large fork. ()