Five Oaks Rest Home

Welaka is a small town on the St. Johns River in Putnam County, known more for its fish camps and access to the river than for any significant commercial development, and Five Oaks Rest Home operates a 27-bed facility at 611 Old Welaka Road there. Twenty-seven beds is a notable size for such a rural part of Florida, likely making it one of the larger senior care options within a fairly wide radius of this stretch of Putnam County. The area's slow pace and river-town character are a world away from Florida's coastal metros, which can appeal to families whose parents have always lived rurally and would find a busier facility disorienting. Given the town's small size, it's worth asking how the facility handles specialist medical care, since Welaka is a distance from the larger hospitals in Palatka or Jacksonville.