Another milestone achieved. Today I moved on to the last map of the trip. The end is nearing.

Peaceful Morning

It was rather warm last night. I spent some time inside the sleeping bag and some time outside the sleeping bag. It was hard to get comfortable temperature wise.

But one thing that was comfortable was the air mattress. I started out with it not inflated quite enough so I did have to add a little air. But once I got it set it stayed perfect all night. I’m not sure if I slept anymore but I sure felt better.

Early in the evening I could hear coyotes off in the distance in the direction of the campsite I was supposed to be at. The comments in the app reflect that not only coyotes live there but panthers as well. I think I’m glad I camped where I did.

I spent the morning munching on granola and listening to music. I’m not sure why, but I was in no rush to get moving. But I did make it out of camp by 6:20 which is really only 20 minutes later than I would like to leave. Sometimes it’s nice to just be able to pack up and have natural light instead of using the head lamp.

I was eager to get to the actual campsite to see what I missed out on. And when I got there it ended up being a really nice campsite. It had lots of big oak trees to provide cover from the morning dew. And despite where I camped in pine trees I didn’t get too wet last night. I would have been hiking in the dark for 20 or 30 minutes if I had pushed on last night.

The terrain this morning was similar to yesterday. There were ravines and creeks every few miles and pine trees in between. There were a few boardwalks around some of the creek areas that were muddy. Dry feet again.

Is Eglin Open or Closed

Spoiler alert – closed.

Just before crossing the highway that indicates you are entering Eglin Air Force Base, I came across a southbound hiker. His first comment was I’m carrying five days of food but I haven’t eaten any of it in five days. He was commenting on all the stores and restaurants along this end of the trail.

I asked him about the trail closure in Eglin. He indicated that they had military police posted at the trailhead where he needed to exit around the closed section. He had to road walk into DeFuniak Springs, and came from there this morning.

I guess there is my answer. Instead of going on to the base until the closure, I might as well just begin the road walk and get into town early. I tried downloading an updated version of the daily closure map but, it keeps downloading the same one. I think I need to assume that the forecasted closure for Thursday and Friday will continue and it will not open up until Saturday. I will be hiking this area on Friday.

As I begin doing the math in my head, I am figuring that by the time I finish the road walk into town and then the road walk back out to the other trailhead it will basically be the end of the day. There is a campsite a few miles later so it would be a long day indeed.

Since I am hot and sweaty and already stinking pretty badly I decided I might as well stay in town instead of finishing the road walk back out to the trail. It is also supposed to rain overnight.

The official alternate has you hiking through town and then west out to the trailhead. There are a ton of hotels in town, so I need to figure out which one I want to stay at.

I use Google maps to check the distance from town to the trailhead. Google maps has picked a route that is very different from the official road walk. It looks like it might be a little shorter. But more importantly, it doesn’t go all the way through town.

There is one hotel on the road it uses to leave town and that is a Holiday Inn Express. Then this is where I will stay.

Air Force Base Trailhead

Where the trail crosses the road that leads into town, It actually enters woods on the other side for a few miles. The trail there is quite nice and only about 100 yards away from the road. You can still hear it but you can’t see it. But then the trail pops out to the road for the last mile or two to the official trailhead.

Since my air mattress is working perfectly I don’t want to be carrying this gigantic pad strapped to the top of my pack. It is windy today and the extra pad just blows me around.

I am hoping that at one of these parking areas it will be a developed parking area with usage and I can leave the extra pad here hoping that someone will throw it away for me.

The first indicated parking area when I crossed the highway was not really a parking area so I could not leave it there. When I get to the actual Air Force Base parking area it is official with a kiosk, but not really space to park. It probably does not receive much car traffic but I can’t carry it on the road walk all the way into town 6 miles away.

I find a tree right near the gate where I can wedge the rolled up pad securely so it won’t blow around. I hope someone else either needs it and uses it or has a car and can throw it away.

I am not fond of abandoning gear on trail. But at least I took it out of the back country and brought it to somewhere with road access for easier disposal.

More Road Walking

Us 331 is a big highway. It is four lanes and has tons of traffic. Trying to walk on the paved shoulder would prove to be super annoying today.

Luckily, there is a dirt road under the right of way of the power lines. I follow the dirt road for about a mile before it disappears.

But now there is a small levee that is still very far from the road that makes easy walking. The entire road walk is finding either dirt roads or this levee to walk all the way into town.

As far as six mile Road walks along busy highways goes this has been the best. I was never any closer than 30 yards to the highway. And most of the time it was more like 40 or 50 yards. Other than the noise it was actually not a bad hike.

But the best part about road walking is the services. And in this case as I approached town the restaurants begin to pop up. They are building a brand new Chick-fil-A and there is a Zaxby’s and a Kentucky fried Chicken. By this time next year there will be three chicken options before even getting to interstate 10.

But I have my heart set on a burger. That leaves the options of McDonald’s and Whataburger. Whataburger it is. They have tables outside so that’s where I’ll sit because I smell like a sewer.

Hotel Bound

After finishing my late lunch, I have only a half of a mile to the Holiday Inn Express. It is down a side road about a quarter of a mile. This is also the road I will be leaving town from.

This is the first time I’ve been to a Holiday Inn in probably 20 years. They are always more expensive than other hotels. And when I get there I see it is quite nice. It is on par with the Marriott properties I am used to.

The other reason for picking this hotel is they have guest laundry. And I need to do laundry quite badly. So after I shower that is the first order of business.

After laundry is done it’s time to start looking over the last map and plan out the last days of the trip. Other than the Air Force Base and one more management area, the rest of the trip is all on roads or bicycle paths. So that means there will be definite places I will need to be stopping.

And I already know that three of those places will be Marriott properties. And given the days and the spacing, it looks like I will be spending a night in another hotel and one more night camping. Five of the last six nights of this trip will be in hotels. I think I like the sound of that.

The only catch with this plan is that two of the days will have to be very long. The day to the campsite will need to be a 28 mile day. And the following day after that will need to be 27 miles. The rest of the days are in the 20 to 22 mile range except for the last few which are shorter.

We’ll need to muster all my energy to make sure that I make that 28 mile day. The 27 mile day right after ends with 5 miles of road walking to a hotel, so that day is less critical.

The only thing left for today is dinner. I noticed that up towards town there is a Beef O Brady’s. I have been craving a Watterson sandwich this entire trip. The restaurant is almost a mile and a half away, so I would like to Uber there instead of walk.

But as usual in the smaller towns, there is no Uber service and there is no Lyft service. Or at least there is no service at dinner time. This is what I discovered back in Palatka. The driver’s work when they want to work and they don’t want to work during dinner time.

I decide to go ahead and walk it. What’s another three miles? The walk is not bad but there are no sidewalks for the first half. I am carrying my umbrella because it should start raining at some point. It has been overcast and cloudy all day long.

When I get to the restaurant, I am horrified to find out that they no longer serve the Watterson sandwich. All of this trouble for no reason. I could have ordered Domino’s and had it delivered.

Emotion of the Day

I think I need to pick relaxed for today.

Even though I woke up with plenty of time to head out at 6:00, I just casually did my morning routine. 20 minutes is not much of a delay but it means one less mile hiked in the day.

On the trail all morning, I felt relaxed as well. I was in no hurry to get to a specific destination. I stopped once to eat an early lunch when I saw the southbound hiker, and then at the Eglin trailhead to pick and book a hotel.

And once I knew I was going to be in a hotel and not camping I was definitely relaxed at that point.

Having good surface plenty far away from the highway for the 6 Mile Road walk was also relaxing because I did not have to stress about cars.

And I got to the hotel by 2:00, so I had plenty of time to plan out the rest of the hike.

Other than two really long days planned for the remaining hike, all of the other days will be relatively short. And the fact that I am only camping out one more night means that this end to the hike is going to be somewhat luxurious.

Maybe I can use luxurious for the emotion one day soon. I like the sound of that word.

It’s really nice to be back on trails again.

Hurry up and Wait

The Post Office doesn’t open until 8:00 a.m. so I tried to sleep in as late as possible. But I went to bed with a slight headache that only got worse as the evening went on. At 4:00 a.m. I finally had to take it aspirin.

I know this headache wasn’t triggered by caffeine. I have been regulating my caffeine intake as closely as possible. But one thing I did do last night and I also did a few days ago which caused a slight headache is each sugar.

Last night I drank part of a drink that was basically just flavored sugar. I thought it was a fruit soda but it was a kid’s drink. I also ate a few sugar cookies which I had also eaten a few days ago when I got a headache.

When I finally got up at 7:00 a.m. both of those items went into the garbage can immediately. I still felt lousy but I walked over to the gas station to get some breakfast sandwiches and some milk. My head was hurting so badly that I didn’t want to eat but I knew I had to.

One of the things I needed to take care of today was to get a permit for Eglin Air Force Base. I didn’t realize until a few days ago after talking with Jack and Mickey that you have to watch a training video take a test and purchase a permit.

I did all that in about 20 minutes and had a PDF of my permit. I went to the front desk to see if they would let me email it to them and have them print it out for me. They agreed happily and so now I have a printed permit that is good for one year.

When 8:00 rolled around I headed over to the Post Office. I got there right as she was unlocking the window. I got my box quickly and headed back to the hotel to finish packing.

I have most of the food items I will need for the rest of the trip now. Towards the end of the trip I will be walking by stores and restaurants frequently so I won’t need much food for the end. Most of the food I will need to carry is for today and the next two days on Eglin Air Force Base.

The other chore was to get the repair tape from the box and reinforce the inflation valve on the air mattress. I had Karen send a giant piece just in case. So I will use giant pieces to reinforce the area around the valve. I really do think this is a very poor design on this mattress.

Start the Day with a Little Road Walking

I came into town on road walk and so I must leave town on a road walk. But the good news is, once I make it to the trail I think I will be on trails the rest of the day. Won’t that be wonderful.

Traffic is just insane this morning. Where are all these people going? The traffic is far worse than at any time yesterday.

It is cool this morning, but not cold, so I am wearing my shorts and a short sleeve shirt. When it is this nice this early in the morning it usually means it’s going to get pretty hot.

Chocktawhatchee River

This section of trail is fairly new. It is 8 1/2 miles of trail that replaced 10 miles of road walking. Hallelujah.

There is a campsite at each end of this trail section. The campsites have metal benches and a fire ring. I used one of them to have lunch. The metal benches are nice because they are breezy and never covered in mold the way a wooden picnic bench can get.

The trail changes quite a bit throughout the day. Sometimes it is down near creeks or swamps and gifts a little bit muddy. There is a large cypress swamp that has a boardwalk that goes right through the middle of it. But most of the time it is high and dry in sandy areas with pine trees.

This new trail section is a great improvement over the road walk it replaced. Mainly because half of the road walk used to be on County Road 20 which is just an insane road walk. And the fact that the trail is shorter than the road walk is an extra bonus.

Lafayette Creek Wildlife Management Area

The Eastern side of Lafayette Creek where I entered is nothing but pine trees in sandy areas. But every mile or two it crosses a creek where the trail gets damp but not muddy.

It is nice being able to filter water whenever you need to instead of having to plan where to pick it up and how far you have to carry it. That is one of the biggest annoyances with roadwalks. You never want to filter water from the side of the road because it is always contaminated with wash off from the road.

I ended up filtering water twice today. They were both from small streams and were very cool and clear water. It was hot enough today that I needed lots of water too.

Time to Camp

I am trying to make a campsite called Steep Head which would be over 25 miles for the day. If I had left plenty early this would be no problem.

But because I had to wait for the Post Office to open and then still do some chores, I didn’t get out of town till nearly 9:00. So right off the bat I’ve lost 3 hours of hiking time.

As the day progresses It is evident that I’m going to be two or three miles short of the campsite by the time the sun goes down. I will aim to stealth camp at about 5:30. But at this time I will be right on the trail that goes along Lafayette Creek which is prone to flooding. We have had so much rain in the last few days that I’m worried that I may not be able to find a good campsite here by the creek.

There is a high water alternate that I decided to take instead because it is under power lines and should have plenty of flat clear ground to camp on.

I am almost back to the regular trail again when 5:30 hits. The sun has set and the light is beginning to fade quickly behind the clouds. I find a good spot on an abandoned road bed that has no weeds and just a sand and grass base.

This is where I will set up the night. When I check the map I am less than 2 miles from where I intended to be. I could have pushed to that campsite but it would have been at least 10 or 15 minutes after dark.

There is no point in pushing myself tonight. I will just get up early in the morning and see if I can still make my intended campsite tomorrow.

The usual chores ensue. Tent, cook, set up, eat, blog. It is only about 65° tonight which is pretty warm. The forecast says it’s going to stay 65° all night so I doubt I’ll even get in the sleeping bag.

I go ahead and check the closure report for Eglin Air Force Base for the next 3 days. It looks like the opening section I will start in is closed for the next 3 days. But based on comments I see from other people It looks like Florida Trail might have an exemption for those early sections. I will have to double check that tomorrow.

If the first section is closed then I will have to road walk around it. That road will add several miles but it will also add convenience stores and restaurants. So either way tomorrow will be interesting. It could either be no road walking or more than half road walking. Stay tuned tomorrow to find out.

Emotion of the Day

I think I will just pick simple happiness.

It was nice having a day that was almost entirely on trails instead of roads. It was very rarely even on forest roads, but it did cross a lot of them.

The fact that the trail was dry nearly the entire length was nice. It was also nice to have creeks for streams every mile or two.

The trails themselves were nice as well. When they were near the creeks they were thick and lush. When they were in the pines they were grassy if they were mature pines and sandy if they were freshly planted pines.

I am not the least bit sad that I did not make my intended campsite. I left so late in the morning that it would have been a miracle to be able to make it. The fact that I’m only 2 miles away is actually quite good.

Other than being a little warm, It was just a nice day on nice trails. And that makes me happy.

The second half of the Econfina Creek area was far less impressive than the first half. And Titi swamp was not that great either. But what I found in the swamp is amazing. Keep reading to find out what it was.

Chilly Evening

The temperature was supposed to be about 40° last night. It felt a little colder but there is no frost on the ground. And speaking of the ground, have I mentioned that my air mattress won’t stay inflated more than an hour?

I don’t want to start walking in the dark so I wait a little later to start getting ready. It is nearly 7:00 before I actually get packed up and leave. This is an hour later than my usual time. And the Sun is already high in the sky to greet me.

When I get to the actual Rattlesnake Lake campsite, the gate has been locked and there’s a closed sign posted outside. My suspicions are correct and the entire campsite is permanently closed.

I am betting it is because it flooded and there was a porta-potty in the area that also got flooded. Nothing says closed to camping like having human waste spread all around the campsite and lake.

The Sad Econfina

Even though this is still the Econfina watershed, the river is nowhere near where we are hiking. We are hiking in hilly areas with scattered lakes. And every single pine tree for as far as the eye can see has been destroyed. It looks like a nuclear wasteland.

There are grasses and other small vines growing up amid the destruction. Together they both soak me with dew and scratch up my legs. Nothing says fun like wet cuts on your leg.

When the trail is in bad shape like this and there are Forest roads around, I will sometimes elect to take the roads and just connect back to the trail later on. But these roads are really sandy and don’t really go in the directions I want to head to.

The map shows a road that will bypass a small section of trail right at the exit of the area. But when I get to that spot the trail looks amazing. It is a very wide open area of soft grasses and pine trees that are even nicer than the ones in Ocala. It looks like the trail goes right through a wheat field. I must take this trail.

But the trail is very short and eventually I come to the parking area. And a parking area means is roadwalk time again.

Road Walking

This road is State Road 20. It has a fair amount of traffic on it and it has just been freshly paved. The shoulder is pretty wide and nearly flat in many places so I spend more of my time walking in the grass than trying to walk on the road.

It is about five miles to a convenience store. The walk goes quickly and the temperatures are still nice and cool.

The store itself is a Chevron and they have a pretty extensive selection of fried foods. Chicken wings and a corn dog will be lunch today. They also have a nice picnic bench to eat lunch on. But of course I need to get ice cream before I leave.

Now it is another 9 miles on the same road. This side of the road seems to have more traffic. The shoulder is sometimes wide and sometimes narrow and steep. So it is a mix of walking in the grass and walking on the bicycle lane for the rest of the walk.

It is also starting to get warmer. I am drinking a lot more water and feeling more tired than yesterday. I think it is partially from the temperature and partially from the boredom of this road. The sad part is there is still much more road walking ahead on this trail.

Titi Swamp

When the road does finally end it begins with a dirt road under power lines. Not exactly sexy but there is no one passing another car from behind me and four feet away from me going 90 miles an hour either.

Yes, that happened to me three times today on County Road 20. No courtesy honk. No beep beep. Just a massive rush of air and a few skipped heartbeats. Jackasses. And one of them was a log truck.

The trail eventually makes it into actual woods. It starts out as pine trees but makes its way to a small creek in an area called Titi swamp. This is supposed to be one of the nice areas again.

To me it just looks like thick woods and swampy trails. There are boardwalks over most of the wet areas and some over areas that are quite dry. I get my feet just a little bit muddy as I misplaced my feet on a few steps and sunk into mud a little deeper than I would have liked.

I can’t say that I liked Titi swamp, but I liked what I found within it. Remember me mentioning many times about my lovely air mattress? And remember me mentioning that I normally use a closed cell foam pad called a Ridgerest?

Well right there in the middle of the trail in the middle of Titi swamp, I found an abandoned Ridgerest pad. It is a full-length pad exactly like the one I used on the Pacific Crest Trail. And you bet your ass I rolled it up and strapped it to my pack.

On to Ebro

My last resupply box is waiting for me in the post office is only open from 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Monday through Friday. My original plan was to Camp only 2 miles outside of town and then head in about 7:30 in the morning.

But I am only 3 miles from town and it is only 3:00, so I might as well just go into town and hit the post office in the morning from there. I called the only hotel in town and it looks like they have a room available so off I go.

The road walk into town is not too bad. It is a four-lane highway so the traffic is more spread out. The shoulder is also very wide. And halfway into town it turns into a sidewalk.

The walk is easy and I make it to the hotel by 4:00. They have a special hiker rate and the room has a bonus. It has an actual tub instead of a shower.

So not only do I have the closed cell foam pad to use tomorrow night, but I also have a bathtub that I can use to find the leak in the air mattress tonight. Today just keeps getting better.

And it does get a little bit better. I thought there was only a dollar general and a gas station in town. But the gas station also has a Subway inside of it. Even though I am not fond of Subway, they’re toasted sandwiches are far better than anything you can buy at either Dollar General or a gas station.

The normal priorities ensue. Take a shower. Dry out wet things like the sleeping bag and tent. Go eat dinner. Repair air mattress. Blog.

I ended up finding three holes in the air mattress. To a right at the very top in a similar place where the other one was punctured. But this one is also leaking from the corner of the valve.

This model has a crazy wing lock valve. The air mattress is glued to a hard section that houses the valve. That section has sharp corners. And those sharp corners look like they’re puncturing the air mattress itself.

I consider this a design defect and will be letting Thermarest know about my displeasure. They have over engineered something that wasn’t a problem and created a new problem.

I was able to repair the two punctures at the top, but I have run out of repair tape and cannot repair the valve. The box that I will be picking up tomorrow morning as a large quantity of additional repair tape. I will finish the repairs tomorrow.

And if I am lucky, tomorrow night I will sleep comfortably on an air mattress on a Thermarest pad on 1/8 of an inch foam pad. That sounds like heaven.

Emotion of the Day

I’m not sure whether to pick joy or delight. I think joy is probably the one to pick.

Neither of the roadblocks were full of joy today.

But I was very happy at the convenience store, so that counts as joy.

I was very happy to find a Thermarest in the middle of the woods which is exactly the item I need in case I cannot repair my air mattress. I am 950 mi into this hike and have found two foam mattresses. They are the only two I have found in about 7,000 miles of hiking.

And to find out that the hotel had a bathtub where I could find three leaks in my air mattress also fills me with joy. I have had some leaking pads in the past where I never found the leak.

The only thing that could fill me with more joy is finding a barbecue restaurant right next to the hotel.

The guidebook says that this section of trail looks just like the Appalachian Trail. That is probably an exaggeration, but there is quite a similarity of flora and terrain.

Rise and Shine

I know with the new time zone that I should just subtract an hour from the time I normally get up. But that just sounds way too early in the morning. I lounge around until I can see it’s starting to get light outside. Now it’s time to get moving.

Mickey was already up and making coffee. There are some interesting pumpkin biscuits in the refrigerator so Mickey and I each had one of those. There was also one piece of sugar free pie that had my name on it. A few triskits in the gullet and I am set to leave.

There was a pretty heavy frost on the ground. All of the door steps were very slippery with ice and melted ice.

I managed to make it out the door at 7:00 a.m. which is really 8:00 in the previous time zone. This is an hour later than I wanted, but I knew it would be really cold this morning.

More Road Walking

This section may begin to sound like a broken record. But it seems like there is road walking every single day now. I have 10 miles of road walking before I can hit actual trail.

The one pay off of the road walk is there as a dollar general just off trail. I am carrying two days of food, but it’s always more fun to get fresh food. I should be able to get there by 10:00 or so. It will make a nice early lunch stop.

Along the road there are many dogs. Dogs are not usually fond of strange people walking by their houses. But I think that they hate hikers more because they think we’re mutants with this big giant hump on our back.

The dogs are usually either chained or fenced. I think about four or five times so far there have been dogs that were not chained or fenced. So far I have been able to control them with voice commands.

But today I finally met the first dog that would not respond to voice commands. It was a pit bull and it got within six feet of me, which is too close for my comfort. All I could do is stand there and yell at it while it barked at me. Eventually I think it got bored and I was able to slip away.

The rest of the road walk was uneventful except for the Dollar General. I had a Santa Fe salad, a yogurt, a Green Machine, and a frappuccino for lunch. I only drink half the frappuccino and we’ll save the rest for tomorrow morning.

The Econfina River

The road walk eventually turned into dirt roads as it entered water management lands. The trail turned off onto an actual wooded trail away from the road. It was a long a small creek that was flowing pretty heavily.

I have been hearing mixed reports that this section of trail is either flooded or dry. It starts out dry but then a few muddy areas appear. It is easy to walk around the mud.

After about a mile, this creek merges into the Econfina river. It is a much smaller version of the Suwannee. This whole area has been devastated by hurricane Michael a few years ago. There are downed trees everywhere and almost clogging up the river itself.

Much of the woods away from the river is just dead pine trees. There is some undergrowth, but it is just weird not having tall pine trees to provide shade.

After a few miles it starts to get more hilly and the trail goes over exposed roots from the nearby trees. I also noticed that I’m starting to see both Rhododendron and Mountain Laurel which are trees you normally see on the Appalachian Trail. If there were taller pine trees providing shade this section would look a lot like the Appalachian Trail.

A few miles further the trail now starts to go along the edge of a bluff. Now there is not only Mountain Laurel and Rhododendron, but now the trail is on the side of an incline. Now this is really starting to feel like the Appalachian Trail.

Every few miles the trail changes its character. And about mile 8 it’s character changed to total destruction. There is hardly a tree standing and there is so much debris on the ground that it is very difficult to follow the trail.

There are blackberries and other prickly vines and bushes growing all over the trail. The combination of destruction everywhere and being scratched makes this area not much fun. I actually get lost a few times and have to backtrack or bushwack back to the direction of the trail.

After two miles of this unpleasant section of the trail it starts to get nice again. The hills return and now young pine trees begin to show up. Now it’s starting to turn into a fun trail again.

Finding a Campsite

The area where I wanted to stop is called Rattlesnake Lake Campground. You have to reserve it and it looks like it’s totally booked for every day for the next several months.

Comments in the guidebook app say that it is flooded. I am guessing that this means that the campsite is actually closed and not really booked. There is another campsite nearby that I will have to stop at instead.

I am still getting used to the new time, but I think I should have plenty of daylight to get to near where I want to camp. It is still an area of planted pines but there is a lot of thick undergrowth. The kind of prickly undergrowth that is not ideal for tenting.

None of the area around here seems flooded. And before long I’m actually within a few tenths of a mile of the actual campsite when I find a nice area off to the side that has lots of pine needles and very little of anything else. This will make a perfect campsite.

It seems odd going through the camping routine when I have been in either a motel or a hostel for the last two nights. But it is the same routine. Set up the tent. Cook the food. Configure the tent. Eat the food. Write the blog. Go to sleep.

Emotion of the Day

Other than the one dog that was troublesome, the rest of the day was pretty good, even the 10-mile road walk.

But I think the emotion for today is actually sadness.

It is mainly sadness at seeing all the destruction of this section of trail. I bet ten years ago this was one of the best sections of the trail. But right now it is just a massive area of chaos for much of it.

Having fresh food doesn’t trump the sadness. Seeing plants you normally only see on Appalachian Trail doesn’t trump the sadness. Finding an excellent stream to collect water that has absolutely no color in it cannot trump this sadness.

It was actually a really good day today. But I am sad that I could not see this section of trail back in its glory. Maybe in 10 years I can come back and it will be somewhat restored. Only that will break the sadness of today.

Today was like any other day on the Florida trail. Two miles of trail, two miles of bicycle trail, and 18 miles of road walks.

Cold Morning Start

I still had plenty of food from my Piggly wiggly run left, so breakfast was a feast. Sausage dog, hot pocket, grapefruit wedges, and an egg roll.I got rolling by 7:30 and there were still tons of clouds in the sky. It looked like more rain.

The first obstacle out of town was crossing the Apalachicola river on a very long bridge. The floodplain for the river is very wide. It started raining lightly about half way over the bridge. My umbrella was able to keep me dry and I was happy because I did not want to start the day soaking wet.

The significance of crossing this river is that it is the border between Eastern and Central Time. My phone switched almost immediately as it connected to a cell tower from Blountstown. My watch changed several hours later. It is GPS based and they probably just use a straight line and not bother with the contours of the river.

Coming into Blountstown, the trail immediately goes into a rail trail around the edge of town. The map shows the trail immediately transitioning between a bridge overpass directly to the trail below. But there is a buzzard circle trail that loops you around to it like an interstate would. Another map inaccuracy.

The pavement on the rail trail was very slippery. I don’t think it gets used very much. It had a light covering of mold over the surface.

It passed by a park with bathrooms, a train and caboose, and a few restaurants which were closed for the weekend.

More Road Walking

After about two miles, it was onto another county road, CR 71. This was a two lane road with quite a bit of high speed traffic, but being a Sunday, no big trucks. I would be on this road for nearly eight miles.

The shoulder was very narrow and very sloped in most places. My feet were getting sore from having to get onto that slope so often to try to walk. I put a heel lift insert in only my left shoe to try to compensate for the slope. It did seem to help a little bit.

The highlight of this road is when it ends. There is a convenience store. The cashier saw me coming and opened the door for me. She was very friendly.

The food selection was very thin, but I found a few things to buy to make a lunch from. As I watched people come and go, I saw the cashier outside the store as much as inside. I think she is very bored.

Leaving the store, the trail goes into a much smaller road, then eventually through a neighborhood. Lots of barking dogs, but only one mean one. They were all fenced.

Finally, a Trail

The neighborhood leads to a Wildlife Management Unit around the Chipola River. The forest here still shows massive damage from Hurricane Michael. Many trees are pushed over or leaning heavily and much of the forest has been clear cut.

The trail is muddy in only a few sections leading up to the river. I am able to skirt around all of it and keep my feet dry.

The river itself is nice. It looks a little high, but not too bad. The trail zigs along it like a mini Suwannee.

More Road Walking (again)

The trail only lasts a mile and a half before popping out to cross the bridge on another highway, so it is back to highway walking. I think it is seven miles to the Baptist Church. I should be there shortly after 3 pm.

This road has slightly less traffic and a much better shoulder. It is far more pleasant than the one from Blountstown.

There used to be a convenience store on this road, but it was destroyed by the hurricane and is now just an empty parking lot. That’s too bad. I take a break there to text the Pastor of the church that I should arrive at about 3:15.

While I am doing that, Jack and Mickey show up. We hike the remaining four and a half miles together.

Hillcrest Baptist Church

The church is an amazing complex of buildings. The main hiker building has two bunks, a small kitchen, and a sofa area. Another building has another bunk, a shower, and laundry. The main church has a large kitchen, bathrooms, and more rooms to sleep in. There is a refrigerator full of food in each building. I have no idea why I did not take a single picture of any of the buildings.

The first order of business is a shower and laundry. I think this might be my first real laundry since the 88 store. The rest of the day is nibbling on food and chatting with other hikers.

One of the hikers here, Eric, has hiked this trail five times already. We talk to him quite a bit about upcoming trail conditions. There will be more mud and water, but nothing that sounds outrageous. He is the unofficial Mayor of Hillcrest Baptist Church.

More importantly, Jack has let me borrow his double sleeping pads to test out tonight. I am eager to see if it could be a future solution for me since I am having so much trouble with inflatables. Stay tuned.

Emotion of the Day

I think nostalgia is what I will pick today.

The rail trail around Blountstown reminded me of trails in other cities, and the hostel reminds me of the kind of thing you would see on the Appalachian Trail.

With other hikers around, it finally feels like a national scenic trail.

I am the only one leaving northbound tomorrow, so it will be back to feeling like the Florida Trail again.

The rain was even worse today. And it was much colder. From the entire time of leaving the campground to hitting the hotel, it was constantly raining. And it was cold.

A Decent Night’s Sleep

As you already know, my new sleeping pad is already leaking. And each night it seems to get a little worse. Since I was camping on concrete last night, I really needed it to function well. But it did not. I had to blow it back up at least six times during the night.

Jack and Mickey are using closed cell foam pads. They are nearly identical to the one that I used on the Pacific Crest Trail. But interestingly they are using two pads and not just one. They use a full length pad on the bottom and a torso length pad on top of that. It may not be a light solution, but it looks like a comfortable solution.

I was originally planning on using my closed cell foam pad. But I decided against it because when it is strapped on top of my pack it sticks out to either side. And I knew I would be crashing through a bunch of weeds and brush. And the pad just catches those things and makes it harder to push through.

But Jack and Mickey have found a solution to that problem, too. They stowe their pads vertically instead of horizontally. My pack is not equipped with the cords to be able to do that, but I think I might modify the pack when I get home to be able to do exactly that.

It rained most of the night last night. I have my tent on the picnic table blocking the wind. But the wind was shifting throughout the night so it wasn’t always effective.

When the rain intensified, I could feel water mist on my face during the night. But when the rain let up, things did actually dry quite well. When I woke up in the morning the bag was as dry, if not dryer, than when I’m in my tent. It also happened to not be raining very hard at the time.

A slack in the rain means eat your breakfast get packed up and get moving quickly. So I did just that. Because it was only 15 or 16 miles into town, there was no rush to get out early. So it was only 8:00 when I left.

Here Comes the Rain Again

I left at the perfect time, because 5 minutes after leaving camp it started raining pretty hard. I was wearing my shorts, a short sleeve t-shirt, and a long sleeve t-shirt over that. My rain jacket is actually what I’m using to keep rain from soaking through from the top of the pack down to the rest of the pack.

I wasn’t sure how warm or cold it was going to get throughout the day. I didn’t want my long sleeve shirt to get wet, but I also didn’t want to get cold. I was beginning to think that the decision to wear the long sleeve shirt might have been the wrong choice.

I am not using a pack cover on this trip. My backpack is made of nylon and not waterproof. All of my clothes and sleeping bag are in waterproof dry bags. But the packet self gets very wet.

I had forgotten that I have a garbage bag with me. I was hoping to be able to put it over the pack and then cut little slits to pull the backpack straps through. But this garbage bag is not nearly big enough to do that. So all I can do is drape it over the pack like a shower cap.

It does not work well at all and at some point during the morning blew off on the roadwalk. I never even noticed that it happened until I got to the hotel and it was missing. I really wish I had gotten a Dynema backpack for this trip.

Jack and Mickey passed me about six or seven miles into the road walk. They found an abandoned house with a very large overhang to hide from the rain. I went to join them because it was time for a break. I also wanted to try and call the hotel to reserve a room.

I called the hotel and they did have a room so I was very relieved. We were still two miles from the convenience store, and then another three miles into town. So two hours from now I should be dry.

Jack was getting very cold so he went ahead and took off and Mickey followed after him. After I packed up everything up and set out again, I can see that Jack actually started running down the road. He was getting very cold and shivering and probably close to getting hypothermia. He really wanted to get to that convenience store quickly.

After only about a half of a mile, I could see that Mickey was getting a ride from a pickup truck. This is probably the best thing for them if Jack is in that bad of shape. I expect that they will hitch all the way to the hotel just to get out of the rain immediately.

For some odd reason, even though I am cold and pretty wet I am in good spirits. I guess mainly because I was expecting it today and it really wasn’t that bad of a road walk.

My umbrella keeps the top half of my body moderately dry. But my shorts and obviously my shoes and socks were completely drenched. I could see from an electronic sign at a bank that the temperature was 56°. This normally would be perfect hiking weather, but when it is windy and rainy it’s a little on the cool side. 66 would have been much better.

It doesn’t take long before I am at the convenience store. I go inside and I’m happy to see that they have a hot deli counter at the back of the store so I head directly for it. Fried chicken, fried okra, baked beans, and cornbread, please. The fried chicken is not quite as good as the Jay Veer store but it was still delicious. And the store is warm and dry.

I also bought a chocolate milk and an oatmeal cream pie to eat before leaving. But I also bought a tube of Pringles and a honey bun for tomorrow in case I can’t find breakfast food.

I am planning on resupplying at the Piggly Wiggly that is at the other end of town, but I want to have an emergency backup just in case. If it rains this hard all afternoon, then I’m not likely to go to the Piggly Wiggly.

A few miles out of town there is a sidewalk which makes the walking much less stressful. But this sidewalk must be too close to Bradwell Bay, because big stretches of the sidewalk are under water. Some of the deepest sections are about 4 inches deep. My feet are so wet it doesn’t really matter if I walk through them or not.

Snowbird Motel

I managed to get to the hotel at 1:00, which is when I told them I would arrive. My hands are so cold that I have to give the clerk my ID and have him fill out the form for me. When it comes time to sign the credit card receipt, it is so jagged it doesn’t even look like my signature.

The first thing I do is to head straight for the shower. I take my shoes and socks off and my long sleeve shirt, but just jump in the shower with everything else. Everything is so soaking wet it doesn’t really matter so I might as well rinse them out at the same time.

The hot shower never felt so good. Instead of washing dirt off, this is just to get my body temperature back up. I haven’t even bothered to get any dry clothes out of my backpack.

The next thing is to get the heat turned on which takes a while to figure out but eventually I get it working. Then I can finally get into some dry clothes.

After a quick 5-minute rest, it’s time to do chores. The first chores are to wash the filty things that need washing. In this case it’s mainly socks and gaiters. I washed them and set them out to dry. Then I set all the other wet clothes out to dry.

Then I need to get everything out of the backpack so I can hang the backpack upside down to dry. The dry bags work extremely well at keeping the clothes and sleeping bag dry. But the outside of the bags themselves are wet and need to be dried.

This room is going to start stinking in just a few minutes with all this nasty laundry lying around. But as long as I’m dry I don’t care what it smells like.

Later in the day it does stop raining. It is about 5:30 and I make my break for the Piggly Wiggly to go hit their deli. It is 3/4 of a mile so it is not a trivial walk.

When I get there, I am horrified to see that the deli has closed and is already cleaned up. The only thing in the deli are packs of cooked ribs and one sausage dog. I will have to go buy stuff from the Frozen aisle to cook in the room. This was not the Piggly Wiggly trip I have been dreaming about for days.

I also pick up some things for breakfast tomorrow, and enough walking snacks and lunches for the next two days. I made the mistake of not eating before grocery shopping and buy way too much food. I guess I will be feasting for dinner and breakfast. It’s good to be the King.

Emotion of the Day

I want to pick the word accomplishment.

Not that hiking in the rain is some major task to overcome. But I started out the morning knowing that it was going to be miserable. And all during the miserable hike I was in pretty good spirits.

After I ate lunch at the convenience store, I did get much colder than before. This is because the body sends blood to the stomach to process the food and you tend to get cold very quickly.

So the 30 minutes after leaving the store I was probably my coldest. The rain might not have been at its hardest but it definitely was far from its lightest.

Then even though I had a nice sidewalk to walk in, it had enormous amounts of water all over it. But it didn’t seem to bother me at all.

I was in the hiker zone. I was cold. I was wet. But I was not tired and I was not hungry. I was also in a somewhat upbeat mood.

The worst part was probably the cold. If I had a better solution to keeping my backpack dry, I probably should have worn my rain jacket. After all, that’s what a rain jacket is for – keeping you warm in the rain. It’s job is not actually to keep you dry. But that is a secondary function as part of its purpose to keep you warm.

I know it is going to rain like this for two days again at the end of next week. I will be better prepared for that rain.

So I guess I feel accomplishment because I was able to take really horrible hiking conditions and actually have a reasonably good time doing it. But tomorrow will be better when it is cool and no longer raining.

Hiking in the rain as a completely different sport. When it’s raining you tend to not want to stop. But you need to stop to rest and to eat food. I got very lucky today with timing my food stops with very brief periods where the rain let up and then immediately started pouring again.

Early Start to the Day

I was able to get out at 7:00 today. I am not likely to go past Camel Lake Campground. It is only 16 miles away. There is one more camp about 2 miles past that, but after that it’s a 10-mile road walking to Bristol which is too far.

It barely sprinkled last night off and on. I was expecting it to rain quite heavily. And in the morning I was relieved to see that the tent wasn’t very wet at all. I was careful about placing the edge of the tent lower so that no water could get inside.

Wet Trails

The grass is wet with rain, so my shoes get wet pretty quickly. I am also still in Apalachicola National Forest, so every mile or so the trail gets very swampy and muddy.

There are a few sections every few miles where you do have to wade through ankle to calf deep water for a hundred yards or so. It is nothing like Bradwell Bay, but it is still a pain.

It is mostly raining very lightly, but as the afternoon approaches it starts to rain quite heavily. Before I left camp I made sure that my coffee was ready so that he didn’t have to stop and fix it. I was also fortunate that I stopped for an early lunch break at the Vilas Campground.

Because shortly after I left is when it started raining pretty hard. Hard enough you don’t dare stop.

I had plenty of snacks in my pockets because I knew I wasn’t going to want to stop very much. But as the afternoon approached I was getting tired and would have liked to stop just for 10 minutes to get off my feet.

Right around coffee time, the rain did let up so I took the opportunity to stop and have a quick snack and make coffee at the same time. I’m glad I did because it started raining pretty hard just a few minutes after I resumed hiking.

I was only a few miles from the campground and I knew that bathrooms and showers awaited me.

Camel Lake Campground

The campground itself is in a sandy pine area. I was happy to see this because it means there won’t be muddy trail or campsites. I got there about 3:30 so the camp hosts were busy checking people in.

They said they were full and could not accommodate walk-in hikers today. But at least I was able to get a shower.

I found out Jack and Mickey were already there and the camp host had offered them the primitive spot they reserved for the hikers. But Mickey said what they pointed to was a low point off to the side that looks like it would fill up with a water. And because it was still going to rain another day and a half there’s no way anyone in the right mind would want to camp in a depression.

They were hanging out under the picnic pavilion out by the lake and the swimming area. It was pretty large and had four picnic tables. It was a great place to wait out the rain.

They were planning on going a little further and stealth camping. But because the rain still wouldn’t let up and actually got harder, they decided they were just going to try and camp under the pavilion. And that sounded like a perfect plan to me, too.

Just before dark the camp host came over and let us know that it would be okay to hang out under there overnight. No one was going to be picnicking or swimming in the rain. And we were only 40 yards from a bathroom. Sounds like a perfect spot.

Even though the rain had never stopped, I set out a few things to try and dry. And to a my amazement, some of the things actually did dry pretty well.

That was good, because we were cowboy camping in our sleeping bags on the bare concrete. I could have put my tent over myself, but then my body vapor would condense on the inside of the tent.

I just hope the rain doesn’t get so bad or the wind so high that it starts blowing rain in on us while we’re trying to sleep. That would not make for very pleasant sleep.

Emotion of the Day

I think I need to pick exhaustion today.

I normally only get exhausted when it’s hot outside. And the rain today kept it very cool.

But because there were so few breaks in the rain, I was not able to stop and take even quick 5 minute breaks. If I had not timed my lunch and coffee stops perfectly, then I would not have been able to stop to do those things any other time.

And in the afternoon before getting to the campground, I was getting pretty tired. If I could have stopped for just 10 minutes that would have made all the difference in the world. But when it’s raining pretty heavily you don’t want to take your backpack off and you certainly don’t want to set it on the ground.

So you just keep hiking in the rain, and that is exhausting.

Wading through miles of water in Big Cypress was fun. Wading through miles of water in Bradwell Bay was not fun. I guess it’s only fun if you’re expecting it.

Early Start

I knew today would be a long day so I wanted to get an early start and get as far as I can towards Bristol. I was able to get rolling by 6:40 which is my earliest start so far.

It was still a little dark so I needed my head lamp. And even with the lamp I missed two turns in the darkness. The trail was weaving on and off forest roads and it was hard to see some of the places where it veered off a road.

Let’s Get Wet

Within the first 30 minutes I came to a water crossing that was far too wide to try and dance around. I know today will be full of water so I might as well just get it over with now. So I plunged straight through the water in my shoes and socks.

The water was cool, but it didn’t seem as cool as the water in the Everglades. It was more tannic but it was still clear.

I don’t think I went more than 10 or 15 minutes all morning without getting wet walking straight through water. I was impressed how quickly the water would slosh out of these shoes but everything was still wet of course.

Since there was plenty of dry land between the wet spots it wasn’t challenging like the Everglades. There were plenty of places to stop whenever I needed to.

Eventually the trail came to the Sopchoppy River. It was a lot like the Suwannee but quite a bit smaller. It’s another black water river with high bluffs and trails zigging up and down ravines.

Bradwell Bay

Everyone seems to know about Bradwell Bay, but I didn’t really know what it was all about. We have to be 70 mi from the gulf so why is it called a bay? I was about to find out.

Instead of just swampy mud holes to walk through like the morning hiking, This was bonafide wading through water. Lots of water.

I was unprepared for how long some of these wades were. I think the first one was over a mile and a half. And I was only going one mile an hour.

It was just as challenging as the Everglades. There was soft mud and varying depth of the water. The water might come up to your knee. Or your foot might sink all the way to your knee in the mud and the water come up to your waist. One step could be firm and the next one foot of mud.

I was never in danger of losing a shoe, but there are many steps that took 10 or 12 seconds to get my foot free from the mud.

There were brief sections of dry trail in between the long stretches of wading. Just in that main section of Bradwell Bay, there must have been four or five miles total for walking through the muddy water like this.

And one thing that made it more difficult than the Everglades, was that there was debris everywhere. Hurricane Michael destroyed the West Coast of Florida a few years ago. And you can still see the effects on the trail here.

It seemed like they were almost as many trees laying on their sides as standing upright. You could also see where they rerouted the trail around large downed trees to avoid having to cut and move them. Those blazers would be bright orange and fresh.

But they didn’t bother painting over the old blazers which were more faded. And with all the debris I was getting lost quite frequently. But sometimes I would be on the old trail and not the new one. After three or four times getting fooled by these older blazes, I just started ignoring the faded ones and only looking for fresh ones.

After the first water crossing was over, I stopped to eat lunch and rest my feet. All of the dead skin from prior blisters wiped cleanly off my feet. And there was a lot of stand inside my socks just like in the Everglades.

I have no idea how much more water was ahead so when I stopped to eat was actually a perfect stopping point. It gave me the energy I needed to continue through the other miles afterwards.

Road Walking

The rest of the afternoon was a combination of walking on muddy trails and road walking. The muddy trails were more like the morning. There would be stretches of mud 20 yards or maybe a hundred yards long. But then there would be a few tenths of a mile of dry trail until the next mud pile.

The road walks were a combination dirt roads and paved roads. They were all forest roads and had very little traffic on them. But it still sucks to be on a road walk with soaking wet feet. I do not want to develop a new crop of blisters.

Rain in the Forecast

I think my schedule is one day off. I started walking through the water today. But tonight it is supposed to start raining for two days. It would have been nicer to start the water walking when the rain started. That way it wouldn’t matter how wet my feet got.

Tomorrow should be much dryer trail but will probably have some muddy spots. But I do not expect to have to walk through standing water.

The day after will be a road walk into Bristol. There is only one small hotel there. Subway will be the only restaurant open. But there are several options for resupply and groceries.

I doubt the hotel has laundry, but at least they have showers. And I should be passing a campground tomorrow that has showers if I think I need one before then. I think it will all depend on how hard it is raining. If it’s raining hard enough I will be getting an automatic shower.

Today was the longest day of the trail yet. It went from dark to almost dark and was probably over 30 miles. I am still 40 mi from Bristol which should be easy to do in 2 days.

I was getting worried in Bradwell Bay that I was going too slow and might actually be in the situation where I could run out of food before getting to Bristol. The road walking helped to counteract the slower miles with some fast ones.

I am camped at a campground which is high up on a hill. It is Sandy pine scrub habitat. If it is going to rain cats and dogs tonight, then this is a good place to be. But so far tonight it has only been sprinkling lightly. But the night is young.

Emotion of the Day

It is a negative emotion today, but I’m not sure which one.

I knew from other hikers that Bradwell Bay was going to be wet. But I had no idea it was going to be a swamp crossing.

What is weird is that I had no idea when it started and when it would end. In Big Cypress it was very clear each section that was water and each section that was land. Here it was just a long red line on the map with no markers to tell you beginning of swamp end of swamp.

I wasn’t upset about plunging into the water so early in the morning. And I wasn’t upset about having a really long hiking day almost 12 hours long. That was my choice to hike so long.

I think the feeling that sticks with me the most is the helpless feeling while in the middle of the swamp. I had no idea if it would end after the next tree. Or if I would still be walking in water past dark.

So I guess helpless is the emotion I need to pick for today. It is the only day of the hike so far that I have felt this way. And I hope that it is the last.

It’s going to be hard to leave the bed and breakfast and the town of Saint Marks. And that’s because the B&B does not serve breakfast and the only place that does doesn’t open till 9:00. So I literally cannot leave until after 9:00 and that will be hard.

A Good Night of Sleep

It’s hard to beat a big old four poster bed with cushy pillows and a fluffy comforter. I woke up at my usual time, so I made a cup of decaf coffee and had some fruit and a fig bar.

I spent most of the morning just looking at the maps and figuring out what lies ahead for the next miles or so. The next point of interest is the town of Bristol, which has one hotel and probably no laundry. They have a grocery store and only one restaurant will be open over the weekend when I will be there.

But between here and Bristol is a hundred miles of Apalachicola National Forest and Bradwell Bay. Both of these places are well known as the muddiest and wettest sections of trail outside the Everglades. Today will probably be my last day of dry feet for the next few days.

I also took a look at the weather forecast. It will be sunny and dry for the next two days and then overcast and raining for the two following days. So my last two days of the wettest section and doing a 10-mile road walk into Bristol I will be soaking wet. Fun fun.

At a little after 8:00, I am packed and ready to go. I haul everything downstairs and decide to spend one last session in the massage chair. This thing is amazing. It’s a chair that actually causes physical pain.

The torture session ends right at 8:30 so it is time to head out. The coffee shop is a mile and a half away and it will take me exactly 30 minutes to get there.

Coffee Time

I have already had two decaf coffees which does have some caffeine. What I want to get at the coffee shop is a decaf Americano but they have no decaf beans. It looks like I will be upping my dose of caffeine today.

I order a bagel sandwich and avocado toast to go with it. I have never had avocado toast before but it is awesomely delicious. It is now permanently on my rotation of breakfast foods.

Jack and Mickey were already at the coffee shop when I arrived. We sat together and talked for 30 or 40 minutes while we ate breakfast.

I didn’t leave the coffee shop until 9:45. This is a super late start for me. But I know the trail starts out on the St Mark’s bike path and will be a combination of trails, roads, and bike path for most of the day.

A Day of Alternate Trails

The trails today will go in and out of sections that are known to be swampy. There is also one section with a missing bridge and supposedly has signs posting a reroute.

But this section has many high water alternates too. So wherever there is an alternate I just automatically take it. This does add more road walking, but the roads are not too busy and the road walks are not too long. I think the longest one was about four miles.

I noticed that the end of this particular alternate takes me very close to a barbecue restaurant just barely off the path. By my calculations I should arrive there about 5:00 p.m. and that sounds perfect to a hungry hiker.

Throughout the day I cross paths with Jack and Mickey and tell them about my plan. They like the plan too. And much to my surprise the roadwalks were probably shorter than I thought they were going to be, because we arrived there at about 4:00. That may sound early for dinner but it’s not too early for hiker dinner.

The name of the restaurant is Hamaknockers BBQ and if you are ever in the town of Medart, Florida, you must stop by this place. I have had a lot of barbecue in my days, and this is some of the best. I will definitely be saving this in Google maps.

Find a Campsite

When we leave the restaurant, I realize that the restaurant is on the same road that we left St Marks from. If we were so inclined, we could have stayed on the bike path the entire day and gone straight to the restaurant and probably gotten here a few hours earlier. That would have bypassed 15 miles of trail, though.

Once back on the trail, the map indicates there are many road crossings and the pictures show dry sand and pine trees. But interspersed with the road symbols are marsh symbols showing boardwalks over water.

The distance between the symbols is very short so it looks like I should not have too much trouble finding a campsite whenever I want to. Since I don’t need to cook dinner, I plan on hiking until 6:00 or possibly even later.

As 5:30 rolls around I come to the end of the map section and have to switch maps. This is a huge milestone as this is the second to last map for the entire trip. It’s a bit like finishing another state on the Appalachian Trail.

As I go to the new map section and jump out a mile or two to see where I should be at around 6:00, I notice that there is an official campsite. I guess there is no more guesswork. If I’m going to hit a campsite right about 6:00, then that’s where I should go.

I do get to the Bent Sapling Campsite at about 5 minutes before 6:00. It is a section of pine trees with a few palmettos, but more important to me there are a few oak trees. I always prefer oak trees because they provide better protection from the dew.

These are not big ones, but the space underneath them is ample for my tent. I am here for the night.

Emotion of the Day

I think I will just pick a simple upbeat as my emotion for today.

It wasn’t super great because I had to wait so long to leave town. But the B&B was nice and breakfast was nice and dinner was super nice.

Some of the trail was on bike paths, which I love to hike on. Some of it was on forest roads, which I also love to hike on. Some of it was on a road walks, but it was not a bad road.

And anywhere there was water, there were logs or boardwalks to cross the water on.

So even with the late start, the alternate trails, and the road walks, I still went further today than I expected to. And to be on the next map is also a little boost to the spirits.

It was nice crossing paths with Jack and Mickey a few times during the day and sharing dinner with them. I am camped at a dry campsite with oak leaves above me. And the forecast for tomorrow is no rain.

So other than knowing I am dealing with mud and water tomorrow, today has been an easy day.

How could I not feel upbeat on a day like today?

Crossing the St Marks River today was phenomenal. I paddle boarded across it. I am still 100% human powdered on this hike so far.

Another Sunrise

Being out in an open estuary has the advantage of giving you both sunsets and sunrises equally. This morning was another nearly cloudless day and an awesome sunrise.

I was out of camp by 7:00 a.m. which was my goal. Jack and Mickey left only 5 minutes before I did. But they are far faster hikers than I am so I didn’t see them for at least an hour.

I was stopping every 5 minutes after leaving camp just to spin around and take the views in. Sunrises and sunsets change very quickly. Every time I would stop to look at it it would look different each time.

The trail all morning was still on levees above the estuary. There was a section torn up by hogs but other than that it is very easy hiking. And the grass was low enough that my feet did not get wet with dew.

Shortly after crossing Lighthouse Road the trail goes into a wooded area again. It is still on a double track Forest Road so it is still easy hiking. And it is straight as an ERA with not a single curve for at least three or four miles.

Once I know I am halfway to the river and can accurately predict when I will get there, I go ahead and text laughing bear that I should hit the river at 10:30. The only stop I need to make this morning is to make coffee around 9:00. I know there is a campsite I will hit about 9:30 so I will just go ahead and go there to make it.

When I get to the campsite there are two hikers there packing up and getting ready to leave. One of them has very bad shin splints and they are going very slowly for the last week or two, possibly even longer.

We talk about trail conditions while I make my coffee and drink it down. They are basically doing less than 10 miles a day going from campsite to campsite.

Their major concern going this slow is running out of water and possibly food. This stretch of trail has no natural water sources since it is two brackish from the Gulf of Mexico water to be able to drink. They are headed to the visitor center to top up with water before moving to the campsite that I just left this morning.

Let’s Hit the River

I am still a mile and a half from the river so I need to get going quickly. I see that the trail leaving the campsite goes through a creek that looks too wide to jump across so I decide to take the alternate trail that goes towards Port Leon since it is on the roadway.

When I get halfway through the alternate I notice that it says I need to cross a creek. Then I noticed the big lake that feeds that Creek and now have figured out why the official Trail does a weird reroute around this corner.

At this point I think that I may have made a mistake taking the alternate trail. I may have traded a small puddle for a giant river. It is too late now I am committed to this path.

As I get closer to the crossing, I can see that it is a very large lake and the chasm ahead looks like a major river. This could get ugly.

But when I actually get there I am relieved to see that it is low tide and the entire riverbed shows exposed rock that I can easily hop across. As long as none of them move or wiggle too bad it should be a super easy crossing. The only hard part is the bank on each side is very very steep.

but I am easily able to manage getting down across and back up without getting wet or muddy. If it had been high tide the creek would have been 4 ft deep. I dodged a bullet with this one.

The other bullet that I dodged is that if I had planned on swimming across the river at low tide the river flow would be at its fastest. So what is good for crossing this Little River would have been really bad for crossing the big one. God is on my side with this one.

I can tell I’m getting close to the river when I start to hear boat traffic. I pop out at the river at 11:24 with 6 minutes to spare and laughing bear is already standing on the shore with his paddle board and kayak. Today is going perfectly.

I get my shoes off and tie them to my pack. I then take out all my electronics and put them in a ziplock and bury them deep in the pack. But I take the waterproof camera and rig it to the pack so that it can record the entire crossing.

The width of the river looks much narrower than I remembered it from being here last year. I do feel confident that even if I did try to swim the river as initially planned it would still be an easy swim even with a low tide current.

But I am relieved to have a paddle board instead. I get the pack loaded up and strapped down and then hop on the board itself.

I have never done stand-up paddle board but it looks pretty easy. It is a pretty stable and wide platform.

I push off the shore and start paddling across the river and the only difficulty I have is keeping it straight. The wind is quite strong so I can’t paddle straight across I need to go at an angle. I’m keeping the angle consistent is harder than it looks.

Instead of trying to do a j stroke like I would in a canoe I just keep alternating the paddle on each side as needed to go in a zig-zaggy course in the direction I need to head to.

The crossing takes less than 2 minutes, and I had a total blast doing it. I help Laughing Bear load the boats into his van and within minutes he is headed back home to South Carolina.

I am now in the bustling metropolis of downtown St Marks, Florida. It will take at least 3 minutes to hike all the way across the entire downtown section. In other words, it is very small.

In Town at Last

I head up to the main intersection of town and see that Jack and Mickey are there talking to Wingman. Wingman is a trail angel that lives near St Mark’s who I had met yesterday morning while walking to JR’s convenience store.

It is only 11:00 and we are not likely to be able to check in to the bed and breakfast until 2:00 p.m. or possibly later. I am unsure if the laundromat is open or closed. Nothing in the hiking app says it’s closed but it is no longer on Google maps.

wingman drives me down to the laundromat so we can check to see if it is still open. When we get there we can see that it is closed. They have signs on the window saying they are closed because of excessive vandalism. So no laundry today.

on the way back he stops by the post office so that I can pick up my box. The Post Office closes at 1:00 p.m. and it is already noon. I can see my box on a stack of three right by the counter so it is an easy pickup. In fact all of the PO pickups on this trip have been very easy.

The postmaster wants to chat and I can tell we could probably talk for hours but I have wingman waiting in his truck outside.

Jack and Mickey head out with wingman to go by their resupply for the next section. I have enough between what I still have and what’s in the box to last me to the next convenience store. So I head down to the water to go have lunch at the restaurant.

A blackened grouper sandwich and coleslaw is what I order. And they have Apalachicola brewery beers so I have one of those too. It is very peaceful sitting at the dock watching the birds and the boats go by.

After I finish my sandwich, I’m actually still hungry so I decided to order some chicken wings as well. The other crew comes in about the time I’m ordering my chicken wings so I go over to sit with them when I am finished.

It is a nice sunny day but with the breeze it’s a little chilly. I had to put my long sleeve shirt back on.

We go back out to the grassy area to kill more time until our rooms are ready. It doesn’t take long before we both get texts that our rooms are ready. A shower at last.

Bed and Breakfast

We get there and check in and get our keys and the owner informs this that he has to fix a plumbing problem in one of the rooms so the water will be off for the next hour. Okay, so the shower will have to wait. Bummer.

The B&B is really nice. The rooms are nice and they have a huge common area that has every snack you could think of and so many drinks that I’ve never even seen some of them before. You could practically eat a whole meal here. So I find it odd that this B&B doesn’t actually serve breakfast. They have a mountain of snacks instead.

They also have a massage chair. I normally don’t like massage chairs because they are usually just a mediocre vibrating machine. But I go ahead and check this one out anyway. And oh my God is it amazing. It is such a good massage chair that it actually causes significant pain. I need to find out who makes this chair.

At 4pm the water is finally on. Hallelujah. Shower time. Have I mentioned before how amazing showers are?

The rest of the afternoon is chores until 6:30 when it’s time to head back to the restaurant for dinner. Jack and Mickey join me and we have a nice evening talking about hiking.

They were hiking southbound on the AT in 2020 when I was hiking northbound. Mickey looks so familiar to me that I am certain we actually met on that trail two plus years ago. We are not really sure if it actually happened, but something in the back of my mind is absolutely positive.

We are all three planning on going to the coffee shop up the road that opens at 9am. That is likely the last time I will see them since they hike so much faster than me.

Emotion of the Day

I think it is excitement for today.

Even before getting out of the tent, I was excited to see an awesome sunrise. I knew the first half of the morning was going to be out in the open estuaries and I was excited about that too.

And not just crossing the St Mark’s River, but being able to paddle across it I have been looking forward to all morning long.

Checking in to the B&B and being able to take a shower had me excited all day long. It was a bummer to have to wait 3 hours to check in and another 2 hours to shower, but it got done.

Yes, today was an exciting day.