Day Three continued, 3 miles (Dean Campsite)
At the end of the beach, clouds move in and things feel less idyllic than before. Jim meets me and drives me across the causeway to a restaurant favored by locals, Dave’s Oyster Bar and again, it’s seafood with a Southern twist.
He drives me the five miles of road to a trailhead on a rutted dirt road at the end of a subdivision. This will become a pattern. Later I meet thru-hikers that say the road is awful and they were almost hit by distracted drivers multiple times. I just can’t abide the harsh conditions on my feet waling pavement and have no pride left to count miles this way.
The forest walk is lovely even if I can still hear the highway din. Palmettos spread their fans, short with their entire trunk underground. Humpy dusty-green deer moss litters the trail and pines give this late afternoon an earthy scent.
It’s dark by 6:15 so happy to make it to sweet Dean Campsite. There’s water up ahead, but I don’t need any and set my wee tent as the air starts to cool and a few raindrops fall. I have a good book and nestle in to some very loud crickets. Not a soul visits me overnight.
The flutey musical box of a Tufted Titmouse awakens me and a fresh piney scent fills my nostrils. I wonder if this guy will head to Minnesota later this spring? Sandy-bottomed Dean Creek is sparkling as I cross on a cleverly built pedestrian bridge. I don’t collect water thinking I’ll be meeting a gas station soon.
Day Four, 15 miles (Guest Lake Campsite)
My plan the following morning is to meet Florida Highway 87 and hitch a ride to the next section past East Milton and you know what they say about the best laid plans.
When I arrive after about an hour walking through forest, it’s drizzling. Cars and trucks whizz by clocking close to 80 mph. I stick out my thumb at a spot with plenty of room to pull over, but no one does. This is Florida and we’re living in tense times. I can’t imagine what people must think of me standing there with a backpack.
So I cross the road and begin pushing through more forest toward the next road, hopefully meeting some trail angel along the way who will keep me from having to actually walk on the highway.
The drizzle stops and it’s just gray. That’s a good thing to keep the sun from melting me away. Right at the cross I see two enormous feral hogs, dead and bloated. And I came here to walk this?
Cheer up, Blissful, this is an adventure! True, although I am delighted to see a group of trail runners parking their cars. I ask one if there is any chance of taking me up the road. And what luck, Carrie obliges. She has just returned from running on the hilly Pinhote Trail in Alabama and not in any great rush to get started.
As we drive up the highway, cars tailgate centimeters behind, kissing her bumper. No place for a hiker! She tells me that her runner husband had an accident and is living with a severe brain injury. That’s really why she’s in no rush to get started as he will move very slow.
I’m so sorry for this tough break, but she replies, “You roll with it. That’s what you do.” What a brave soul. Carrie takes me all the way in past subdivisions and again to a bumpy dirt road that marks the trail. I am so grateful to concentrate my time back in the woods and also to have met this amazing woman.
Am I glad she took me here. Such beauty and quiet in this forest. Also, believe-it-or-not, there are hills. Mostly they’re ravines, deeply cut by streams. The air is humid but I’m shaded and followed by a loud Pileated Woodpecker laughing somewhere high above.
Along with birds, a gentle breeze setting the pines to whisper and burbling creeks, I hear bombs and artillery ahead. I’ll walk through Eglin Air Force Base soon enough though I wonder if timing it to the weekend is to my advantage as far as closures.
I find a nice shady spot to sit and collect water for filtering. Just then, a hiker passes. He’s called “The Good Doctor” and tells me he only has a small section to walk and he will have completed all of the Eastern Continental Trail. That’s the Appalachian Trail plus Florida and Pinhote plus a Northern Extension.
I congratulate him while fairly certain I have no interest in hiking all of this. A few sections at a time works just fine for me. I lumber on, revived from drinking electrolyte-infused water past a tiny cypress swamp, the trees still free of leaves mirrored on the surface. Soon after is a clear cut and a sign pointing north to Alabama, 46 miles away. This must be how The Good Doctor connects the dots.
After a clear cut is a plantation, Long Leaf Pines like so many Sideshow Bob hairstyles. I feel lucky to see them up close and personal in their youth. The needles twice the size of my outstretched hands, but completely hidden once the tree gains height.
The sand-bottomed streams through this section are clear and fresh, and after filtering, the water tastes amazing. Splayed limbs are covered with flowers on this early spring day: Yellow Jessamine, Buckwheat Tree and Chickasaw Plum.
I cross one creek after another, mostly on boards with a handy wire at chest height to stabilize. I’m sure it would be just fine to slosh through, but this way I don’t cloud things up. It makes for very easy walking, and remember, Florida is mostly flat and easy walking.
The campsite is nothing more than a wide spot near a road. Somehow I’ve entered Guest Lake Park on the Yellow River. I hear plenty of cars and activities, but no one seems interested in this spot without water or benches or a privy.
Like last night, I set up on a flat spot just as the sun begins to set. A hiker calling himself “Shoelace” walks through and I’m fairly certain he did what I plan to do tomorrow and got a hitch on busy State Highway 90 to Crestview.
He pushes on for a spot near water but tells me another hiker is on his way behind him. I crawl in as it goes dark and a Brown Thrasher sings his complex R2D2 song just above my head. He gives way to Barred Owls caterwauling to each other through the forest. I love these guys. They always look a bit concerned yet are hardly shy when it comes to hooting their distinctive Who-cooks-for-y’all??
I have a little giggle all alone then hear feet pushing through dead leaves. A raccoon? A bear? A madman?!?
I unzip the bug net and shine my light on the intruder hoping to claim the upper hand. It’s an armadillo. Another whimsical creature with a pointy snout and jaunty upturned ears poking out of a leathery-armored torso, all atop razor-sharp claws.
I’m sure he just wants to see what I might have dropped as I ate and once fully snuffled, clears the area just as I begin to doze. Though not for long, as the promised hiker arrives. He is very quiet except for a lot of heavy sighs and grunts as he puts up his tent — and shines his light right on my tent. Dude, no. Red light!
To be fair, he’s out fast, and so am I sleeping deeply until I creep out in the early hours before he stirs.
Day Five, 6 miles (Niceville)
At this point, I’ve walked less than 20 miles in the forest. I come quickly to a road where kids wait for the school bus and pose for photos. Roosters crow the sunrise and I march along towards the highway. A man and his son pick me up and leave me at beautiful Holt Park where I find a picnic table to make coffee.
It’s 27 miles of road walking to Eglin Air Force Base, although I’ll meet friends-of-friends in Crestview who’ll take me to their home on the bayou and let me get cleaned up. As I read this, I feel I’m hardly doing the Florida Trail justice. But speaking forthrightly and honestly, there is so much road walking in between the beautiful parts.
Walk it if you want, but we’re not talking the kind of forest roads or bike paths I encountered in the south. These are big and scary highways that should likely never see anyone on their shoulders let alone a hiker. It’s disappointing but that feeling is mitigated by the wonder of the wild parts.
So perhaps the way to view this trail is as a string of loveliness connected by civilization in all its awfulness. When I planned to walk to the end of the East Panhandle section south of Tallahassee (two different downloadable maps in Far Out) I noticed that would be over 300 miles and I wasn’t entirely sure I’d have the stamina to walk that far.
In reality, I walk only 175 miles and finish early enough to hang out with a High School friend living in Florida. It turns out to be plenty and just might make me want more next year! There’s a reason I didn’t thru-hike Florida. It’s so muddy, buggy, relentless, samey that I’d likely get fed up. This was of doing sections allows me to savor the good stuff.
It’s not long before a young woman stops along the highway and scoops me up to get me to the other side of Crestview. Christina is from South Florida and a recent transplant. She and her husband live in a trailer on state park land, so she gets the whole backpacking thing. She’s also on her way to meet clients as an insurance broker and has to go this way anyway.
But I am ever so grateful as I make the transition from sleeping on the ground and making coffee over a tiny stove to hitting a WalMart for resupply and replacing a wonky phone charging cord. Wanda and Mike meet me at a McDonald’s and whisk me back to Niceville. Like Carrie, life has hit them hard as well with Mike managing brain cancer. Still, they are generous, fun and full of life. It’s humbling.
Day Six, 15 miles (Speck Pond)
I am so refreshed getting to know them and seeing another part of Florida on the bayou looking out towards gulf islands and Destin. We eat oysters and fish tacos, sample from Mike’s extensive bourbon collection and look at his many awards as a teacher, including Florida Secondary Music Educator of the Year. I am among the greats!
In the morning, they drop me off at the Pearl Trailhead where I’ll enter the base. It’s meant to be a gorgeous day although tomorrow we’ll be in for severe thunderstorms. And just like that, Jim comes out of the woodwork and offers to meet me about halfway through with food and an escape should I need it.
But I love this day. It’s Sunday and the base is quiet. Wanda worked here and assures me no one will be working on the Sabbath, so I just walk on carpets of pine needles, over crystal clear creeks and under a bluebird sky. A White Eyed Vireo sings his uptalk-like song and Cloudless Sulphur Butterflies flutter in a dance of their own devising. It’s hard to believe a storm is coming.
A sign warns that snakes share this region and I pay attention to my footing, almost stepping on a Pine Snake, camouflaged in the middle of the trail. I take a break halfway through for water, relaxing in the shade against a signpost. Just as I put away my filter, I look up and 25 yards away, a giant black bear decides to cross the path I was just walking. Not enough time for a picture, but enough for me to take him in.
Jim meets me with loads of food. We make a quick run to the beach for one last look, but it’s socked-in fog. Still I wade into the waves before we head back to Speck Pond where he can sleep in his van and me in my tent.
The moon was lovely and the frogs like noisy rolling stones. But in the morning, Jim yells out at me that the rain is coming in 15 minutes. I quickly take everything down and throw in his van before the heavens open up ad unleash their fury.
So much for walking in the rain. I’ll miss this spot because right now, it’s flooding out. Jim drops me in DeFuniak Springs on his way to Myrtle Beach, and I spend the remainder of the day in a motel. I must have had one bad oyster because I feel a bit of fever coming on, but tomorrow’s a new day — and it’s supposed to be cooler too.