Florida Trail: Day 17
January 23, 2022
Mile: 9.5 to 26.3 (16.8 miles)
Start: Pine savannah tenting at 10 Mile Camp, Big Cypress Swamp National Preserve
Finish: Thank God Island, Big Cypress Swamp
I woke up in the morning at 5:30am and couldn’t go back to sleep because I was so excited for the big slog starting today. The toughest and wildest part of the whole Florida Trail was coming up and today was the day where we traversed a major swamp crossing where you had to island hop for miles and miles. Our alarm wasn’t supposed to go off till 6:45am so I read a little bit and journaled, waiting for the sun to rise and the birds to start chirping before waking up Shannon. At 6:45am Shannon was pretty grumpy but he begrudgingly woke up and we slowly made a breakfast of a couple cups of tea and coffee. We were just a little bit nervous before committing ourselves to not having dry feet for a couple of days and were savoring each moment of dry clothes while we were able to.
As we were getting ready for the morning a couple named Ducky and I forget the guy’s name came by. They had met thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail last year and had gone out for a long weekend to hike 50 miles of the Florida trail through the Big Cypress Swamp. They were really cool and had camped with Pine Stick and Father Will just before the actual 10 Mile Campsite that we were staying at. They were kind of winging it and just enjoying being out there and didn’t realize that the campsite they were at was not actually the 10 Mile Campsite where we were staying which had a picnic table, fire ring and flattened down grass. The rest of them tented in an overgrown area .2 miles south of the actual campground because none of them checked the navigation. Oh well!
Father Will and Pine Stick came by and it was really funny because together they have sooo much energy and it tends to be them talking over each other. The whole day we knew when we were near them because you could hear them from a mile away talking. I don’t think they paused for breath once the entire time we saw them. It was funny and we were happy that they were so excited!
The trail started off with some fast flat pine forest mixed with spiky green palmettos and interspersed with ankle breaking marl holes in the limestone. Marl is very sketchy terrain to walk on as not only do the slick surfaces of the clay and limestone rocks cause your feet to slide out from under you. Where the true danger lies is underneath the pine duff and grasses covering the marl where over time water has bored through the rock creating deep holes perfect for your foot to catch and fall into. It’s pretty scary stuff and comes out of nowhere causing us to have to pump the brakes from our typical 3-3.5 mph hiking pace to 1 mph or less as we carefully picked our way across the slippery gray stone. One badly placed step in the marl could easily require a backcountry evacuation or rescue if you broke your leg out here. We did not want to do that so we were very careful and took our time trekking through these sections.
The morning was cool and overcast and surprisingly last night had even gotten kind of chilly for south Florida which was surprising after coming from the tropical feeling of the Keys. It was maybe in the 50s this morning and we were enjoying the perfect hiking weather of the thick silver clouds, the cool temperatures and the fast, flat trail. We knew it wasn’t going to last though.
Yesterday we had a couple sections of trail where we were wading through water but it was nothing too crazy. The look of disgust on Shannon‘s face as he got his feet wet and dirty was priceless and I try not to laugh. One of the reasons his Trail Name was changed from “North Star” to “Princess North Star” is because, amongst other things, he really hates getting his feet wet or dirty. Hiking and trail running are probably not the best hobbies for this dislike but somehow he powers through it. Oh, the travesty! 😉
Shannon was in for it today in Big Cypress Swamp and he was pretty grumpy knowing that he was going to be trudging through the swamp for a couple of days getting his feet wet and muddy the entire time. Hopefully the section of trail would be pretty enough in its own way to change Shannon’s mind about having to get his feet dirty. It is funny for someone who is a trail runner and also loves long distance hiking how he absolutely hates getting his feet dirty. Shannon is a bit of a hiking princess and would be the first one to admit it but it makes our outdoor adventures quite entertaining.
The morning was cool and uneventful as we slogged through several mud pits and calf-deep water. Underneath the slash pines we spotted several delicate fuschia orchids bouncing merrily on their long elegant stems in the soft breeze with their glorious tiny little flowers bursting with sparks of color in the drab winter of the prairie. Of the 30,000 known orchid species, the swamplands of Florida hid myriads of rare orchid species that unfortunately enterprising poachers spend their lives in search of to sell on the black market.
One of the rarest plants in the world is found in Big Cypress Preserve: the endangered and magnificently beautiful Ghost Orchid. We learned how there were several hundred Ghost Orchids left in the Big Cypress Preserve which is such an extremely rare plant that it can command prices on the black market of upwards of $150,000 per plant. I had read a book a few years ago about the illicit orchid trade called The Orchid Thief which was an absolutely wild literary adventure documenting how poachers and legitimate orchid sellers alike obtain their rare plants, selling them to absurdly rich orchid collectors like they are rare gemstones or priceless paintings belonging to the great masters. Some of these poachers will hike deep into the preserves or protected areas in search of rare orchids like the Ghost Orchid to illegally harvest them. Finding a Ghost Orchid is sort of like finding a Rembrandt or Picasso painting in the middle of a garage sale or thrift store and all of a sudden discovering this weird artwork is actually worth a fair chunk of change. Except the garage sale is actually a massive swamp and that Picasso painting is a weird looking flower growing 20 feet up a tree. Sometimes the harvesters will sell the federally-protected flowers on the black market for orchids (which is crazy to even think that something like that exists) or pretend that the orchids were obtained legally and sell them at nurseries or flower auctions. The story of the collectors who are obsessed with orchids discussed in The Orchid Thief was definitely crazy to read about.
For lunch we stopped at the so-called 13 Mile Camp which was actually 17 miles into the Florida Trail where for a brief few moments we enjoyed some peace and quiet before our garrulous fellow hikers came tumbling down the trail. Like us, they seemed to like to wing it but unlike us they didn’t really think ahead on the next few miles. One of the hikers was more concerned with the convenience store that was 35 miles ahead instead of trying to find one of the precious few islands to camp out on that was safely out of the knee-deep waters of the alligator- and snake-filled swamp tonight. We were somewhat concerned when neither of the hikers knew there was at least a 9-mile-long section of swamp coming up where we wouldn’t have dry feet and would be trudging through water for hours between tiny dry islands. Neither of them knew what poison ivy looked like so we showed them before they swung their legs into the rash-inducing plant under the picnic table. It was fun talking to them and to help them out we tried to ask them thought-provoking questions about the trail coming up like, “Which island are you going to try to get to before sunset? We heard you needed at least 2 hours of daylight to make it to such-and-such island…” and “Are you excited for 2 days of knee-deep water?”
We were hoping this kind of conversation would help the gentlemen think about planning a little bit better these next few days where they were going to camp tonight since some of these islands were so far apart long slugs in the swamp that you really had to have a couple of hours before sunset in order to make it to the next island. We hoped that the two guys would help each other out through the upcoming swamp and that we wouldn’t hear about them on the news.
Shannon and I took off through the woods, grateful that the temperatures were still brisk because we would hopefully have less interactions with snakes since they’re cold blooded reptiles and are very sluggish during the cool temperatures. The hikers we ran into gushed on about seeing a baby rattlesnake curled up on the side of the trail which isn’t cute – it’s actually kind of scary. The baby snakes have no control over how much venom they inject in you and oftentimes a venomous baby snake will inject many times more venom into a victim versus an adult snake with experience. I just shook my head and said a silent prayer hoping that these two hikers would not only survive the swamp but also stay far away from “cute” baby venomous snakes.
As we continued on through the lush jungle, the trail became very difficult to follow but luckily someone had been out maintaining the bright orange blazing on the trees when we most needed it. You had to constantly look up at the blazes in order to not get absurdly lost in the million acre swamp that appeared to look exactly the same everywhere. You also had to keep looking down at your feet so you wouldn’t break your ankle in a marl hole, step on a snake or eat sh*t in the mud.
I spotted a small vibrant green tree frog hopping across the trail that was pretty cute and I was pretty sure it was not venomous or poisonous. We walked past an old alligator hole where a couple years ago supposedly housed an angry mama gator and her babies. Luckily this year the gator hole had become overgrown and we were fairly certain it was empty but we didn’t get too close (even though it was only a few feet from the Florida Trail). We didn’t realize until we went to the Everglades Visitor’s Center that alligators will actually go into the swamp and dig out a deep hole for the water to fill into so they have a place to swim and collect fish and raise babies. Gator holes are very deep and we are hoping we don’t run into any on the trail that we have to swim through. It would be not fun to go from ankle deep pools into waist or chest deep water and it would especially not be fun if the gator hole had an occupant in it of the reptile variety.
After lunch we were running low on water and our options were limited and needed to filter water from an old jeep road puddle. Unfortunately the clear water was all churned up with thick mud and brown sludge because of a swamp buggy (aka monster truck on steroids) that had just come through. Our water filter has been not working very well and we think it’s a flaw with one of the connectors in the filter flow so it’s been taking hours for a single liter of water to filter through compared to the advertised 1.75L/minute advertised flow. Luckily we had the foresight to bring backup water treatment of chlorine dioxide Aquamira drops which kills all of the microscopic bugs and bacteria that make you sick. However we found out last night that after scooping water from a dwindling pool that Aquamira does not actually kill sea monkeys (a.k.a. mosquito larvae) and even after double treating our water with Aquamira we realized that these mosquito larvae were either going to go down or hatch or we were going to have to do a rough filter first through our Buff neck gaiters to get rid of the mosquito larvae first.
Right after we filtered water, we hit the beginnings of the 9 mile slog through the swamp where our feet became so muddy with sand and dirt that you just had to accept it because that’s how it was going to be unless you wanted to turn around and hike 20 something miles back to the Big Cypress Visitor’s Center. Shannon had been grumpy all morning getting his feet wet but he started to loosen up in the afternoon as the clear water warmed up and the temperatures were nice for hiking. As we turned a corner we ran into another hiker who surprised us not only because we didn’t expect to see anyone else in the middle of the swamp but because this southbound hiker had a skateboard strapped to the back of his hiking pack. Our new friend said he skateboarded most of the road walks and bike paths (of which there are many, many miles of on this trail). It was so strange seeing a random bearded guy in the middle of the swamp with a skateboard and all three of us celebrated the randomness of the Florida Trail! He said he was just finishing his Florida trail thru-hike and had skateboarded most of the road walk sections which I thought was brilliant. It’s foot powered and it gets you there faster so why the heck not?
As we shuffled our feet through the lightly tea-stained water of the cypress strands, tiny minnows and water bugs darted around the silvery buttress roots. Strings of leafy water plants stirred as our feet pushed the flow of water forward and the still surface reflected the shimmering clouds up above. Luckily it was cool enough where we didn’t encounter any snakes today as far as I could tell. Water moccasins were my main concern but it was so chilly that the only animal we saw out and about was a singular squirrel. Everything else seemed to be hibernating or in a torpor waiting for warmer weather. As far as we could tell there were no alligators to be seen swimming amongst the knee deep water that we were wading in. However that didn’t mean that the ancient reptiles weren’t there watching us.
The muted gray sky transformed from moody and overcast to a brilliant turquoise blue with a few heavy clouds but the sun was able to peek through. It warmed up the water a little bit and we made it to the first island called Oak Hill 2 miles later without too much incident. Yes our feet were wet but we were still in one piece and hadn’t seen any snakes or gators. We knew that the older guys who liked to talk were probably going to camp at Oak Hill Island for the night but we didn’t feel like doing much talking. Logistically we were hoping to make it to the next island sanctuary. The following 4 mile section of swamp between Oak Hill and the next island would take at least 2 hours to slog through and we needed to make sure we had enough daylight to finish or risk getting lost amongst the cypress trees. Sunset was around 6pm and it stayed light for another 20 to 25 minutes after sunset. It was 4:15pm when we hit Oak Hill and we agreed to just go for it to make it to the next island. It would be a close call but if we could maintain our slogging pace at 1.5 mph then we could make it as the light was fading to the aptly named Thank God Island.
It was an awesome yet harrowing experience traversing through the cypress strands. Sometimes the footing was good but more often than not it was full of mud and holes where you had to be extremely careful or your foot would slip right out from under you and you would find yourself sitting in water and mud. Just north of Oak Hill Island was supposedly the deepest part of the swamp trail which turned out to actually be the most beautiful part: the Black Lagoon. It was tricky to navigate but as long as you kept the deep black water over by the alligator flag plant to your east you wouldn’t sink too much over your knees in water. Plus we didn’t want to linger near the deep water because who knows what else was lingering in the depths.
Bromeliads with rainbow pastel leaves decorated the cypress trees, the air plants growing extremely well in their misty swamp environment. My favorite part of walking through the swamp was being amongst the large cypress trees and their wide buttress roots that erupted out of the water carrying dozens of little air plants on each trunk, making it seem as though the trees were rafts providing the colorful sprays of flowers refuge from the blackwater. As the massive trees sucked up water from their flanged roots, they created little environments for tiny fish, critters and water bugs to live in. Strangely we hadn’t seen very many herons or water birds and I suspect it’s because the water is so shallow out here that there’s not enough fish and frogs to sustain a substantial avian population. We’re hoping that the shallow water also means there’s less alligators and luckily we didn’t see any the whole day.
The 2 hours between Oak Hill and Thank God Islands were a mad but focused effort to beat the sunset. We crossed over deep water along the swamp buggy roads and at one point a bunch of clothes that resembled a dead body but we didn’t stick around. The southbound hiker with the skateboard who we had run into earlier in the day said that the only other person he ran into in the swamp was a dead body and I think this pile of clothing is what he was referring to. Maybe this is where Carol Baskin’s ex-husband is buried – who the heck knows.
Shannon‘s mood improved as the day went on and I think at some points I even caught him smiling as he splashed through the water ahead of me. We were starting to get the technique down of walking through the swamp so that you could move quickly and didn’t fall. The main trail was often deep and riddled with solution holes which appear to be soft mud and silty sand until you accidentally slide into the deep abyss and find out it’s actually a leg breaking pit in the marl. Other hikers had blazed rabbit trails to the side of the main route which tended to be less muddy and had much better footing. We tried to stay as much as we could on the rabbit trails which paralleled the Florida Trail but occasionally they strayed far off the orange blazes and we’d bushwhack our way through the sawgrass back.
The Florida Trail had very good blazing so if you kept your head up you could fairly easily follow the blazes from these rabbit trails where hikers had gotten sick of the mud and bushwhacked through the reeds and marsh to get to dryer land. Yet it did get a little exhausting to walk 20 feet, search for the orange blaze, slosh 20 more feet and pick out the next trail marker, always making sure you knew where the next one was because everything looked exactly the same and it would be so easy to get lost out here. The swamp is a million acres and it would take a massive manhunt to find someone who is lost out here. We didn’t want to be those people being manhunted and so we kept our heads up and focused on following the orange blazes.
We had figured out that to get through this terrain as fast as we could, you had to walk kind of like you were skating on ice or cross country skiing. First you would slide your foot forward pointing it and feeling the terrain ahead of you with your hiking poles you’d determine if there was a deep hole or objects in the way that could trip you up. Then you’d set your foot down gently and slide your next foot forward. Pointing your foot also helped to cut through the water’s drag and not get stuck in the mud like you would if you flat-footed it. Still, no matter how fast we hiked we still couldn’t break the 1.5 mph barrier amongst the deep water.
It was definitely a workout trudging through miles and miles of ankle to thigh deep water. We had chugged down Shannon’s caffeine drink that he had made on Oak Hill Island which helped us skate through the miles without feeling too tired. However, as the sun started to get low in the sky I started to get a little nervous about how many swamp miles we had left and how much daylight we had. We kept checking in at certain mile markers to calculate our pace which seemed to keep us on par for our 1.5 mph goal which was pretty excellent for the section of sloshing through water and mud. I think the sun had baked my brains a bit and I told Shannon I had a revelation that, “This was not the glute and quad workout that we wanted but it was the one that we needed!” He just looked at me like I was crazy. Maybe I was but if you thought of spending hours with soaking wet feet, getting stuck in mud pits and falling on your butt several times as a glute workout then it helped you get through the hell that was our hike today.
As the sun set below the cypress domes, we still had half a mile to go and we would be cutting it close if we got there before it got all the way dark. The sunset colors were pretty peaches and ambers reflected on the smooth surface of the blackwater. It was difficult to ignore my desire to take photos but also in the back of my mind listening to the words of our Miccosukee airboat guide that come nightfall out in the swamp you want to be sleeping somewhere above the ground or in a tent because that’s when the snakes and other nocturnal predators come out.
A few days ago we hiked past a large snakeskin shed of one of the Burmese pythons that have invaded Florida, growing 18 feet or more and such problematic animals that the Florida government has put out bounties in the hundreds of dollars for each killed snake. I did not want to be out here sloshing through the water at night when the Burmese pythons do their hunting. I also really did not want to be approached by something moving in the still, dark water with no escape and realizing that it’s not an alligator coming towards you but a freaking python that’s trying to suffocate you, kill you and eat you. I guess I shouldn’t have watched that movie Anaconda with Danny Trejo and J.Lo recently as my imagination and anxiety was getting away from me as the darkness settled in.
Shannon and I sloshed through the final stretches of cypress trees, the darkness closing in on our heels and making it difficult to see the orange blazes in the deepening evening. Finally, we made it to our island sanctuary where we both said, “Thank God!” as we reached the aptly named Thank God Island which was a miserable little piece of land that was at least somewhat dry after spending the past 6 hours with soaking wet feet. There were two campsites and nobody else was there which was great. What was not so great was that the past occupants who had recently visited the island decided to poop everywhere and left the poopy toilet paper and wipes just lying on the ground next to the campsites so that was super cool. We were so dirty and disgusting having walked through the swamp all afternoon and now dealing with this literal shit escalated all of our rage at these stupid people. With the tips of our hiking poles, we started throwing the poop wipes further into the woods and cursing the dumb motherf*ckers who did this, hoping that one day that they would crap their pants in public or step on someone else’s poop while wearing flip-flops. Thank God Island was turning out to be quite disgusting and my feelings of murdering someone weren’t being quelled anytime soon.
The temperature started to cool down in the “oasis” and our dry little island was getting a little chilly. Carefully we unfurled our socks, scooped out handfuls of mud from our shoes and our socks and set them up to dry as best as they could overnight against a cabbage palm tree. We started filtering water, scooping it from the nearby swamp and when the rate of filtration was so slow that it seemed like it would take several hours because our brand new filter was junk, we said screw it and decided to just let it filter overnight.
We changed out of our soaking wet clothes and into warm dry ones. We shivered as we ate a quick dinner and shimmied into bed as quickly as we could. I had made a concoction of Spanish quinoa that we found in the Sedano‘s grocery store which is like a Cuban Latino grocery store and mixed it with some gluten free tortilla soup. Shannon had half a thing of mac & cheese because he was going to help me chow down on the massive amount of quinoa I just made. We drank electrolyte drink mix and we started to shiver even with our coats on so we cleaned up and jumped into our tent.
Even though the cold weather was making us shiver, it was also welcome because there were absolutely zero mosquitoes which was nice. We did have a raccoon running around our campsite for a little but she left us alone after we shone our lights and yelled at it. The stars started to come out and we could see our breath so we snuggled down deep in our sleeping bags, cinching the bags tightly and curled up for the night dreaming of dry feet hopefully tomorrow.