I dare not get up. The mosquitos swarm in a mat against my bug net.
It’s foggy, damp and loud with birds. Just starting will be a challenge.
But the sun does wonders, seemingly slowing them down. I shake the tent, then exit and I’m right, not one comes for my blood.
It’s a few miles to another trail angel water cache, but I still pack a liter just in case it’s emptied. They want to ensure we don’t have to drink from the canals. The animals seem fine, but there’s a lot of run off from pesticides and fertilizer.
The fog lifts quickly to a clear day, the morning still cool and filled with life. Three vultures hang out on a tall utility pole drying their wings.
Noisy limpkin with oversized beaks wade on the opposite bank as a half dozen cattle egret looking like bowling pins stick up out of the grass.
It’s a loud morning too when I startle a cranky blue heron, his legs dangling down as he moves only a few feet beyond. His pal, a scraggly whistler duck, follows close behind. Killdeer chirrup like a motor on the fritz as they scatter in my path.
And twenty anihingas – totally silent – roost in a cypress tree like Christmas ornaments.
There’s still plenty of water, so I fill up a liter knowing it will be an eleven mile walk to the next cache. I find a beautiful spot under a live oak, its branches spreading widely. I’m near a home here, so try not to draw too much attention to myself.
Still, I do my leg stretches and take the time I need in this air conditioned space. For most of the way, I’ll walk on road below the levee, a road made of crushed limestone and bright white. Needless to say, it will be exhausting.
So I make a plan to break things up halfway and drink my second liter. I can’t totally depend on the water ahead – and the last hiker to make a note in our app said there was only 2 1/2 gallons remaining.
But that cache is on a busy road and I should be able to ask a passing motorist for water – or resort to drinking canal water. I will be fine, I decide.
It is indeed hot on this road. I have a slight breeze, though, and the fat cumulus clouds are building so I should get some relief.
Unlike yesterday, I walk one long, straight, nearly unvarying path for 16 miles. There are very few landmarks ahead, just a far off lump of bushes or tree that I set my sights on and walk to.
Those lumps are always much further than they look.
But since I have to just keep walking anyway, I play a little guessing game of just how far they are.
It keeps me occupied all the way until my halfway point where I plan to find shade and have a water break.
The gate to a lovely home is bordered by two tall palms giving me just the shade I need. But a pair of red shouldered hawks are nesting and sound the alarm.
The male flies up to a power line and calls back to his mate, maybe asking (if I spoke red tailed hawk) if he should pike out my eyes.
Maybe I won’t sit here after all.
I plod on down the long white road. Ahead is gray smoke from a controlled burn that dissipates quickly into just another cumulus cloud.
I do have to say this landscape is unique – uniquely boring. No creatures anymore and just flat forever.
But somehow I use the time to work on my next talk. I practice and try out ideas, and because the walking is so easy, I can take notes as I go.
Boring yes, but a good use of time too.
Soon enough, I reach a left turn that takes me back on top of the levee. The air is sweeter here and my birds are back.
In just a mile, I reach the water cache. One gallon left! And friends, I take nearly all of it.
I cross the very busy road and find the covered picnic tables. The tables themselves are a bit of a broken concrete mess, but at least there’s shade to cook my meal and grass in the sun to dry my soaking wet tent and sleeping bag.
I meet a Canadian snowbird named Danny who has a million and one questions about what I’m doing. It’s fun to talk about this crazy thing I do.
I eat up then lay down for a few minutes on the concrete bench. Since the designated site has no shade, I plan to stay here until 4:00 and walk the last three miles in the relatively cool part of the day, setting my tent in time for the sunset.
Florida cranes graze in the crop rows and a nice breeze follows me on the easy last bit to the site. Two men wave from a fishing boat. They’ll arrive just as I finish setting the alicoop and the setting sun colors the sky.
The sight is a bit lower than the bend in the canal, but there’s a lovely spot big enough for just me here, where I can catch the breeze and listen to the squawk of a crowned night heron.
The sun disappears and gnats give way to mosquitos, though they seem less hungry on my perch. Maybe it’s the breeze? At any rate, just past 7:00 it’s pitch dark and I’m tucked in.
