Florida Trail: Dean Camp to Fort Pickens

Trail Miles:  1068.6 to  1103.7


Dean Camp to Bay Camp:

This is our day in a nutshell:   Woods to red dirt road, to Navarre sidewalk, to the most amazing snow white beach with turquoise water to swim in, and then to the dunes to watch the sunset with Champagne (thanks Mayor!). Awesome! 

But some special details are that we meet up with fellow Florida Trail hiker, Mayor, fishing on his hometown pier and have a warm reunion while some guy hooks the first cobia of the season and we all run and follow him while the fish fights to get away and does indeed eventually break the line.  It is an apparently big moment on this really long pier filled with fisherman and tourists, as everyone rushes over to watch.  It is a bit anticlimactic when he doesn't land it though and I wonder if our hike's ending will be as well. Anticlimactic.   We have hiked all this way and it could end without us landing a feeling of extreme satisfaction.  It might end without any pop at all.  Will the hike still seem worthy?

Later in the day, after a lot of hiking along an incredible white sand beach, Mayor finds all of us on our hike  and tells us he hid some water and a bottle of Champagne behind some dunes for us to have tonight.   Look.  Mark has his Champagne goggles on.

We sit around camp tonight and toast our almost finish of the Florida Trail while watching the sun set. It is a sweet moment right on the the quiet bay.  The setting sun turns the sky into a lovely melted pastel crayons color.  (Bay camp is in a nice and critical location, but it isn't much of a camp really.  No picnic tables, and by this time you must know we love picnic tables.)

It is our last camp.  It feels like yesterday and forever since we took our first step on this trail. It’s yesterday because  in the  big scheme of things these three months will seem like a very short time.  It’s also forever, in that a quarter of the year has gone by since we left California.  

The end is coming and I must rest. 

Bay Camp to Fort Pickens:

We leave camp an hour earlier than normal as rain is in the forecast.  It’s seven. A strong wind is thankfully at our backs and seems to whisper, ‘hurry, hurry’ and so we do.   We find the posts that are planted among the dunes and walk slowly in the sand from pole to pole toward some high rise condos in the distance.  

Yesterday I was manic.  I couldn’t stop talking and whooping and hollering to people along the beach.  “Do you know you are sitting along the Florida National Scenic Trail?  We are finishing our 1100 mile  walk from Big Cypress way down in the Everglades.”   Over and over and over.  It is absolutely ridiculous and I think I did it to try and validate the hike and myself somewhat.  

Today, I don't feel the need to validate.  We are almost done.  The finishing validates the doing.

 I’m very quiet, more contemplative.  Maybe even a bit depressed.  What will I do tomorrow?

Today I also don’t feel the inevitable pain that one feels walking day after day.  This long distance hiking does often hurt.  But today, my mind just shuts down and I just walk.  Step, step, step.  I watch the clouds come in and the sea darken and I feel a bit the same.  

Broody.  

We’ve walked a long way and I’m not really sure why.  We enjoy being grounded in nature and walking everyday also gives some sense of forward motion and purpose.  There are no idle moments.  You are busy walking and eating and drinking and eliminating.   You are a physical machine.  You feel like you are doing something important, or adventurous. It is really amazing and awe inspiring that our ordinary, slightly out of shape bodies could walk so far.  Yet, we also know, deep down, we are just walking. 

We certainly didn’t plan to be thru hiking this trail.  At least not in the beginning.  We came out thinking we might hike half the trail.  Maybe.  I honestly didn’t think my knee would hold up.   If we made it to the Orlando area we said we would deem it a success.  Then the bug hit.  The walking addiction bug;  the 'let's be thru hikers' bug.  Once this long toothed bug sank its teeth in our hearts, it proved impossible to remove.   

What would it feel like to hike thru?  Would it feel different than walking a few hundred miles?  Could we even do it? The only way to find out was to try and so we did.  In the choosing we found the meaning.  As troubles hit,  we just kept choosing to hike. We knew we wouldn’t fail if we didn’t quit. 

We certainly had lots of reasons to quit.  Illness, injury, and infighting (even today!) all got in our way, as well as all the roads and all the dogs who made certain aspects of the trail not very fun.   

I’ve certainly learned a lot about myself.  Some of it good and some of it not so good.  I’m sure Mark has done the same. The trail has a way of not letting you hide from your flaws and it also highlights some of your strengths. Being committed to hiking this whole trail has also turned out to be a bit like being committed in marriage.  It has good times and bad times and you just gotta keep moving forward. If you quit while it’s bad you will miss out on all the good. There has been a lot of good  on this trail and the completion of it adds a big bold exclamation point.  

On my phone I play the music ‘Chariots of Fire’ as we near the Northern Terminus monument in Fort Pickens.  Rain is moderately falling.  A flash of lightening lights the sky.  Our trail friend, Mayor, and his  dog Katana walk up to greet all of us.  My eyes well up.  We are done.  It is finished.  We did it!  Time to take some goofy photos and step off the trail and back into our regular lives. 

But first, Nancy, our trail angel picks us up and takes us to her home, while a hard rain falls outside. We celebrate by   eating lots of food and even a cake that Nancy made and decorated just for us.  What a gal!  

I glance down at the floor and see my bare feet.   I  see strength in the tendons and a breadth and depth to my feet  that wasn’t there before.   This simple, humble part of my anatomy, that mostly lives life hidden from view, has taken the brunt of the pain of this journey and has finished quietly victorious.


Miles hiked this section:  35
Total Miles hiked: 1103.7

Lesson Learned:  Finishing a thru hike is bitter sweet and extremely satisfying. 

A  4 minute slideshow of our hike from Blountstown to Fort Pickens