The Lakes Day (ECT Day 37)

• Hiked Today: 31.3 miles
  • The Florida Trail (508.5 – 539.8)
• Total Hiked: 758.1 miles
• Total Paddled: 99.5 miles

Weather: 55-80°F, sunny and clear, few clouds in the afternoon, no wind.

Iron Bridge Shelter to Cow Creek Camp

Sleeping in the shelter was nice. I’ll admit though that not being in my cozy tent, as well as some animals scurrying around made it so I didn’t sleep as well. Even with that, I still appreciated the experience. It was also much quicker packing up not having to take my tent down and having everything laid out ready to rock and roll.

6:15 am was my early start time, which gave me my longest morning pre-dawn walk yet. Thankfully, the trail was nice and wide, not overgrown at all, and with only minor spider webs.

There were a bunch of sandhill cranes in the area. I only saw two, but heard what sounded like a whole herd hiding just behind the trees. Sound up for this video, not sure how well it will project…

I saw a few different groups of deer this morning too. And, there was another smoldering burn area to walk through. Thankfully it was short because the smoke wasn’t awesome.

After a few hours I got along side a road and that trend continued for a while.

My home town folks will get a kick out of this set up. I had a scooter for a short bit, Remus the Honda Ruckus, and often talk of my plans to some day scooter pack across the continent! Maybe it was destiny that led me right here to this wild hog?

Late morning, I entered into Smith Lake Preserve and started my tour of lakes. There were a lot of them today!

This was a neat spot with a recreation center/bathrooms/place i could fill up a water bottle.

There were some beautiful creeks in this section.

After lunch, I crossed a highway and entered Camp Blanding, which is a military space I believe. I think the sign said they have the Florida National Guard training here. Twice I heard a helicopter hovering close by, but it must have been on a stealth reconnaissance mission because I never saw it.

I liked this section of lakes, it had a different feel than any other section thus far. Not really knowing it until walking through today, I think I was feeling a slight bit of monotony in the forest lands. So this was a nice change up. I met a few day hikers in these parts since it is really nice and quite accessible, but no other thru-hikers walking.

The last few miles of the day were roadside, which was disappointing. I had thought it was trail wrapping around the lakes and the roads didn’t give many glimpses of the waterfront. Mostly private property surrounded them all. I also took a wrong turn for nearly half a mile, so that didn’t give me fond feelings either.

Even so, the heat of the day was calming down at this point and I knew by this time I was in good shape with my big day. Things also lined up today to attend Trail Fest! But I’ll fill y’all in on that in the next posts.

There was a gas station 1 mile prior to camp… Treat yo self (to a Coke)!

Album of the Day: “Only God Was Above Us” by Vampire Weekend

Podcast Episode of the Day: “Ke Huy Quan is Still Proving He’s Good Enough” – Wild Card with Rachel Martin