“I would see humanity survive the tests they put themselves and their world through. It makes for a better tale.” – Old Sean
The Headliner
Florida, to be frank, has a somewhat sullied but consistent reputation. I once read that Florida’s contribution to a new United States civil war would be randomly mailing spam letters and weapons around the nation indiscriminately. I’ve also read the absolute legion of crazy headlines coming out of Florida.
Florida Man Too Fat For Jail
Florida Man Kills Imaginary Friend While On Drugs, Turns Himself In
Florida Man Arrested for Feeding Crocodile Bagels
Florida Man Arrested for Calling 911 After Kitten Denied Entrance at Strip Club
Florida Woman Calls 911 Three Times Regarding Chicken McNugget Shortage
Florida Man Dies After Winning Cockroach Eating Contest
I swear, if there was a Netflix series called “Florida Man,” based on these articles it would be religiously followed by a demented fanbase.
Regardless, I began driving south through Florida, but quickly slipped into a sleepy lull. The drive is painfully flat with almost no elevation.
Trees grow in short, stunted bunches and the ground grows rapidly more treacherous away from the road, where marshes rise rapidly. Fruit stands and trucks selling produce out of their beds are a frequent and bright sight. The nearby lakes that dot the edges of the roads are extremely welcome sights, with unearthly blue water standing as enormous, glassy disks. Great plumes of controlled burns often rise in the distance, clambering high into nonbeing after a few minutes. Typical Confederate flags crack on flagpoles when breezes rush through and the number of pickup trucks on the roads increased dramatically.
Edge of the Everglades
Finally, after a long slog of driving, I arrived in the outskirts of the Everglades, quickly veering into the Robert is Here fruit stand. A typical Florida fruit stand sprawling far beyond all reason, Robert is Here is more of an outdoor all-natural shopping center with a petting zoo included. Rotting machinery loiters in the backyard, a veritable playground for goats, chickens, waterfowl and tiny cows. Indoors, there are fantastic milkshakes and other oddities, such as enormous ostrich eggs and honey spiced with jalapenos, cherries and virtually any other substance that stands a chance of pairing well.
Slightly further down the road is the bustling outdoor eatery on the way to the Everglades, Everglades’ Gator Grill. This small shop offers entire cups of miniture cookies alongside baskets of grilled gator. It tastes a bit like fish, wish stronger texture and a certain springy chewiness.
Hunger and curiosity sated, I forged forward and entered the Everglades themselves.
A Realm of Sawtooth Blades
“The Everglades is a test. If we pass it, we get to keep the planet” – Joe Podger
I really didn’t have a reason for visiting Florida beyond the Everglades. The sprawling biological preserve exists only on human-levee life-support and I would be truly surprised if the land here continues to exist in thirty years.
Technically, the Everglades don’t even exist now. The rise and fall water system that creates naturally occurring biospheres for the preserve’s residents is broken and gone. Only human artificial tidal systems allow the plants and animals to remain.
Much of my travel has been oriented towards seeing the wonders and experiences of the world before my own mortal demise. The Everglades, however, are a wonder I may well outlive. Hence, I added thirteen hours to my drive time in the hopes of traversing the expansive lands.
I was not disappointed. The Everglades are wonderous. The roads are bare ridges with deep marshes toppling off both sides. Great lines of waving and clattering sawtooth grass stretches beyond the horizon. Clouds kept the air heavy as the bulbous forms intermittently brushed out the sun. A deep humidity made the air soupy and soon, my lightest attire was dappled with sweat. Everything smelled slightly boggy, but constant breezes stirred the air enough where it was barely noticeable.
Islands and Everglades
My original goal was to traverse the Everglade canals and 10,000 Islands (which were technically too far from my launching point) with a kayak rental brought to Flamingo Marina. But I managed to make a minor detour to a couple very nice hiking trails.
Now, I should mention that the Everglades‘ peak visiting time is in the winter, in the coolest and driest season. The tail end of April is the final dry periods for the preserve. I was fortunate to not face too much rain during my visit and my mini-hikes were very kind to me.
I first stopped by the dry marshlands to see the cracked ground of silt spanning over miles with only the occasional egret and vulture picking their way around.
One of the unique features of the Everglades is the difference in biospheres created in elevation. A mere three inches can radically change the environment. Three inches below on one side of the road is dry, desert-like marshland with brown clusters of grass.
Another three inches down results in wild wetland, complete with large fish skimming the surface and placid crocodiles drifting along. Six inches higher, and the land turns to enormously tall and skinny trees rustling defiantly in the wind. Another six inches in hardwoods clustered in jungle-like density.
Marsh Trails
My first real hike was along Gumbo Limbo Trail. Before my hike, I was forced to spread blankets over the windshield of my vehicle, as numerous warning signs lament that vultures often vandalize the rubber for unknown reasons. Once I got started though, I enjoyed the miniture trail immensely.
Aside from the legion of informative signs, the trail skitters noisily with the sounds of lizards performing acrobatic escapes from my footsteps, flinging themselves with abandon away into the foliage. Enormous crickets often crouch about, black chitin with toxic yellow strikes streaking their bodies. A North American Racer Snake flung itself into a shallow pool of stagnate water and eyed me reproachfully as I lumbered past. Zebra butterflies loitered in sunbeams which became increasingly scarce as I delved deeper into the woods.
Following Gumbo Limbo Trail, I tried my luck on Anhinga Trail, which is more a boardwalk than anything else. Stretching out over still-deep-watered marshes, the activity here was astounding. Fish splashed noisily, birds ruffled, called and coughed across the entire zone and turtles found miniscule clumps of grass as perfect islands for sunbathing.
Drifting With Style
Finally, I made it to Flamingo at Everglades where I lashed a fair number of goods and some surplus water and launched into the bay, taking special care to bring backup maps and confirm with locals that the wind wouldn’t trap me or wash me out any unfortunate directions.
That being said, my time kayaking the Everglades was surreal. There were very few people and fish often nibbled the bottom of my boat. I sometimes needed to stretch my legs and would walk on the upper roots of mangrove trees to stretch.
Crocodiles drifted both close and far, and it took a considerable amount of effort to navigate them. Occasional rainfalls could be thwarted with a rainfly lashed to my own hat and kayak and the canals were mostly placid.
I wound around sandbars, managing to get stuck twice but otherwise paddled through mangrove coves, ducking branches and getting rocked violently by occasional speedboats flinging past.
I visited Coot Bay where crowds surprisingly thronged on an otherwise empty journey and spent considerable time in Whitewater Bay, poorly navigating the endless, dotted islands there, seeking out water deep enough to paddle.
I slept near a few other tents on a patched island that night, sharing gator-jerky with another Everglades tour.
On Semi-Solid Footing
When my kayaking-camping journey was finally over, I loaded back into the car, dropped off my kayak rental and pushed to the far north for my final morning, the Shark Valley Visitor Area.
I didn’t see anything here that I hadn’t already experienced, though properly stretching my legs was nice.
The real prize was the Loop Scenic Drive. This gravel road filled with redneck lodging areas is a wonderous tour of Cyprus groves, roadside water channels and surprisingly open nesting areas for birds, herons, ducks, egrets and spoonbills. I spotted flocks of egrets hiding in trees, which had an amusing takeoff pattern, using the gravel roads as sort of runways while they fought into the sky, rather than risk the dense swamp foliage.
The endless gator population traversed the canals in droves and enormous spiderwebs caught entire blocks of sunlight as I drove past.
I stopped for a short hike along Big Cyprus National Preserve, where I carefully sought out tree snails, which sparkle like jeweled-fruit if you shine a light on their shells. Bronze-chitin dragonflies caught the light at strange intervals, causing me to get whiplash when their reflection winked at me. A red-tailed hawk took flight as I drove by, dropping a wrangling serpent it had captured.
Finally, sated for the day, I spent one night in an outlandish hostel in Homestead (Miami was practically overbooked) called Hoosville Hostel. This was a strange place it bears mentioning. I spoke with a sea-turtle conservation veterinarian during my stay by climbing into a hammock treehouse on the second story of the hostel. Also included was a waterfall pool, several gazebos, a quiet garden-space for contemplation with bizarre statues, a very proud series of chickens and an outdoor shower which really sold the rest.
Pivoting North
Now, but this point, I had thrashed my poor Chevy Spark as much as it could manage. The check oil light was glowing and I was told to head to the Miami International Airport for a car exchange. After spending most of my day traversing Miami’s unholy traffic grid, I arrived in time to be told that no reservation had been made and there wasn’t a single rental available on this side of the seaboard.
Grim, I puttered forward, the Chevy groaning at the abuse. I didn’t exactly deviate from my route, but I was hunting for a shop that the rental company would pay for.
After visiting a Chicago hot dog shop and a next-door pastry, I drove past Blowing Rocks while spooning a crème brule into my mouth with my fingers. I finally reached a Pep Boys for an oil change, snoozed for a minute and prepped to camp for the night.
Next up on the trip is into the Carolinas. Until then,
Best regards and excellent trails,
Old Sean
Written May 8th 2021
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The GoPro Hero Black is my go to Action camera. I’m not comfortable bringing my cell phone to many wet and rugged locations, so the GoPro does most of my photographic heavy-lifting. The only things I bring in my GoPro kit are the camera, a spare battery and the forehead mount. I upgrade my GoPro once every two years. It was particularly excellent to have during my aquatic tour of Belize.
