Wilderness Waterway 100 mile paddle 8 nights

Ann arrived on the 5th in the late afternoon. At 6 AM, we drove to Roger’s house to grab him and the trailer, then off to Everglades City to meet up with our shuttle driver and give him a key to my car. We then drove on to Flamingo where we spent the night in a campsite. We had arranged for the car to be driven back North to our take out point and that worked out just fine.

So, Jan 6th we were sitting in the campground when the news came to us about all hell breaking loose in DC. Ann and Roger were all about monitoring the news, while I was more of the mind to let it sort itself out while I was paddling in blissful ignorance. Ann had some internet connection for 2 days, and Roger had brought along a small transistor radio. Despite their best efforts to keep me informed, my own attitude won out in the end. They did their thing, and I did mine.

Thursday morning, we put the boats in the water, grabbed our permit, and pushed off. It was a bright sunny morning, with the wind at our backs. Roger had a small sail on his boat, that allowed him to rest his bad shoulder as long as we had favorable winds. We had an uneventful day, and Ann learned how difficult it would be to find a place to pull over for a bush break. Mangrove islands are not conducive to anyone exiting the boat for a nature break. Arrived at South Joe chickee, and had it all to ourselves. Normally, there is room for 2 groups. We spread out and enjoyed the space.

Friday morning, the weather turned, and we had winds in our face for the day. Roger struggled with it and was not able to keep up with Ann, nor I. Being an able paddler, I was not concerned for him and we set our own pace. Ann and I arrived at Oyster Bay chickee and could see Roger quite a ways back, but still coming on. When he went behind an island, Ann wondered if we should go find him. I knew the lay of the land and told her Roger would be popping out on the other side of the island shortly. 20 minutes went by, and I prepared to get into the boat to go see what was up. We had radios, but I could not raise him on his.

Just as I was settling into my kayak, Roger popped up on his radio, uncertain of just where he was, but thought he was close by. I told him I would come get him. I paddled about 10 minutes to steer around the back of the island and found him sitting in the calm waters there. He had tired crossing the bay, with the wind and chop in his face. We slowly made our way to the chickee, and Roger settled down in his chair. It was not 5 PM yet. We had the 2 platforms to ourselves again, so we spread out. However, on this night the other party showed up right at dinnertime, so we had to scurry around, moving our things all onto just one side of the dual platforms. In the mess, I dropped my GPS into the water. It did not float. I put my crap down, took off my clothing, and dipped into the chilly water. I could not find the device with my feet, and the shoulder deep water was not warm enough to do an extensive search. I exited (Ann averted her eyes, I think), dressed, and came to the realization that it was a good thing I had packed a back up.

Saturday, before we left for the next camp, Roger asked that we stay closer together in case he needed help again. I agreed that was wise. We again had no good fortune with the wind and waves, so I attached a line to Roger and towed him for 4 hours, as we crossed the open waters of the bay. Once we arrived on the inside of the many islands, the waters calmed enough for Roger to be on his own. We made Graveyard camp easily enough by 4, and I had “an arm day”. In gym parlance, that is a day of workouts for building up arms, normally alternated with leg days. This trip was to present zero opportunities for leg days.

Graveyard camp is a familiar site to Roger and I, a known bug and raccoon haven. This time, the bugs weren’t bad, due to the high winds, and there were no raccoons to be seen. Roger speculated it was because of the constrictors that are overrunning the Glades. We saw none of those either. By Sunday morning, we were getting better at getting going in the morning. We had left the marina at the beginning of the trip at 10 am, and now a mere 3 mornings later we were getting into the water by 9. Within a few more days, we’d be paddling by 8.

Ah, Sunday the 10th. We had a 4.5 mile passage along the coast, out in the Gulf, before turning up Broad Creek to find “The Nightmare”, the section Roger really wanted to paddle, but could only be done at high tide. I got in more arm workouts when Roger accepted some help while we were out in the Gulf. It allowed us to make some time crossing the distance. The timing of the tides worked out just fine. The Nightmare was a narrow, twisting, tangled mess of overhanging trees and vines. It took us a little over an hour to navigate our way through it. Pleasant enough, but nothing all that special to my way of thinking. It didn’t matter because Roger liked it and appreciated the beauty of the vegetation.

The Nightmare dumps out into Broad River. I was the first to arrive at the campsite. As I got out of my kayak and walked up the ramp to reach the camp, a 5-6 foot long gator decided he no longer wanted to sun itself in our camp, leaving hastily into the waters of the river. Ann was just a little taken aback. She decided she was not pitching a tent on that ground, choosing instead to set up her tent on the far end of the short dock. It offered her some protection from the biting insects, and for some reason, peace of mind about the gator visiting her in the middle of the night. We did have some large splashing in the night, and she swore the dock shook like something climbed up onto it. Still, there was no sign we had been visited on land by any gators.

Monday found us taking several smaller back routes to Willy Willy camp. We saw a gator swimming in the water near Alligator Creek, Dads fishing on Dad’s Bay (or at least we assumed they were Dads), and rocks on the bottom of Rocky creek. We reached camp at 2:30, where we met Jim. He was a fellow about our own age, and was paddling round trip from Flamingo to Everglades City and back, saving himself the shuttle fee. Maybe I’ll do that as a solo trip some year, as he was, when I can set my own pace and mileage per day. Willy Willy is a ground site, where you pull your boat up out of the water and set your tent up on the ground. There is a small L shaped dock with some cleats to tie the boats up. Ann opted to use the dock for her tent, and for her effort, was serenaded during the night by a low gator growl from about 20 feet from her head. They evidently believed she was out there to feed her fish entrails and were asking her to hurry up.

From Willy Willy, we paddled across a few open bays until we reached Lostman’s 5 campsite. This site is a platform built almost right on the ground, to keep the tents out of the muck. This also means the bugs can be bad, but not this time. Again Ann opted to tent on the dock, but no visitors this time. It was an uneventful camp.

Wednesday the 13th, we paddled 10 miles to Darwin’s Place, named after a local resident, not the famous scientist. It is more like a beach site, with sand and shells, but a ground site because the vegetation grows close to the campsite. We arrived about noon, ate lunch, and went for a nice afternoon paddle. Roger stayed ashore and read. When we got back, we ate our routine 4 PM apple, had our 5 PM cocktails, and prepared for our 6 PM dinner. Just as dinner was ready to eat, the bugs came out, so I retired to my tent. As Ann and Roger were putting away their kitchen gear, a pair of canoes pulled in with a trio of men. They had the other permit for the site and were surprised to see we had the other half of the allotted permits. Maybe they thought they would be alone, since the site is relatively small. Nonetheless, we told them they could set up anywhere they pleased, and we would try to stay out of their way.

These fellows told us a story of a 36 hour drive down from Maine, then they grabbed a permit and paddled off to the site we would use the following night. They arrived after dark, so they set up their tents and crashed. On the arrival of morning, they had taken their time getting organized before setting off for Darwin’s. This was supposed to explain their late arrival, butm judging by their lack of organization, I’d have to say they needed another couple of hours just to figure out which gear was in which bag in which canoe.

Thursday the 14th we left Darwin before the trio arose, slipping out of camp by 8:20. This allowed us to take our time paddling to the Crooked Creek site. We got close to it by 1 PM, and then managed to spend an hour locating it. We split up, mostly by plan, with Roger looking in one direction and Ann and I in another. Roger and I had VHF marine radios to keep in touch.

After some searching, I decided to just paddle down Crooked Creek until I reached the end where it entered the Lopez River. I mean, if the site is named Crooked Creek, shouldn’t it be on Crooked Creek? Sure enough, there it was at the Lopez junction. Our confusion was more exasperating because I no longer had my GPS with the Lat/ Long location, and Ann’s GPS had not recorded them when she plugged them into her GPS. Once she told me this, I reissued to her the numbers and she put them into her unit. That told me we were on the right track.

Now, we had the chickee, but no Roger. I tried raising him on the radio, to no luck. I told Ann to stay on the chickee while I went back for Roger. She asked if she could just paddle off a bit. I told her NO. I tried to explain she had no radio, and if she were to get lost I would have no luck in finding her, with no idea which direction she had gone off. I reminded her that if I returned with Roger and she was not on the chickee, I would kick her butt when I next saw her.

Off I paddled up the Crooked Creek. It took me 15 minutes of hard paddling to get to the bay where I left Roger. That told me it was over a mile. Upon reaching the bay, I could see Roger off in the distance a couple of hundreds yards away. I radioed him, asking him if he could see me, as I had him in sight. He had to turn his boat to see me. He radioed back that he had me, and he paddled back towards me. We started paddling down the creek towards camp. 40 minutes later, Roger asked me how much further. I knew Roger was barely making 1 mph, but I really had no idea how to tell him how far away camp was, so I said, “It is just around the next bend.” That made him laugh, which was the desired effect. As it turned out, it was just around the next bend, and we were happy to see Ann standing on the platform.

We had Crooked Creek to ourselves, so Ann moved her tent to the other side. In the morning, our last one, we managed to get organized and moving by 9. By 1, we were at the take out ramp. We loaded up the car, which the shuttle service had delivered as contracted, and we set off for home. We called our various people to tell them we were off the water, and rove to Roger’s house to unload his stuff before continuing on to mine. We got to my house about 7:30, showered, started laundry, ate dinner, and went to sleep. It was a fabulous trip.