Remember in the movie, The Poseiden Adventure, when Gene Hackman and what's left of his cronies emerge from the bottom of the big ship, (which is actually the top, now) after Shelley Winters suffers a major heat attack swimming fearlessly through deep waters to save the other passengers? And Maureen McGovern sings "There's Got to Be a Morning After" and tears fall embarrassingly on your cheeks because you can't believe you're crying after watching such a campy movie as The Poseiden Adventure?
Well, that was how it is as my friends and I emerge from our rain-soaked, frozen tents the first morning of our winter backpacking trip to St. Mark's Wildlife Refuge. A few rays of sun shine down through the clouds, and the four of us run toward the light, basking in the warmth, shivering with gladness. But with gladness and joy comes cocky and boastful behaviour, as we slap each other on the backs, swaggering with pride on how brave and strong we were the night before. Yes, it was only 36 degrees, it rained all night, we were lucky not to have hypothermia, but are BACKPACKERS, after all, and backpackers are prepared for all sorts of bad weather and unfortunate circumstances.
And what happens next is we throw back some coffee and eat a few tangerines, and then we are ready to pack up and head off to our next destination. That is, until we realize that everything we have is soaking wet. And wet things are heavy. Our clothing, our sleeping bags, tents, and tarps are soaked, and now we have to stuff 200 pounds of these items into our packs and carry them 12 or 15 miles. Our hiking boots and socks are slushy and slimy. And JR is not there with his gun to put us out of our misery.
Thank goodness for the plethora of wildlife in the wildlife refuge. We see alligators and woodstorks, and other birds that I can't name. Our hike takes us along the forgotten coast, a remote and beautiful wilderness that includes coastal marshes, islands, tidal creeks, and the estuaries of seven north Florida rivers. Rainwater runs out of the bottom of our packs as we walk.
The first thing I do when we get to our next campsite is to throw myself on the ground and curl up into a fetal position. I'm so tired and still so wet from dragging 50 pounds of soggy bedding around all day, that I can barely walk another step. My youthful companions have a little more energy than I, and rig up a couple of clothes lines to hang all our wet things. By the time we get our tents up and lay everything out to dry, our rustic wilderness campsite looks like Jedd Clampett's back yard before he moved his family to Bevery Hills.
In order not to make the story about this trip even longer than the four days it took us to hike it, I will cut some details short. After a good night's sleep, we hike to the famous and historic St. Mark's Lighthouse, that was built in 1832, admire it for a bit, until Cindy's husband calls her on his cell phone. He and Paula's husband, Brent, are hanging out in a bar in Jacksonville, about to watch a football game, and want to know if their wives would like to cut their trip short and join them. The beer is cold, the peanuts are salty, and Cindy and Paula bid us a swift sayonara. Roger and I never figured this out, but somehow the two women, in haste to get away from any further trail shenanigans, manage to switch the cars themselves so that mine is at the end point, at the Wakulla River, and in a few hours they are enjoying a cold one in the warmth of a neighborhood saloon.
Roger and I feel determined to continue our trip, but find ourselves hiking on a highway, which is sometimes necessary when you travel on the Florida Trail, because much of the trail is not developed yet. As cars and trucks whizz by, we come along all sorts of interesting litter, that includes a hammer, a tape measure, and a bag of pot, none of which Roger lets me take into my pack. When we get to the Wakulla River, we decide to get my car and drive to a private campground instead of sleeping at a wilderness site. The temperature is dropping again, and by 4 a.m. it is in the mid-20s. Roger starts a campfire, and we stand there, shivering, until 6 a.m.. We haven't slept at all that night, anyway, and decided to pack it up, if anything, to drive around for a couple of hours in my warm PT Cruiser.
Surprisingly, or maybe not, my car takes us to JR's Aucilla Store, the only place that is open at pre-dawn hours. It is almost as if JR is expecting us. He makes us coffee, and tea, and sausage sandwiches, and encourages us to sit in front of his potbelly stove, where we are forced to pet his dog, Stupid. There is a twinkle in his eye, as if to mock us, albeit in a gentle way. After all, his business depends on silly people like us, adventurers, who go out into all kinds of weather to enjoy the wilderness, then come back to JR's Aucilla Store, our tails between our legs in shame, hungry for only what JR can give us - warmth, food, and friendship.
I ask JR for his phone number, so that if we decide to come back to hike the eastern section of the trail, we can call him for advice about the weather, and make driving arrangements in advance. "Hopefully we'll be back next year," I say brightly.
"Oh, you'll be back," says JR. "They always come back."
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