January 4th, 2008 Sandra Friend
When winter’s chill wraps itself around the Florida peninsula, you know that hiking season has settled in, in earnest. Last night the temperatures dropped well below freezing throughout Central Florida, which can only mean one thing: ding, dong the bugs are dead! No chiggers, no ticks, and none too many mosquitoes, either. I encourage you to get out and hike: the weather’s great!
I did this past weekend, having difficulty carving out time between holiday visits with family and friends and the multitude of writing projects on my plate at the moment. My friend Phyllis (aka Shortcut) started a Florida Trail thru-hike a couple years ago that got cut short, and I still have FT sections to fill. So we spent the holiday weekend filling in gaps for her and I: Gold Head Branch State Park and part of Etoniah Creek State Forest, with enough roadwalk inbetween to remind me how much I hate roadwalks and am willing to wait them out, since it seems silly to do them when you’re not backpacking. The weather was dicey, overcast the whole time, but I had the chance to take plenty of photos and try out my new digital recorder, so there will be a podcast or two in the future, soon as I find the time to mix ‘em. We saw plenty of deer and plenty of sinkholes, and in Gold Head, lots of fellow hikers. Hooray! So get out there and enjoy while the weather’s chill and you can knock out the miles on a section hike of the Florida Trail.
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May 18th, 2007 Sandra Friend
Lifting up my head from my work on the book to note that wildfires have decmiated the Florida Trail in Seminole State Forest and the Royal Trails area north to Maggie Jones Road. While it’s not known how much of the trail still exists in the Osecola National Forest, the prospects aren’t great - the Bugaboo Fire is the largest wildfire Florida has ever seen and it’s still burning. The trail is closed from Ocean Pond west to Camp Branch west of White Springs, and I’d suggest not going near the whole upper Suwannee Valley for hiking due to the smoke. From the locator maps, I’d venture a guess that the Big Gum Swamp Trail and Fanny Bay Trails have been wiped out, but will wait for official comment on that. Down south, fires in the Big Cypress Swamp are close enough to the Florida Trail to cause smoke inhalation problems. I wouldn’t recommend hiking down there right now.
For official details about the Florida Trail closures, see www.floridatrail.org. Be careful out there!
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May 8th, 2007 Sandra Friend
I’m just back from nearly a week up in the mountains of North Carolina, and returned home to find the Sunshine State under a thick blanket of smoke. Looks like hiking plans for the weekend ought to be scratched. It’s especially bad around Lake City and Gainesville, with visibility extremely poor and ashes falling from the sky even down here in Ocala. See the Florida Trail website for links to various agencies with fire maps, advisories, etc. … meanwhile, I would stay off the trail. I have a book to write, after all, but you have a better excuse!
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March 18th, 2007 Sandra Friend
Now here’s a real comparison in pack weight for long distance hikers. To the left, Mike “Smileage” DeWitt, with a pack that many of us gals could crawl into and sleep in, it’s so danged big. He won’t say but I’m guessing it tips the scales past 50 pounds. To the right, the esteemed Nimblewill Nomad and his pack, roughly 12 pounds with water. I split the difference when I’m hiking….
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March 10th, 2007 Sandra Friend
I’m surprised I haven’t seen this message in every newspaper and outdoor-related magazine across Florida: outdoor recreation on National Lands just became affordable! In January, the Federal Government started selling a new National Public Lands Pass. It’s designed to replace the mess of passes that one person had to get to visit all the federal public lands - National Parks, National Forests, National Wildlife Refuges, and (not relavant to Florida but to points west) Bureau of Land Management and Bureau of Reclamation. For $80 - the same cost as a Florida State Parks pass - you’re covered to hit Everglades National Park, all of the fee areas in the Ocala, Osceola, and Apalachicola National Forests, and all of the many National Wildlife Refuges we have, some of which (like Ding Darling and St. Marks) charge admission. It’s good for a year from purchase. If you’re 62 or older, you can get a lifetime version of the pass for $10. Awesome! Just visiting the springs in the Ocala NF is worth buying this pass, since it costs $4 per person otherwise and the pass is good for a carload. I called last month and checked with the federal agency selling the passes and they told me they are good at all “US Fee Area” sites. Hooray! I’ll be picking up one soon.
Here’s where you can get yours online.
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