When we reached Blue Springs we knew that we were about half-way through the race. We were now unranked and we knew that if Nature Calls could keep the team healthy they would pull off the win. Julie and I are both pretty intense competitors, not in the mean sense, we simply like to go fast and see who comes out in front. The plan from this point on was to race hard as we could and see how we did. We also knew that in 3 more weeks we would be in Montana doing what is reputed to be the hardest race in the world – not just the hardest in Florida. Anyway it was strangely motivating. Of course the reality was that it was also stiflingly hot. We had received the control points for the next leg of the race, so I proceeded to mark the next section. I would let my crew mark the rest of the race after we left – I was only worried at this time about the next bike leg. After marking the next leg I knew we would be in for some serious biking. My time estimate was 12-20 hours of biking based on conditions. At least the leg started with some easy road riding from Blue Springs to Paisley Florida, where we would enter the Ocala Forest and start the difficult section.
As we rode I knew that we would need to fuel heavily, so we bypassed the turn in to Ocala and hit a convenience store in Paisley (there are two). I looked for the most caloric food I could find (Zingers and Twinkies won out) and downed a large Mountain Dew – I also got some Pop-Tarts for later. It was then into the woods. The first point was quite easy and we even passed by a forest ranger who told us the numbers of some of the trails, and also gave us road conditions of the roads we would need to take. Of course the news was not good – pretty much sandy and soft the entire way. The first flag was at the intersection of a road and the bike trail, so we decided to take the bike trail. I kept a constant eye on my compass – and odometer and calculated when we would be close to the next point which was manned. When we got within what I thought was 300 meters we started to yell, hoping the folks would answer. They didn’t – so we reverted to plan B. Plan B was to continue on the Ocala Bike trail to the power lines (mapped) and then use the contours along the line to determine the correct trail back (about 1 km) to the manned point. This worked perfectly, even though the trail back was too soft to ride. And then Julie got a flat – and realized she had given up her tube earlier in the race. She was using Presta and I had Schrader. And of course she had a Presta rim on her bike. In other words we were in the middle of nowhere and without a bike tube. So we devised a plan. Plan A – walk the bikes (we could not ride anyway) to the manned TA and hope they had and would give us a tube. Plan B – use my bike tool to score out Julies bike rim so my Schrader tube would fit. We walked to the Manned CP – and sure enough Dennis Godber (super-biker) was there and had multiple tubes. He had switched to tubeless – but still had all the tubes. The first tube had dry rotted and had split seams (lesson – they don’t last forever). We did however get her bike fixed – avoiding plan B and being able to continue on with the race. We even got one spare tube for me to carry in case Julie got another flat. My lesson – use Schrader rims, they will fit either tire. I’ve also learned from many adventure races that you need to be able to fix nearly anything that can happen to your bike in the field.
Notice the nice loops we made before the flat tire. We did finally find this Manned CP.Well – regardless, one of the reasons we moved fast to that point was to make the orienteering course before it got dark, and it looked like we would make it. However, the O course had been cancelled and so had all the checkpoints between there and the next TA. In my calculation over 6 hours of trekking and biking were just shaved off that leg. I was disappointed about the O course as it looked pretty cool – though not terribly. The TA gave us directions and said basically follow the yellow bike trail to Alexander Springs, and then it was road from there. As we headed out (it was now dark) we missed the turn onto the bike trail and came out at Forest Road 538. I knew that this road would take us directly to 445 which is where we wanted to go anyway – and as a bonus it was packed solid. Now I had no idea of how to get to Moss Bluff from 445 – the folks at the CP just told us to “cut across the forest somehow”. I knew that we could take the road that led past Big Scrub, but that was probably the worst biking road in the world – so I was going to find an alternative. Plan A – head to Altoona (there were signs), find a convenience store, and get directions. Plan B – take whatever road we could find going west and hope for the best.
Once again Plan A prevailed. We got to Altoona, stopped in the Kangaroo Store, and were rewarded with more Mountain Dew, and fruit pies (500 calories in three easy bites!). Also a local was happy to give me directions when they saw me looking through the maps, and the directions were perfect. It was funny when they said – that’s a awful long way to bike. I joked with them a bit, they were really nice and it was interesting to see what folks did in Altoona on a Saturday night – these were good old country boys.
The rest of the ride was a blur with hills. It was dark and cool and we had a light tailwind. We flew – the downhills were great, the uphills were pounding, and the on the flats we tried to keep a solid 18-20 mph. I knew we had been traveling fast when we got to the next TA and they asked whether we had caught a ride. The SPOT tracker had showed our progress quite well.
It was now time to sleep! The next leg was a paddle downstream on the Ocklawaha River, followed by a turn upstream on the Silver River. I knew that paddling in this state would have both of us sleeping within an hour. Julie ate while I slept, then we switched. We had agreed to 30 minutes and then we were ready. Our crew was also doing a wonderful job. Oscar had the boats loaded and ready to go with everything we would need, Abhijit had the maps prepared and went over them with me including distances, and Heather had every food I could imagine ready to go. To make it even better; both Josh and Clay were now back to full strength and helping out.
As we hit the water it was perfect still and flat. I knew we were going downstream – but there was no perceptible current, but also no wind. We turned our headlamps off and used the moon and the horizon to navigate. I told Julie I could handle the paddle for a while and let her take a short nap while I soaked up the surroundings. She woke up on her own after about 15 minutes, and we paddled to the “iron bridge”. After the iron bridge there were lots of snags in the water so we had to switch to headlamps. With the headlamps on we got to see all the frogs (yellow eyes) and gators (red eyes). We also got to start some mild hallucinations. I kept hearing banjo music – which could have only been made by the frogs, Banjo Picking Frogs. I never actually saw the frogs picking the banjo’s – but it was obvious they were doing it. Meanwhile Julie was having a conversation about Amber Jack that went like this;
“Amber Jack”
“Do you want Amber Jack”
“Yes”
“The beer or the fish”
“The fish”
“You want fish?”
“No – just Amber Jack”
And then repeat again. Meanwhile the banjo-picking frogs were mocking me as we turned upstream into the Silver River. The current was now coming at us and hard. It took us over an hour to paddle to the take-out which was an abandoned dock. I bargained with Julie that if we did not find it I would paddle us both to the correct location. When we got to the dock there was no-one there and signs saying area closed. So we sat in the boat and hollered – and sure enough people came.
This is a map of the paddle. It is an incredible place to paddle at night. Long straight river lines with lots of wildlife and scenery.
We were now at Silver River State Park, it was about 6:30 AM, and we soon found out that the last paddle was cancelled so we only had a trek and a bike to go. We were psyched. Some oatmeal and Ramen noodles and a warm shower at the campsite later – I was feeling good and ready to trek. Also Clay and Josh were going to join us for the trek. Getting back to a 4 person dynamic was fun and with Clay and Josh both fresh – this leg was a lot of fun. My legs were fatigued (Julie and I had run much of the first trek, and the second one was just leg punishment) as were Julie’s – so we did not want to go too fast. We were able to chat and really just enjoy the trek – and it was hot. Good news was the CP that was later stolen, was still there – so we had no navigation problems (or even slow-downs). The entire trek was on the Florida trail – so it was simply following the orange blazes. In fact if it had not been for the oppressive heat and swarming horseflies – this would have been really fun.
We had no idea where the other teams were, I figured Nature Call’s was back there somewhere – and I knew Colin (solo guy) was still in the race somewhere as we had heard about some of the teams at the last TA. We did not know where the other teams were – we saw Colin at Blue Springs, but had not seen any other teams for a few hours.
Here is the trek from Sliver River State Park to Santos. It is only about 11-12 miles and all along the marked Florida Trail. The area has incredible trails and hiking, and Santos is truly the mountain bike capital of Florida.
Well – we had made it to Santos and the last leg of the race. The last long leg. I had no idea of the conditions of the off-road sections – though it was a long way from Santos to Crystal River. The first two checkpoints were pretty easy in the Santo’s main biking area. As we headed for the second one I ran into a group of bikers that I knew, and then a second group from Orlando who had done one of the CFAR races – so we ended up with an entourage of bikers helping us through the free-ride section of Santo’s heading to CP22. At this point, instead of biking through Spider Kingdom (there aren’t really spiders) we decided to take the road to the trail just east of the Land Bridge.
After crossing the land bridge we headed north on the bike trail, or at least I did. After going back I found Julie having a conversation with Tommy, so I interrupted her and told her she needed to come with me. She continued to talk to Tommy as we found CP23 (I overshot it at first) so I found a spot with nice pine trees and none of the swarming horseflies and let her sleep for about 10 minutes. The next section was really cool. I had never ridden the blue bike trail west of the land bridge – it was awesome. Dips, vortexes, drops, climbs – they were all there.
There was one two more checkpoints – one manned. CP 25 was a challenge (re-entrant on back side of ridge) There were about 100 re-entrants along the ridge and I really had no idea which was the front or back side. I joked with Julie we could never find it because whichever side we were on would always be the front side and the other side would be the back side. She asked Tommy what I meant. I figured she would be OK as long as she had someone to talk to.
We hit the manned CP, said hi – and then it was to the finish line. It was 20-30 miles to the finish. We flew, even passing a convenience store without stopping. In the end we finished strong in 60 hours 57 minutes. I was quite happy with out performance and hopefully we can be ready for Montana. My biggest thanks go out to all the volunteers, the other teams – and to Elias, Dave, Dennis, and all the others that make this incredible experience called the Florida Coast to Coast a reality.
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