Nomadic 2005 ‐ Arachnids

2005-09-26

Apalachicola National Forest (30.184 N, 84.454 W)This morning, first thing, I got up and hiked South along the Florida Trail from Holton Spring to where Holton Creek meets up with the Suwannee River. I have to tell you, that had to be the most beautiful stretch of the Florida Trail I have yet toured. On a side note, someday I'd like to return and canoe down the Suwannee River.

My next stop of the day was Blue Springs State Park. There's a spring there. And it's blue. I drank some of the water gushing out and it tasted remarkably good. Interestingly, there is a Deer Park bottling plant just down the road.

South from Blue Springs almost to the Gulf Coast brings me to Econfina River State Park. (I don't know how to pronounce it either.) This park offered miles of hiking trails that could have actually been quite nice had they been maintained. As it was, as I hiked along the grass-covered trails I managed to pick up a dozen or so of those little tiny ticks that you can barely see and even some of the ticks that you can only see if somebody points them out to you. I'll be feeling crawly things all over my body for days. The trails also supported numerous spider webs. Most webs had a big spider in the middle which made them easy to spot and avoid. The rest I managed to knock away with my face. Eventually the trail deteriorated to the point that I lost it and had to depend on Patch Glitch (my GPS) to lead me half of the way back to Medo before picking the trail up again. Walking without a trail isn't much fun in Florida.

Patch Glitch is the name of my GPS. My original GPS was named Glitch, after Glitch from the cartoon, "Reboot," as in, "Glitch! Game stat?" After Steven C slammed Glitch in a truck door and I accidentally left it in Colorado, I acquired a new GPS with a very touchy power button that was fixed by super-gluing a rubber "patch" around the button, making it harder to press in. A la Patch Glitch.

Anyway, I'm now in the Apalachicola National Forest where I'm discovering that Medo (my car, for those who forgot) is definitely not a jeep. I was planning on driving across the forest land on these small "roads," but decided against it after a bit. Medo has limits.

This forest is once again mostly pine trees. While eating dinner, I was harassed by house flies--yep, plain old house flies. Unlike most of the insects down here, house flies don't sting or bite or attempt to draw blood, so I was amazingly tolerant of them.

On a personal note, I really need a hair cut. Not too concerned with style on this homeless trek, I was putting it off. (Wearing the same pants for four weeks erodes your fashion consciousness.) However, after today's tick-fest, I'll be forever feeling things crawling over my scalp that I can't root out.