Florida Trail Thru-Hike Day 6 “Trip and Fall”

Today is my 36th birthday so hopefully all of the forest animals will offer to carry my packs for the day!

I climb out of my tent to check the stick at the waters edge to see the water had dropped over two feet, what a difference that would have made yesterday. The river was rushing by pretty fast and the fog was following along for the ride. I get my camera out to try to catch this image.

Hoping to stick to my plan and get more Photographs today we head off back up the dirt road to where we left the trail. Shortly we get to Blueberry Hill and take a couple of Photographs from Blueberry Hill.

About a mile and a half into the day I cross a dirt road and right back to the campsite I was at last night. What a waste of time! The trail continued right behind where my tent was not sure why the data book sent me down a dirt road to a campsite on the trail. I shrug it off and start back down the trail right into knee deep water just to get the day going right. This is better than what the trail looked like last night, well it was completely underwater last night. We keep going listening to the sloshing of my boots till we come upon a creek, I hope I see a bridge soon. Yes there is a bridge.

As if walking in a circle wasn’t bad enough I step into a rabbit hole or something taking me to the ground pretty quick and hurting my ankle, nothing severe but just adding to the difficulties of the pack weight it wasn’t very comfortable. We push on into an area that was recently part of a prescribed burn.

Now coming down a hill I get tripped up on some roots and try to catch myself only to build up enough speed to make a better crash face first into my camera bag! As if my ankle wasn’t enough now I am sitting here debating the whole trip, is it worth finding out later the feeling in my sides are more than just sore maybe I’m causing some damage, is it worth risking the loss of my laptop or worse my camera??! I get back up and head down the trail more discouraged than ever I arrive at a crossroads on the trail one goes to a campsite about 4.5 miles off the Florida Trail along a blue blazed trail and the other brings me further down the Florida Trail. I sit for a while upset with myself for the decision I am even giving myself but I know that heading down the blue blazed trail will end all the pain and the orange blazes will continue an unknown distance before the inevitable early withdraw. I am sure the packs would overpower me sooner or later so I decide to give up hopefully to try again at a later time with lighter packs. I don my packs and start following the blue blazes to end my journey, short lived but still an adventure.