I’d done everything that I came to do on the Florida Trail. Maybe I’d skipped some miles, but I intended on hiking those miles in the opposite direction in order to catch a flight to Las Vegas. A little flip-flop instead of hiking straight through.
Because of the rain, I said goodbye to the bayview campsite, the only designated campsite on Santa Rosa Island, and ran into Navarre to catch up with Nana Man, who was hiking back to the Blackwater Connector going into Alabama. Nana Man can hike, and we covered more ground in a few days than most cover in a week by running late into the night.
We not only covered a lot of ground hiking, but both Kyler and Shep helped us get around a couple of long road walks, so that we soon crossed paths with the rest of the group that we’d left behind in order to finish early.
Kyler had come out to give us a ride around the road walk from Holt through Crestview, and Shep got us across the last stretch to Hillcrest Baptist Church, where Nana Man and I had been planning on taking a zero.
The group was already past the church, and yet convincing us to turn around to hike with them back to the end didn’t take much. Shep dropped us off at the Baptist Church for a zero we wouldn’t get. Even staying one night, both Nana Man and I were overwhelmed with the gratitude for the hospitality Pastor Forrest and his wife Becky provide to all Florida Trail hikers. Neither one of us could get enough of Becky’s delicious quiche either!
The next morning we turned around and started chasing everyone west, trying to catch up, covering miles we’d already run.
#FloridaTrail