The Winter Pilgrimage begins where America ends, at the Southernmost Point in Key West on January 1st, and finishes by March or April at the northern terminus in Fort Pickens, on the Gulf Islands National Seashore, near Pensacola Beach.

The Florida Trail isn’t just 1,000 miles of subtropical escape for hiker trash fleeing northern winters. It’s a place where alligator eyes reflect your headlamp back at you across dark waters, where sawgrass prairies stretch to infinity, and where the Ocala National Forest holds secret springs that glow an impossible blue against white sand.

Familiar faces appear like apparitions on this trail, all of us bound by the unspoken understanding that we’ve stepped outside normal existence. We follow the orange blazes north, through cypress swamps and palmetto scrub, under endless blue skies that fade to pink and purple as the planets perform their cosmic dance above our sleeping bags.