One Week and Counting

WaterTribe's Everglades Challenge, the epic 300-mile canoe/kayak race from St. Petersburg to Key Largo, is just a week away. Our six-man outrigger canoe team, The Insomniacs, has been working hard trying to make any last minute adjustment to the 45-foot boat before we head out on our epic adventure.

The boat, commissioned and built by Dr. George Stovall in Ft. Myers, is a true Hawaiian sailing canoe, the only one of its kind in the continental United States. With a reinforced bow and stern section to handle heavy seas, and a beefed-up mid section to support a mast assembly, the canoe seems seaworthy enough, but the question remains, can we say the same about her crew.

Stovall, a.k.a., Sandspur, lives an breathes for this stuff. So Does Darry Jackson, a.k.a. Dare-Jack. But I don't Aaron Freedman, Air Doc, and Casey LaLomia, also known as The Kauai Kid, and Jason Heffron, the artist formerly known as Salad Boy who now goes by the symbol $, don't have any idea what they are getting in to.

I told them that the upcoming Everglades Challenge would be a leisurely sail down the coast on a balmy March afternoon, but of course I lied. LaLomia, I suspect, suspects the truth. But like a seasoned sergeant leading green troops into combat, he doesn't want to scare the men. Ignorance is bliss, or so they say until a four foot wall of cold water hits you in the face.

But I digress...the canoe has performed well in its first sea trials. Last week, with a 10 knot wind out of the east, it hit a top speed at close to 12 knots, and that was with my scrawny seven-year-old out on the trampoline as ballast.

I am praying for a north wind, 15 to 20 knots, to blow us down the coast. But past experience has taught me to hope for the best, prepare for the worst, and be thankful for either. For after all, what's an adventure without a little drama?

One Thousand Sunsets

Next week, when five of my friends and I set out on the 300-mile Everglades Challenge, I'll be hoping to add a few sunsets to my collection. Some people save stamps, others baseball cards, a few even concert tickets. Me? I collect sunsets.

Tomorrow, I start my 20th year as Outdoors Editor of the St. Petersburg Times. Naturally, one of the perks of the job has been that I have gotten spend a lot of time out of the office. But it is not all fun and games. I have to deal with no-see-ums, mosquitoes, sand in my spaghetti, and spiders. And I really, really, don't like spiders.

Last year, camped out on a place called Palmetto Island up on the Panhandle, my friends and I discovered the place was overrun with black widow spiders. I found three of them in my kayak, and the next day, when we paddled off into the horizon, I kept thinking that there had to me at least one straggler lurking inside my boat, waiting to crawl up my leg, and bite me someplace I dare not mention.

But sleeping with spiders is worth it if it means you get a good sunset in return. Living on the Gulf of Mexico, we tend to take for granted that most nights, you can head out to the beach and see a show for free that some poor soul in Kansas would pay a week's wages for.

I don't know how many sunsets I have picked up over the years, and I've watched that ball of fire disappear over a volcano in New Zealand, melt into the desert in Australia and sink slowly into the canopy of an old growth rain forest in the jungles of the Amazon. But when it comes right down to it, I'd still rather watch my favorite star nod off from the beach at Panther Key than any place in the world.

So what is a sunset really worth? Three hundred miles in an outrigger canoe? Absolutely, to day the least. And at that, you won't find a better bargain on earth.

The Twilight Zone

At 3 a.m., five days into a 300-mile canoe-kayak race from St. Petersburg to Key Largo, my paddling partner Jon Willis stood on a desolate beach in the 10,000 Islands and asked me what I was doing.

"Looking for my laptop," I said as I waded through the bone-chilling water in complete darkness. "It has got to be here somewhere."

Willis, a.k.a., Cornish Jon, scratched his head  and then asked the obvious: "Are you awake?"

"Yes...I think so," I said. "I don't know...maybe."

For several days I had been operating on auto pilot, pushing my mind and body to the limit. The conditions had been rough. The cold, high winds and heavy seas had made progress difficult. I had no fear of death or injury, just failure.

I had been writing stories live as we went, often in wet paddling gear by boat ramps at docks and marinas, and then sending them via a phone line to my editors back home. My biggest concerns were missing deadline and/or losing the company-issued laptop that was my link to the sports desk.

So there I was stumbling around in the middle of the night, looking for something that was stowed safely in the hatch of my kayak.

In retrospect, I should have looked at the warning that is required reading for all entrants in the Everglades Challenge: "The physical demands of the race, combined with sleep deprivation, heat, cold, water dehydration and exhaustion, often cause participants to become disoriented. Amnesia, hallucinations, hypothermia and other debilitating conditions are not uncommon."

Looking back, I realize now that that night in the Everglades wasn't the first or the last time this writer would venture into that place where time and logic make no sense.

"It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge" as Rod Serling once explained. "This is the dimension of the imagination. It is an area which we call the Twilight Zone."

Most of you have probably never been there. But those who are members of The Tribe know what I am talking about. The trick, you see is not if you go, but making sure you find your way back again.

All for one, one for all

Technically, the Everglades Challenge is a race, and in races, people do some pretty nasty things to win. Consider for a moment, that Wacky Racer Dick Dastardly, his sidekick Muttley and their Mean Machine 00, the purple, rocket-powered car with a seemingly endless supply of concealed weapons. That mustachioed villain would do whatever it took to foil poor Penelope Pitstop, Peter Perfect or my hero, Rufus Ruffcut and Sawtooth in the Buzz Wagon. But in the WaterTribe, such behavior would never be tolerated.

Eight years ago, when Cornish Jon and I embarked on the inaugural Everglades Challenge, a 300-mile canoe-kayak race from St. Petersburg to Key Largo, we didn't think as much about winning as we did just surviving. After a hellacious start, where we had to be rescued by Russell Farrow of Sweetwater Kayaks, Cornish Jon and I thought about quitting. Then we came across Dr. George Stovall, a.k.a. Sandspur, laughing on sandbar in his long underwear.

Over the next few days, we picked up a couple more stragglers and soon formed our own little marauding band of miscreants. After 300 miles, with the finish line in sight, we pulled up side by side, sang the theme song to Bonanza ... well, you can't actually sing it since it has no words, so we just hummed it, but really loud ... then crossed the finish line together.

Since then, we have done nearly a dozen trips together, and added several new members to our band of merry men. Some stay for the long haul. Others come for one trip then never return my phone calls.

Friends, partners, teammates, we call ourselves The Crew. But 300 miles is a long way, especially in a canoe with five smelly guys.  After two or three days, I just might be forced to jump ship. I wonder if the Ant Hill Mob is looking for any new muscle?

The Weather is Wonderful

Sometimes I think I missed my calling in life. I should have been a meteorologist. What other job can you be wrong half the time and still get paid?

But if I had that gig, I'd always be right. "Don't worry about a thing, folks," I would tell my loyal viewers. "Tomorrow we will have weather."

I know entrants in this year's 300-mile Everglades Challenge canoe/kayak race will be be checking their favorite weather Web site in the days before this year's race hoping that somehow it will make a difference. To quote Donnie Brasco, "Forget about it."

In 2001, the year of the first WaterTribe Challenge, as the Everglades race was once called, race director Steve Isaac, a.k.a. Chief, took one look at the whitecaps offshore and told the fleet, "I'll start the race, but I would think twice about going."

Nobody listened. Everybody went. Some had to be rescued. Of those, many did not try again the following year. Others learned their lessons and came back better prepared and determined in 2002.

Like Nietzsche said, "That which does not kill us makes us stronger." Or then again, forget about it.

Beat up, bruised and blistered

There is no huge cash prize for the winner of the Everglades Challenge. If you survive the 300-mile paddle from St. Petersburg to Key Largo, you get a T-shirt, shark's tooth and your name in the record book.

No. People don't do any of the WaterTribe events for the money or even the notoriety. In fact, most mainstream humans have never even heard of this ragged gang of die-hard kayakers, canoeists and sailors. These members of the Tribe, who go by names such as "Dances With Mullet" and "Insignificant" have no illusions about what is in store when that starting gun sounds at 7 a.m. on March 7.

But just in case you are wondering, I'll tell you what they get.

For starters, hungry. So hungry, that if they pass a convenience store, they clean out every nasty microwaveable food item, no matter how old, moldy or unfit for human consumption.

And they'll get thirsty. So thirsty, they will crawl a hundred yards through the sand just to sip out of a garden hose. They'll quaff Cokes, Gatorade, Sweet Tea, Yoo-hoo, Dr. Pepper, Orange Juice, and oh yeah, beer, lots of it, the cheaper the better.

And if that doesn't sound like enough, they'll also get bruised, beat up, blistered, burnt, banged around and quite possibly, bent.

On one WaterTribe race down the Suwannee River, I got a rash so bad, I had to drive home half-naked, my derriere doused in Desinex. I couldn't sit in a chair for a week, and my buttocks still itches every time I think about it.

But in the end, after all the blood and cuts, you'll be glad you did it, joining the ranks of the few, the proud, The Tribe.

A Good Paddling

  In 2001, the year of the initial 300-mile WaterTribe Challenge canoe/kayak race from St. Petersburg to Key Largo, my partner Cornish Jon and I often wondered how many times our paddles hit the water during the six-day trip.

To come up with an exact number would be difficult, if not impossible, although it would be safe to wager that the number of my paddle strokes would be greater than his number of strokes since he is a chronic whiner who spent more time eating and drinking than he did paddling.

No, that's a lie. I'm the eating, drinking whiner. But the truth is neither one of us could tell you how many times our paddles hit the water, though it would be safe to guess it numbered in the thousands.

That's why a good paddle is essential on any long canoe or kayak trip. If you have a paddle that weighs an extra an ounce or two, multiply that by 10,000, and suddenly you are talking about 1,250 pounds, roughly the weight of a full grown cow.

Now, while my friend Cornish Jon has called me a heifer on more than one occasion, nobody wants to bring a farm animal along on a long kayak trip.

That's why it pays to get a good paddle. In recent years I have been training with an Epic carbon-fiber wing paddle that costs about $440. That may seem like a lot to spend on a paddle, but trust me, it is still a lot cheaper than a cow. 

Annoying Critters

On any expedition, sooner or later you are bound to run into some obnoxious animals. And I'm not talking about tobacco-chewing good ol' boys.

That's why entrants in this year's Everglades Challenge will be required to sign a waiver. The following is a sample of what the race promoters say may be in store for the 50 or so adventurers in this year's 300-mile canoe/kayak race from St. Petersburg to Key Largo:

"Animal hazards are common. Within the last few years there have been several attacks on humans resulting in serious injury and/or death. These attacks have come from bears, cats, dogs, sharks, alligators, rattlesnakes, cottonmouths, coral snakes, sting rays, barracuda, spiders, bees, hornets, wasps, fire ants, ticks, and mosquitoes. Other dangerous or annoying critters, too numerous to mention, are also in abundance. As an expert you are expected to know how to counter these attacks and it is expected that you have an adequate first-aid kit and that you know how to use it."

In 2001, when several members of my current crew, The Insomniacs, paddled the Suwanee river as part of another WaterTribe race, we had heard stories of some nasty gators, and no, once again I am not talking about University of Florida fans.

Around 1 a.m. about halfway through the trip, we heard an awful ruckus coming from the riverbank above us. The water level was about 30 feet low and we had noticed several of what we took for canoe slides on both banks.  It all happened in a matter of seconds. ... I turned just in time for my headlight to light up a 10-foot alligator charging down the bank.

The beast hit the water about 10 feet away and I smacked it on it head with my paddle as it slid under my kayak. The reptile swam a few yards downstream, tail-whipped my friend's boat, then disappeared into the darkness.

After stopping to change my shorts, we talked about the close call and vowed to take precautions in the future. Since then, my friends and I have always made it a point to bring a rookie along on every trip. I know I can't outpaddle a gator, but that new guy ... now that's a different story.

Night Rangers

Adventure racer Aaron Freedman, a.k.a. Air Doc, has no problem going a day or two without sleep. "Just pop and couple of NoDoz at 3 in the morning and you are good to go," he says.

On March 7, when our outrigger canoe crew, The Insomniacs, and 30 or so other teams embark on the 300-mile Everglades Challenge, sleep will be a prized commodity. It can take anywhere from two to seven days to paddle/row/sail from St. Petersburg to Key Largo. As with any adventure race, the team that can go at it the longest usually ends up winning.

We'll hit the water at 7 a.m. that Saturday, paddle all day and all night, then all day again Sunday, before crashing sometime that night. We'll sleep for a few hours, three or four, then climb back in the canoe and push on. If we are lucky, and there is wind, we'll sail some of the way and possibly make it there in as little as 72 hours.

But on these trips nothing ever goes as planned, so more likely, it will be flat calm and we'll end up paddling the whole way, wondering why in the world anybody would sign up for something like the Everglades Challenge.

Oh, ye of little faith. You ask, "Why?" Members of The Tribe respond, "Why Not?"

Small Comforts of Home

After a long day in the seat of a canoe or kayak, it is the little things that keep you going. Several times during the inaugural WaterTribe Challenge, a 300-mile adventure race from St. Petersburg to Key Largo, I thought about hanging up my paddle. But each time I did, the small comforts of home kept me going.

For those who are unfamiliar with venturing in small boats, the typical day starts a couple of hours before sunrise. We usually get up about 5 a.m., chug some black coffee, put on our wet gear and get underway around 6 a.m. There is nothing better than watching the sun rise on the water.

Around 10 a.m., after four hours or 15 to 20 miles of paddling, we pull over for a midmorning break. We usually chug some black coffee, pound a Power Bar or two, study the map, then put on our wet gear and get back underway.

We usually paddle another four hours, try to cover another 15 to 20 miles, then pull over for lunch. By now, we are off the coffee. Instead, we guzzle water, chew on moldy pepperoni and a chunk of green cheese, then put on our wet gear and get back in the boat.

On a good day, we might only paddle another four hours before stopping for the night. But sometimes, the weather doesn't always cooperate, so we break for dinner, chug some black coffee, eat a Power Bar with some moldy pepperoni/green cheese topping, then put on our night paddling gear, fire up the lights and start paddling.

We may call it a night around 10 p.m., or even midnight, unless we are having too much fun, then we say, "Heck, why don't we go out for breakfast," which means we paddle all night and don't stop until the sun rises. Then we chug black coffee and do it all over again.

This may sound crazy to some, but when adventure calls, food and rest take a back seat. And when you are in the wilderness, everything tastes good. Once, in the Amazon, I sucked the eyeballs out of a fish head and was happy to have 'em. Thank God for the small comforts of home.