Everglades Challenge 2016: Day 3

Day 3: Coon Key to Rodgers River Bay Chickee
Monday, March 7

The alarm roused us from our four hours of sleep on Coon Key. We were happy to find that our tent was not inundated by the tide during the night. 

We set off expecting to slog 11 miles into a headwind to Indian Key Pass, but were pleasantly surprised to find a nice sailing breeze in the early morning hours.

The morning developed into one of the more beautiful sunrises I have seen. A high layer of cirrus clouds was bright white against the dark blue sky with a lower layer of pink clouds.

The cirrus clouds streaking the sky reminded me of the forecast high winds to come, "When the sky appears scratched by a hen, reef your topsails then!"






We caught up to Lugnut and HavanaMana tacking up into Indian Key Pass. We were lucky to find an incoming tide in the pass without having to alter our schedule







We arrived at the Everglades National Park office and stepped out into knee deep stinking brown mud. We got camping permits for Rodgers River Bay Chickee and South Joe River Chickee, and filled our three 10L water bags for the trip through the Everglades. The next chance for water would be over 100 miles away at Flamingo.

The east wind was really blowing strong, and the short paddle from the park office to Checkpoint 2 at Chokoloskee was a challenge.



The Cap'n posted this video of our arrival at CP2 on Facebook.

Lawless pointed us to the Havana Cafe with the Cuban sandwiches we heard so much about.  A Coke on ice tasted really good. We sat in the shade with the Cap'n and ate our sandwiches. We learned that Pubah had retired from the race, so we were the only boat left in Class 3.

In 2014, we paddled the 34 miles to Rodger's River Bay Chickee after visiting the park office and CP2, and arrived there around 10 PM very exhausted. We aimed to follow the same plan, except that we were starting a few hours later from CP2, and that along with the strong east headwind meant we were in for a late night. We started out with a few miles slogging directly into the headwind up Lopez River.

In this video, I saw some dolphins and tried to catch them on the video, while mumbling on into the wind noise about how far we have to paddle. We saw dolphins all along the route and they always cheered us up.

The route alternated between sheltered passages and wide bays exposed to the wind, which was always on the nose.

We overtook a man in a solo canoe crossing a windy bay near Plate Creek Chickee at sunset. He seemed to be in a foul mood, and was not interested in small talk.

The wind moderated a little after dark, but it was still a headwind.  Hoping to make Rodger's River Bay Chickee by 1 AM.

After three long days of paddling and two nights of sleeping four hours, it did not take long after dark for drowsiness to set in. It was very difficult to keep dream land from invading reality.  A low gray cloud in the dark sky turned into a blimp that was being managed by the ground crew (mangrove island) by means of a large net. I snapped out of it, and started to tell Lauren about the things I was seeing. The stars fell out of the sky. She saw the same thing! The mangroves turned into large industrial tubes. That one looks like a witch! That one looks like a bear! Recognizing their existance did not make these things go away, but it did help to keep us more alert. I would have pulled off and slept, but we needed to make the chickee so that we could make the most of our sleep time with some quality sleep.

We came into an area that I thought of as the Bermuda triangle. The islands on the chart were in the wrong places, so we were paddling over what was indicated to be land on the chart. In 2014, Tide Traveller helped me navigate through this area with SandyBottom and Santiago.  This year, we did not see any other Watertribers in the Everglades.  We pressed on and eventually came to the other side of the Bermuda Triangle.



We finally arrived at 1:47 AM. Lauren set up the tent while I made some Mountain House meals. The chickee was sheltered from the wind, but there were a lot of mosquitoes.

In the morning, it would take us three hours to reach the entrance to the Nightmare, and low tide was scheduled at 7 am. I was hoping for some extra sleep, but it was not to be. We set the alarm for four hours, hoping that we would still have enough time to make the tide in the Nightmare.

There were a lot of mosquitoes inside the tent. I tried to kill some, but they were too quick and wiley for me. They probably knew I did not have the energy to pursue them for long. In the morning they were all plump and full of blood.



We had come 206 miles in three days.



Link to Day 4