Saturday, January 18, 2003
We arose to find frost on the car and decided to bug out for a hot breakfast in a warm place. We found an IHOP down the main drag and lingered over hot coffee and stacks of pancakes—I always enjoy trying all the syrups: strawberry, blueberry, boysenberry, butter pecan, and hot maple syrup. Yum! Thoroughly energized with carbohydrate, caffeine, and sugar, we set off for our first Volksmarch at Payne’s Creek Historical Site.

The Volksmarch at Payne’s Creek turned out to be a bit more exciting than we had planned. Payne’s Creek commemorates the site of the incident that precipitated the Third (and final) Seminole War. It seems that 5 renegade Seminoles shot 3 men at a trading post, killing 2 of them. The Seminoles killed one and caught 3 of the others and handed them over to the US authorities. The authorities nonetheless decided to build a line of forts across Florida and stamp out the Seminoles. It seemed to us that the Seminoles made a good faith effort to catch and hand over the miscreants, while the authorities were looking for an excuse to pursue another war. Using thousands of troops to pursue 85 warriors encumbered by women and children, the US Army effectively won the “war” and wiped out all resistance. The Visitor’s Center recounted this story and had sample goods from the trading post displayed which I thought were quite interesting examples of frontier trading goods.

From the Visitor’s Center, the first half of the Volksmarch went past the old site of the fort and then around the perimeter of the park. We saw some migrant families with children picking oranges in the groves around the park, and I thought how serious the life of those kids is when they have to spend Saturdays working rather than playing. We curled back in thru the park entrance to Payne’s Creek, from which we took several trails. First we walked a loop to where Payne’s Creek flows into the Peace River. The creek and the river had very high water—we saw shoreline benches standing in the water and the water covered many tree trunks. The second trail went past the site of the old trading post where the murders had occurred.

The return loop led past a swampy area where we surprised by a family of wild boar. At least two large adults led a charge of the group, fortunately in the other direction. A stream of piglets followed the adults, but two trailed behind long enough for us to get a picture. Those two seemed puzzled by the sudden flight of their parents and siblings, and stood in the middle of the trail looking after them before finally following. Knowing that wild boar can be dangerous, we were happy they had taken flight rather than taken offense at our disturbing their meal. I wanted to get some more piglet pictures, but Monika mentioned that the sow might get particularly upset if I was perceived as endangering her piglet. Monika had a point, so we continued on the last loop of the Volksmarch which led across a rickety suspension bridge—the best kind—to a monument on the other side of Payne’s Creek. We wrapped up the walk drove back to the campsite.

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Along the drive we stopped off a couple places to try to find a cork for the fill valve on the air mattress, which I suspected of leaking. After a couple fruitless attempts, we once again found corks that fit at a Wal-Mart, of course. We explored back roads on our return trip using the GPS as a guide, and it became quite sandy and rutted. I vividly recalled getting stuck in Oklahoma many years ago under similar conditions, and I was really happy to have a 4-wheel drive vehicle this time so I could keep churning ahead. (Digging a 1960 Chevy Impala out from a sand dune takes a lot of time!—see previous stories of the Army period from 1970-1972)

Back at the campground I pumped up the air mattress and inserted the cork, only to be disappointed later on when we returned from a walk and found it deflated. We had a leisurely lunch and warmed ourselves by the fire for a couple of hours. Thus refreshed, we decided we had enough energy to do the Highland Hammock Volksmarch.

We walked directly from our campground for a mile to the official start point and signed up. The trail takes in several nature trails that loop off the main ring road thru the park. One went past a 1,000 year old oak tree, which was a very impressively gnarled old thing indeed. Another traversed a Cypress swamp on a narrow, rickety, and slippery catwalk with just one low railing. The swamp had dark, spooky water which acted as a perfect mirror for the trees. Other nature trails traverse ancient and newer hammocks, which are wooded areas.

Highland Hammock was the first state park in Florida, and many of the facilities were built by the Civilian Conservation Corps. To honor this effort, there is a small but informative CCC museum along the walk which I highly recommend. I was particularly interested in the fact that the average enrollee gained over 13 pounds in the first few weeks. I infer from this that the average young man of that time was in fact undernourished, a point that is hard to believe for our generation. Other pictures showed the skills learned by the CCC boys and all in all, this museum was very upbeat. Speaking of beat, there was an odd assortment of people outside the museum beating on a variety of drums. Apparently a group supporting “Primal Drumming” brings an assortment of drums to the clearing in front of the museum and encourages anyone who feels like it to join in a percussion jam session. I only wish that our friend Brad, the professional percussionist, had been there to see it and maybe give them a few tips so that they would sound a little more in synch. I tuned it out while we were in the CCC museum, but Monika said it was getting on her nerves. Perhaps we should have tried Primal Screams to go with the Primal Drumming, but we decided to go back to the campsite and have dinner before it got dark.

Click on the film reel to view a 15 second video.
If you can't view the video go to http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/ to download the free QuickTime viewer.

The sun was setting as we walked back, and the temperature was dropping rapidly. Monika built a warming fire while I fixed some nice hot soup. We stayed up just long enough to watch a spectacular full moon rising among the trees and then we retreated to the tent. Monika had 4 layers of clothes from the waist up and 2 layers from the waist down, and was still cold. I had 2 layers from the waist up and 1 layer from the waist down and felt warm in my sleeping bag. Altho I tried very hard to get the plug in the air mattress so that it would not leak, the mattress went flat during the middle of the night and we were left lying on the cots. The cots are certainly better than lying directly on the ground, but they are still uncomfortable enough to keep you away, particularly if you’re cold to boot. It was not a night to write home about.