This adventure begins as an idea in the minds of Peter Murk and Dave
Hamilton. We realized the need to get some cycling miles in for a wide
range of reasons, from staying sane, feeding our cycling addiction, and
getting a jump start on the upcoming racing season, and decided a trip
to Florida in February would fit the bill quite nicely. You can enjoy riding
through deep snow in Toronto for only so long before the mind starts to
remember the ease and joy of cruising along dry roads in a warm breeze.
Touring in February is an idea that I liked the sound of very much and
so hatched the plan to fly into Jacksonville With our touring steeds, and
make our way south along the coast to Fort Lauderdale where we’d catch
a plane back to the cold ten days later.
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The first task of any cycling/camping tour is to decide what you need
to bring along and make sure it all fits on the bike as balanced and stable
as possible. The days leading up to departure were occupied with anticipation,
reviewing and revising lists, and talking about what we might need for
ten days tenting. The weather that time of year can range from hot to down
right cold and ‘days of hard rain’ is always a possibility. I have a Trek
520 with front and rear panniers and have already done some extended summer
touring so it was just a matter of hauling out the old gear list and modifying
the clothes to suit the possibility of a wider range of temperatures and
conditions. I’ve had my 520 for nearly two years and have 26,000kms on
it as I use it for commuting as well. I’m always pleased with the loaded
feel of the bike as most of the bumps seem dampened down and smooth and
it handles very well when I pack the weight low. Low center of gravity
and all that stuff. Since we knew we’d be close to a wide array of eateries
most of the time we dispensed with the cooking scene for this trip. No
stoves, mess kits, dirty dishes, etc.
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Boxing up the steed for a plane ride required more dismantling than
I’d done to my 520 at any one time. The night before departure it became
apparent that nothing I could do short of severely damaging the bike was
going to get the seatpost out. So I planned to take it to the local bike
shop in the morning which I did and they had it out in no time. Never having
moved the seat since the bike was new caused the seizure. If it ain’t broke,
why fix it? My legs are the same length every year. A little grease in
there or maybe a bit more scheduled maintenance now and then, might keep
the parts moving that need to come apart at times. By getting two boxes
each from the local bike store, we were able to cut and telescope the boxes
out, overlapping to whatever size we needed to fit the bikes. A roll of
duct tape and some fragile signs and we were all set. Keep the boxes light
we were told. You don’t want to piss off the luggage dudes by adding heavy
to awkward. We’ve both heard horror stories about baggage (mis)handlers
and lift truck blades spearing packages that are deemed ungainly to handle…or
mishandle. Sometimes it seems bikes receive the most hazardous treatment
from the time they disappear at check in to the time you see them again
at your destination. Why is anyone’s guess. But we were lucky this time
and landed in Jacksonville Florida on a Tuesday night in February about
8:30pm and began putting the recreational vehicles together under a staircase
in the airport. It was perfect. Even a carpet to wipe our greasy hands
on!
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Peter had his whole rig together in well under an hour and strolled
around to ask what might be the best way to get out of the airport and
pointing in the direction of Fort Clinch State Park since we had no idea
about road and or traffic conditions outside. The map showed only super
highways in and out of Jacksonville airport. It took me closer to two hours
to get my RV from a million parts into a functioning, serviceable, loaded
touring bike. I was awash in a sea of bags, racks, fenders, screws, lights,
brake bits, wheels, Allen Keys, and lightweight camping gear but all was
under control. I just wanted everything working perfectly from the start
and short of the five or six flats I incurred for the ten days, the bike
worked flawlessly.
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So as I built and adjusted, Peter kept returning with horror stories
from the State Troopers he’d been speaking with, about how we were ‘crazy’
to try and ride a bicycle on the roads of Florida at the best of times.
And how we really had a death wish to be pulling out of here after dark.
Even motorcyclists aren’t safe and get killed all the time. Drinking and
driving was rampant by their accounts, yet they were standing around an
airport instead of out there patrolling these supposedly lunatic infested
roads and highways. Go figure. We couldn’t help but wondering what we were
in for out there. One thing was sure. No matter what we were riding out
with our lights on and finding a place to pitch two tents and get to the
morning light where things are bound to be clearer and we can take it from
there.
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Around 10:30pm we pulled out into the warm air and I noted a smell of
foliage I’d never smelt before and something else which in hindsight I
think was some kind of industry pollution. Our worries about traffic and
finding a decent road soon dissolved into happy glee at the flat dry roads
and general lack of any traffic at all. That was my first glimpse into
the omnipresent American outlook toward cycling or any other type of transportation
other than the almighty car. The State Troopers and most Americans and
Canadians as well would never even entertain the thought of riding a bicycle
on busy open roads with cars at night or any other time. The whole 1065kms
we rode I found the Florida drivers to be nothing but courteous, and cautious
toward us. Many times on a narrow road cars would slow to our speed from
their full highway speed and wait patiently for an opening in oncoming
traffic before passing. No honking, no dirty looks and only one or two
near misses or ‘buzzings’ as we call them. All in all the danger of the
traffic was much lower than at any time riding in Toronto. Maybe we’re just
conditioned from the big city riding we’re used to. I was glad to have
my helmet mirror along anyway. With the mirror I can know when it’s safe
to veer out to avoid a bump or sewer grate or when to stay tight into the
roads edge. So traffic a non issue and the bikes working fine, off we sped
into the night breaking new ground as I like to call it when I’m riding
where I’ve never been before.
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We rode through the night with our fully charged lights shinning brightly
and soon entered a section of highway where there were no street lights.
The stars bright overhead and a sense of beginning adventure sped us along.
We came to a crossroad and stopped at our first general corner store/gas
station where I hate to admit I ate a whole ton of sugary junk in the next
ten days. We chatted a little to a rough looking local character on a rusty
bike who looked like he should stand a little closer to the razor next
time he shaves. He asked us for money before we left. We didn’t give him
any. We were on a budget and planning to sleep anywhere we could find for
the next ten nights and couldn’t afford to support some guys cigarette
habit instead of our own hotel room. Turning east and heading toward the
sea we next stopped to put on more clothes. It was cooling down as the
night progressed. Some guy pulled up to us in a van on the dark road as
we were stopped. I half expected a beer bottle or a gun to come out the
window but nothing like that ever came close to happening. The big bad
America you see on the brainwash tube is not a true cross section of American
culture. Instead this guy was a mountain biker and gave us a whole lot
of information about the area. But at the end of a rather long chat, warned
us about the drivers out on this road at this time of night.
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We finally got to Fort Clinch State Park around 1:30am and rode in to
find a place to pitch the tents. At the end of the road was a cul-de-sac
by the sea with very large RV’s and trailers occupying all the spots. We
rode back out a ways and came to a barricaded off dirt road/path which
was more to our way of thinking. Out of sight, out of mind. We went just
far enough up this path around a bend or two and decided this was camp
#1. We picked a point where we could set up just off the road just incase
someone did want to try and drive along here before we’re up and gone.
But when I put my tent up under a tree and crawled in, many thorns came
poking through the bottom and into my knees and hands. So much for
staying off the road. We pitched the tents on the road and I proceeded
to lose consciousness immediately as I was tired.
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The light of our first full day of the adventure saw us up with less
than six hours sleep. It was a promising morning. Sunny and fairly warm,
at least from what we’re used to in February. I noticed the different foliage
in the daylight. Things I’d never seen growing outside before like cactus
and palm trees. I had never been further south than Pennsylvania before
this trip. This was all new to me and I was savoring the excitement of
a new experience. Setting down the tents and packing up the steeds, we
went back to the washroom we’d noticed at the end of the road to start
the day in a civilized condition. First we had to pose for our habitual
morning picture taken on delay with Peters heavy tripod which he hauled
the whole way. We were on the road by ten o’clock looking for some breakfast.
One of my favorite things about cycle touring is the necessity to consume
copious amounts of food at frequent intervals. Heading south, we came to
a small general ‘bacon and eggsy’ looking place, and decided this would
do as the fuel stop for the time being. I’m vegetarian and so often have
to order things separately as most breakfast ‘combos’ come with some kind
of dead thing. The waitress went into a serious speed wobble when I tried
to swap out my meat portion with some more home fries. We learned from
the huge delay this caused, that in the future we’d just order and swap off
plate to plate if I couldn’t avoid having carcass in my order.
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With the fuel tanks full, the weather beautiful and our spirits high
we started doing what we really came to do; ride. Southward hoe and try
to keep to the sea as much as possible was the plan. Peter doesn’t know
the concept of riding easy. He’s a very strong cyclist and has only two
speeds that I’ve ever seen and they are fast and hammer. So I was pushing
most of the time a bit harder than I otherwise might have had I been riding
alone. Often we set each other off and go into hammer mode for long periods
of time. We both like to ride like this but I was not turning food into
energy at my usual peak fitness rate and the dreaded bonk came to visit
a couple of times. Several hours of steady riding at a good pace and I
started to fade badly. It was just that I was completely out of fuel and
I took a serious energy level dive. I needed food and I needed it now.
I was shaking and going through one of my starvation fades. So we stopped
at the first store we came to and it was lucky that it happened to be right
across the road from the ferry we had to take to avoid a fifty mile inland
trip to a busy bridge. I bought and stuffed in some donuts, tarts and all
manor of sugary fast fuel stashing a pack of cookies in my ‘kitchen’ pannier
just for good measure. The lights came back on in my head within two minutes
flat. I relearned the hard way never to be caught without fuel when touring.
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While I was refueling, we took a look at the map and saw that we must
be close to this ferry we had to find so asked a guy outside the store
having a smoke where it was. He told us with a weird sense of satisfaction
and malicious joy that it was right across the highway, but that it wasn’t
running due to some accident. It turned out that a transport truck and
trailer loaded with seafood had somehow fallen off the ferry and destroyed
the dock and as a result, the ferry was closed until further notice. Apparently
the truck had become stuck and they tried some hare brained maneuver like
driving the ferry away with the truck’s brakes on half on land. I don’t
know what really happened there but it was clear that we, nor anyone else
was going to be going over on the ferry that day. So after being interviewed
by a reporter from a local paper, as the men from Toronto who’s travel
plans were disrupted, we resigned ourselves to the extra detour and started
inland. We didn’t really mind the extra miles as that’s what we were in
Florida for was to ride.But I did want to get down the map to some areas
that looked like nice riding along the coast and now we faced a long haul
back into the heart of Jacksonville at rush hour on what could well be
dangerous roads.
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I was looking at the land right across the water that the ferry would
have taken us to and thinking there’s got to be a way. All we need is someone
with a boat… and then I spotted a 15 foot fishing boat doing circles in
the water near a dock and another guy backing a truck and trailer down
the launch ramp to pick him up. I thought, if he’s doing circles he has
gas and time to burn, and just might take us if we ask real nice. So I
yelled to Peter (up ahead cruising as he usually was) to turn in here!
He hit the dock and I took the guy in the truck and sure enough a few minutes
latter we were sitting in Buddys 125 horse power boat hanging on to our
loaded bikes, crossing the water as fast as the thing would take us.
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The tide was out and we landed low down on a private dock on the far
side. Peter passed the bikes up to me and then climbed the barnacle encrusted
ladder himself. The water was deep and the gangway narrow and I had to
be really careful not to dump the bikes in the drink. That would mess up
the trip in a real hurry. So after a quick photograph and a declined offer
of our monetary gratitude, Buddy sped off and we set about walking our
bikes past expensive looking private yachts to find a way off this dock
and back onto the road. There was no one around except for a few gardeners
working on the grounds of the nearby estates. We came to an iron gate which
would have been hard to climb even without bikes. Getting bikes on the
other side was not going to happen any other way than to open the gate.
And it was locked solid.
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After a full minute or two of starting to wonder how the hell we were
going to overcome this one, Peter found the button to release the magnetic
lock and the gate swung freely open. We laughed with some relief at ourselves
as how stupid we would have looked had we called to someone passing as
we were thinking might be the next thing to try. The gate is for keeping
people off the dock and away from the yachts not trapped on the dock. So
we wheeled up into the subdivision free again and asked a gardener how’s
the best way to get out of here. He seemed amused at our loaded bikes and
that we came from across the water into this ritzy residential area where
not many through travelers pass. He gave us long detailed directions maybe
half of which I remembered but at least we knew which way to head and there’s
always the next person to ask. Pretty hard to mess up anyway when near
water, as fully half your potential directions aren’t an option unless
you want to get wet.
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Out on the road again, dinner was becoming ever more foremost in my
mind (and stomach). I’d just about burned up all that sugary stuff I gobbled
at the ferry disaster site. I was always watching for a bakery where I
could get some good bread. I’d been told before I’d left ‘oh you won’t
find good bread down there’. All they have is white wonder bread and they
even think it’s good for them. So when we saw a bakery beside a bike store
in Ponte Vedra Beech, I hollered to Peter to pull in. It turned out to
be high priced place with homemade healthy and tasty food. We ended up
having a pizza slice each and it was really good. Peter kept up with the
sample breads we were offered and like a true cycle tourist, cleared out
at least two of the whole sample trays. A little map viewing after our
snack showed not much of anything to the south after this except a couple
of State Parks which is just about perfect for breaking camp #2.
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We usually traveled up to about seven or eight at night which was well
after dark this time of year. Our rechargeable lights with the home made
batteries were our lifeline out there on the desolate roads. We both have
great lights and over drive them with heavy duty homemade batteries. Not
only do cars see us, but between us we light the road ahead about as strong
as car headlights. We still had battery juice left after the three and
a half hours of night riding we’d done the night before. But where to charge
them next was becoming a concern. We started bringing in the chargers and
plugging in for an hour or so in where ever place we had dinner. There’s
always a plug somewhere for the vacuum if nothing else. Even left on the
floor by the entrance, most people don’t even notice something plugged
into the wall and the rest haven’t a clue what they are anyway. So when
we walk into a restaurant, already looking weird in our cycling garb, we
start looking under tables and behind decorative plants for an electrical
outlet. Good thing the USA is a big place and they get all types including
cyclists.
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The headwind we battled all day had died down a little after sunset
and made for a pleasant ride south ward out of the built up area and into
darkness. I was still amazed how flat the roads were. Not even a roller
unless climbing up for an overpass or bridge. We were on the look out for
some sign saying Guana State Park but never did see it, even the next morning
in daylight. Tired now and looking for a place to sleep we came on a ‘Ped-X-ing’
in the middle of the dark highway. We checked it out and found a parking
lot had been carved out of the bush across from the ocean. Obviously for
beach goers in busier times. It was vacant and gated off right now and
that made it perfect for camp #2. No muss no fuss. Brand new pavement to
sleep on. Thank heaven for the Thermarest air mattress .
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I had a better, deeper sleep the second night and arose to my 39th birthday,
in a parking lot to a bright sunny promising day and the distant sound
of the ocean. If someone had told me as a child that I’d be waking up in
a parking lot at the age of 39 I might well have been worried. Peter was
up before me and walked across the highway to check out the beach taking
a picture of our camp #2 from a sand ridge along side the road. I got up
and we posed for our usual morning picture and then set down and packed
up the RVs. We were out of water as I was forgetting the essential things
like making sure to fill all three of my water bottles before heading into
a desolate part of the map. It’s no big deal in a built up part of the
world like Florida as water can’t be more than an hours ride away. I’ve
seen myself in rural Nova Scotia run out of water over night and have to
go a long way to the next chance for hydration. So after a walk over to
see the beach and ocean we were back on the flat road south bound. Not
more than a few kilometers, we happened on a work crew hard at building
yet another beach home for some lucky owner and filled our water bottles
at the back of their work truck from the communal water jug.
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About twenty kilometers further along we came upon a convenience store/gas
station and I was able to satisfy my drug addiction…coffee! I had more
snack junk not knowing how far it could be before a real breakfast stop.
It was getting hot already and we prudently elected to apply liberal quantities
of sunscreen to our lily white winter skin. Peter was always stressing
the importance of getting the sunscreen on early as a burn can really mess
up the whole trip. On a bike, you have to be out all day or you don’t go
anywhere. Hard to ride when you’re cowering from the sun with a nasty burn.
We ended up cruising through the morning sunshine all the way to Saint
Augustine before we came to what turned out to be the best eatery of the
whole trip at least in my opinion. It was a vegetarian health food kind
of place. Laid back attitude, trendy even and the food was cheap, plentiful
and real tasty. It’s called the Manatee Café and is well worth the
side trip off the I-95 if your cruising down by car.
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The whole town of St. Augustine is quite different from the usual stripmall/condo/beach
stuff so much of Florida has in abundance. It was apparently,
settled by the Spanish in the sixteenth century and many of the original
buildings still stand today. It seems to have a flavor all of it’s own. We
walked our bikes through an outdoor, open mall type street, which was a
mix of old and new buildings. There was a woman doing a mime routine all
painted silver. I didn’t even think she was a live person at first. We
got a picture of her and she was quite an attraction and had the hefty
tips pail to prove it. Power to her standing so still out in the hot sun
like that.
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We were back on the road and rolling south by early afternoon battling
a stiff headwind out of the south. It felt really great to be doing over
a hundred kilometers a day again. Getting the cobwebs out of the legs.
Sure beats the indoor rollers back home in front of the TV with a tour
de France tape on. Never a dull moment with the scenery rolling past. Even
if it’s not the most breath taking sights in the world, it’s still some
place I’ve never been before. In around Flagler Beach as the day was drifting
into evening, I was starting to become aware that it was time for one of
my favorite parts of touring…Dinner Time. We eventually found a seafood
place and Peter sprang for my birthday dinner of Swordfish Steak. I don’t
usually eat fish and never eat red meat, but when traveling in a coastal
area I don’t mind to try the local seafood once or twice. Being vegetarian
is something I do as I believe it’s healthier for me and the planet but
I’m not so ridged as to miss local cultural dishes. The dinner was excellent.
It was dark when we rolled back out south bound and planned to sleep where
ever we could. Neither of us was all that tired so we agreed to ride a
while longer but the lights were dimming and needing a charge by now having
close to five hours drain on them.
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We figured we’d make it to Tomoka State Park and maybe leave our batteries
at the gate house to charge. To get there, we had to cross the causeway
at Ormond and head inland and back track north a bit. It was around nine
o’clock when we were heading in through Ormond and Peters lights had given
in to discharged battery and mine were not far behind. I was using my handlebar
Cat Eye light as backup and trying to save what little I had left in the
big system in case it was really dark approaching the State Park. Since
we’d be coming back this way, Peter had the good idea of leaving the batteries
somewhere over night to charge and getting them in the morning. Then we
starting thinking where could we leave them? A store? A gas station? Fire
hall?!
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Then there it was. Right across the street. The Ormond Fire Hall. We
were tired and got the idea to knock and ask if we could set up the tents
on a piece of grass out the back. At the very least we could maybe leave
the batteries there for charging. We knocked on the door and pleaded our
case. They were a bit leery at first but within minutes decided we were
really just a couple of harmless Canadians on a bike tour who really just
wanted a place to crash for the night. They turned out to be really friendly
guys and opened up the station to us. By midnight we had taken showers,
the tents were set up out in the back garden and I had crawled off to sleep. But
Peter was in on their computer system tweaking and teaching them things
they’d not even imagined they could do with a computer. That’s the line
of work Peter does so he knows computers. He got them connected to the
internet from the station and showed them a whole realm they’d only wondered
about. So the benefit was mutual. In the morning they offered us coffee
and farewells and good lucks all round. We learned a new survival
technique that night. Fire Halls can be a great sanctuary for the traveling
weary on a budget and a bike in small town America. I don’t know if I should
be spilling this secret on the internet. Just lets all stay friendly when
doing this and keep up the good ambassador on a bike thing so the next
cyclists get welcomed as we did.
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