Vespa Riding In The Everglades

So there I was  in the Seminole Village, late morning, with increasing heat and  the nub of my journey ahead. 

 From studying my maps I figured it should be possible to cover the eight miles from the Swamp Safari to Hopkins Tropical Fruit Nursery where the asphalt from Highway 29 appeared to end.

It looked easy enough studying the Google satellite  view as the street view ends just past the swamp safari and gets nowhere near the nursery. So off I went off the paved road back into the dirt. I wondered if my path might be blocked off by a gate such as this one leading up a mysterious side road:

 The West Boundary Road is wide open and spacious and quite easy to ride for the most part.

 The forest on either side looked impenetrable with undergrowth under the pine trees.

 Me looking slightly daffy posing for the self portrait.

In its own way it was quite scenic though I wondered how creepy  it would be coming home to the ranch house on a pitch black night. I would get creeped out picking my way through the darkness.

I was of course completely alone, no sign or sound of another human aside from the buzzing of my two stroke scooter popping along at 25 miles an hour.

The photo above shows what I thought might be a dead end but as I got closer I saw the boundary road turned off to the right. The picture below shows the actual end of the road. There was no way I could squeeze the Vespa past to get those last two miles done, and even had there been I don't think I would have risked it. I don't suppose the ranchers here are any less friendly than anywhere else one might choose to trespass. However this lonely emptiness gave me an overriding sense that I should stick to the public road and mind my own business. I turned around. 

There were open spaces, strangely reminiscent of meadows, lacking only cows horses or goats grazing them.

You can see the drainage efforts in the Everglades have been quite successful. This meadow, as crazy as it sounds, reminded me of wooded pastures I've seen in Italy, small fields cultivated by small holders who value each foot of land. This spot just looked forgotten.

I enjoyed the shade where I found it and decided to keep moving until I got back to the Village where I might figure out my next move.

This is what the woodlands looked like either side of the road. There were a few tracks that meandered off out of sight but I figured whatever might be at the end of them, if anything, had nothing to do with me.

Frankly the prospect of riding the way I had come sounded intensely boring to me and I had no desire to face another hour of gluing my eyes to the dirt road ahead of me to get safely back to Highway 27. On the other hand I was pretty sure making a huge deviation almost to Lake Okeechobee would get home for a very late dinner indeed. I decided I would come back one day and approach the boundary road from the west and just see for myself how far in I could get. I am curious, that is all. 

The final stretch of road back to the swamp safari air boat base had a lot of sandy pits which could easily topple an incautious rider. Sand, especially in isolated puts like this are easy to fall over into as the front wheel suddenly slows to a stop and probably twists to one side or the other bucking the rider like a bronco. And over you go. I kept a weather eye out for these deformities in the gravel:

Four wheels better than two. I had seen a sign in the village from the Seminole Tribal Police kindly asking that ATVs be kept off the roadway. With progress come prohibitions.

Finally as I was leaving the wilderness I met some traffic. His wake was blown away from me by the wind. My lucky day.

In case there were any doubt which way to turn the safari folks put up a sign directing visitors back to the Seminole Village and from there the main road south, Snake Road, takes you to the Miccosukee reservation and their gas station at Interstate 75.

I paused at the Seminole School baseball diamond in the shade to check my map. It was clear I had no choice but to head back to Huff Bridge Road and thus back to Highway 27, Krome Avenue and so on back to the Keys. 

I started out around noon stopping to take a picture of the bridge in the middle of the village. It's name reminded me of the late Tony Hillerman novels set in the Navajo reservation where clans are a big thing.

I was about four hours away from another engine seize. Sigh.

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The week's new podcast is available at the Travel and Safety website.  Sixteen years ago a negative experience on a cycling tour changed Peter Easton’s life. That’s when he made a rash promise that he could do better. His wife held him to that promise. He has long since given up his first career as an architect in favor of combining his passion for cycling with his love of European culture and living well.  

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River of Grass

Can one get too much of the Everglades National Park? And no alligators either. This essay first appeared in December 2007. It needs saying because it's true: The Everglades generally disappoint. First time visitors expect to see huge looming warped cypress trees with Spanish Moss drooping in a ghostly semblance of Baron Samedi.There are a few spots like that, and some harbor Roseate Spoonbills: Instead the bulk of the Everglades are as Marjorie Stoneman Douglas put it so memorably and vividly, A River of Grass.There's a lookout platform just ten feet above the grass and it gives a tremendous view across the sawgrass to the clumps of hardwood trees known as hammocks. This is the Shark River Slough, 8 miles wide I'm told: And in the foreground one can see a puddle of water, proving the truth of the title of Marjorie Stoneman Douglas's book, which I have adapted as the title of this diary entry.

The Everglades National Park, a slice of mainland Monroe County east of Homestead on the tail end of State Highway 9336, is a true South Florida Wilderness. There's nothing much there at all, especially since Hurricane Wilma paid a visit in 2005 and put paid to what little humans had managed to put down in the wilderness. Hurricane Wilma didn't do much to nature because the open spaces are basically floating on water anyway and animals that live there are pretty much used to coping with a semi-submersible habitat. I'm not one of those.Needless to say, but I'll say it anyway, I love the Everglades, whether I'm rolling down Tamiami Trail, or bouncing down the gravel of the Loop Road or taking the back roads through Seminole Country. It's a complete change from the rocks and water and narrow strips of land that comprise the Florida Keys. Also its totally quiet out in the grass, a place where just the wind whistles an accompaniment to the birds.I left home at 5am today and got home exactly 12 hours and 319 miles later. It started inauspiciously enough as the Highway was wet from earlier rain. Indeed it started to sprinkle around Mile Marker 90, an hour into the ride. I took cover for ten minutes under an overhang and forced myself to stay upright and awake as I had slept badly the night before and I was exhausted. Breakfast at Denny's in Key Largo at Mile Marker 99 woke me up with chorizo, eggs, tortillas and cafe con leche.After breakfast I had half a mind to turn back and tuck myself into bed by ten o'clock but streaks of blue to the north convinced me the low lying clouds would blow away and a glorious day would burst forth. Fortune favors the bold, and I was right; I spent the rest of the day in sunshine and temperatures hovering between 80 and 90 degrees. The road to Flamingo, 50 miles from Homestead passes through fields of agriculture that remind me of nothing so much as California's Salinas Valley.

Flamingo is the park headquarters located on the shore of Florida Bay, a shallow body of water that I'm told gets no deeper than 10 feet. I've sailed to Marathon from the eastern capes hereabouts and its only 30 miles south, more than 120 miles by road...This is the former lodge, an ugly 1950's style motel that used to house visitors at the waterfront. Until Wilma invaded and now the Park Service is contemplating what to do next. Hopefully something more in keeping architecturally with the everglades location. The headquarters building, equally ugly if a good deal more bizarre in design still operates with peeling paint and lots of hurricane induced rust. The views south towards Florida Bay are tremendousand there is an excellent exhibit about the life cycles of the bay inside the building. Looking inland from the observation deck one is forced to wonder who figured this sort of parade ground set the proper tone for "downtown" Flamingo! Pity the man with the mower.

Away from the reconstituted marina and the still functioning campground, I found a chunk of dirt road with the intriguing notice No RV's Low Overhang, so naturally I decided it was time to test the 500 pound Bonneville's off road capability. I though it went quite well, but after a mile or so the potholes were still holey and the vegetation was dense as ever and the road kept rolling merrily along. So I turned back, deciding whatever there was to see at the end would have to wait for another day. I expect it was a campground unsuitable for RVs, but the road was potholed enough it wasn't terribly suitable for Triumph Bonnevilles though the machine acquitted itself just fine. I got tired of bouncing is all, and I wondered what I'd do if I got a flat. It was hot and very quiet down there, all by myself.

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Back on the main road I set my sights on the outside world, however to get there I had to overcome one more obstacle. And I should point out the Park Service does not offer supplemental oxygen to get over the top.I was tempted to coast downhill from here but I had taken my time in the morning and now it was time to pick up the pace back to civilization which was still there,not improved, I'm sorry to say, since I passed through Florida City in the morning.

All good fun comes to an end, with just another two hours down the Overseas Highway to home, but it won't be long before I'm back in range of the black spot, you are here. But not in summer, never in summer unless suicide by mosquito is on the agenda.