What I wouldn't give for a good foot rub right now.

My shins ache. My legs, covered in a mysterious rash, itch. My soles throb. Muscles in my back and legs, muscles I'd forgotten I had, cry out, stiff and sore.

All this from a day hike. A seven mile day hike. In Florida, of all places!

But not like any other day hike I've experienced, anywhere on this planet.

"This trail sucks!" I hopped over a slippery blowdown , one foot caught in thick mud over my boots. Then the other. Standing in water knee deep, water the color of coffee with cream. A giant sucking sound as I freed one boot, then the next. Thwock! Thwock!

"It's the mud that sucks," said Kent Wimmer, our trip leader, as the next victim struggled through the sticky stuff, slyly hidden under the sullied water of the slough.

This is the Florida Trail, in Bradwell Bay. Backpacker Magazine called it one of the ten toughest hikes in the United States. I won't argue. I feel sorry for the trio of backpackers and their pack-laden dog we left behind us an hour ago. I'm  *so* glad this is a day hike.

"It's the lowest I've ever seen it," said Kent, who's on his fifth traverse of Bradwell Bay. He'll be returning this Tuesday to chaperone thru-hiker Joan Hobson through the wilderness. He runs an annual hike for the Florida Trail Association Apalachee Chapter, and always manages to sucker...I mean, convince...a few neophytes along each year. I have no excuse. I asked for this. I've been warned. I knew what I was  getting into. Or so I thought.

"This is low?" I question, watching as Ralph, behind me, slips and plunges into a mudhole up to his waist.

"Yup," says Jerry. "Wait 'til you see The Pond. That's where you take photos to impress your friends."

Bradwell Bay's swamp  - deep in accumulated layers of humus, the waterlogged rotting remains of leaves, mosses, and grass - often blankets the entire forest in water ranging from knee-deep to chest-deep. We're lucky. Even with the rain a couple days ago, there are dry patches between the mudholes. Okay, so they’re only little islands of slightly harder muck accumulated around tree roots. Cypress knees jut out of the dark water. Sweetbay magnolia towers overhead.

It's an obstacle course. Winter blowdowns force us into deeper water. We clamber up and over and through tangles of brittle branches and thorny vines. Bloody gashes appear on bare skin.

And then there's the muck. The sucking muck. The muck that oozes into tennis shoes. Linda is in front of me, making funny
noises. "Ewwww. Goooo."  Squish. Squish. Squish.  I'm glad I wore my high-topped, double-tongued Vasque boots.

The muck that grabs so tightly at heavy boots that you have to cantilever yourself against a tree and reclaim your foot with a resounding "thwock!"

The muck that coats the swamp floor so deeply that only a foot of my fully-extended Lekis peeps out above waterline as I probe ahead for footing.

The muck that sucks so hard on my hiking poles that they become disjointed. I see the inner workings, the springs, for the first time. I require help to push my poles back together again before they are ruined. I probe less deeply after learning *that* lesson.

Water seems to gravitate to the trail corridor. Or did some diabolical trail builder blaze the trail right into the deepest sloughs?

"Keep right! Keep right!" Ann yells back.

Thwock. "Aaaaaaahhh!" There’s a big splash. Another hiker down in a hole. Looks like Tom this time. "Watch out! Big hole on the left!" he yells. I'm glad I'm second to last in line.

The hiking poles are a necessity. It’s the first time I've found them of any use in Florida. Some of these blackwater troughs have pits deep enough to swallow you whole. Especially The Pond. Here, all we can see is water in every direction. And trees. Trail? What trail? Look for the bright orange rope. Follow it closely.

"Left side." Someone yells from far ahead; I can't make out who, through the dense brush. "Switch to the right in the middle..."

"Aaaaaaaahhhh!"  Splash. Repeat twenty times.

I'm one of the lucky third of the group who's managed to keep dry from mid-thigh up, despite the frequent splashes of my comrades. Even with poles, it's easy to slip in the unseen muck and lose your footing. Or wrench your foot under a hidden root, break an ankle. Or step on a slimy log. Or plunge into a deep hole. It's not a place to visit alone.

And I'm so glad I'm not carrying 35 pounds of gear on my back.

It's easy to get lost in this wilderness. You spend so much time looking down, blazes can be miseed. In a couple of burnt-out areas - "forest fire of '98," says Kent - there are NO blazes at all, just a faint footpath, or a bit of string.

Looking down, you see the subtleties of the swamp. Delicate sundew plants, glistening with droplets on reddish-orange leaves; a box turtle, its shell rotten with algae. Three hikers manage to wade by a baby snake, its slight black and red frame drawn back into a pose saying, "don't mess with me, I mean business!" before I point it out, ready to strike at ankles. Another more colorful box turtle cowers in a mudbank. Oddly veined in deep crimson, bladder-like cups of green line one section of trail-"pitcher plant," says Linda. Delicately fringed bursts of white bog buttons break up the greenery of the marsh.

Kent points upward. "This is what's special about this forest." Towering above, a centuries-old loblolly pine. From its height and circumference, it’s  ikely one of the oldest in Florida. It’s surrounded by neighbors of similar size. "The loggers never made it back here," Kent says.

After four hours of slogging, wading, and slipping, we reach the hammock. It’s another victim of the forest fire, but lively with young shrubs, yellow flags of Carolina jessamine, vivid buttery sprays of polygala. Time for a lunch break. Relax. Pour water from my boots. A pointless pursuit, it turns out.

Tom's bummed that we're no longer knee-deep in water. The lush hammock of Bradwell Island, the only place hikers can safely stop and camp in this section, is thick with sweetbay magnolia and the elusive black titi. Small puddles begin to appear in the trail. He stomps through them like a happy child, spraying squishy mud on Linda, Kent, and me.

"Bet *your* mother never made you write 'I will not stomp in mud puddles' one hundred times," I said, as he gleefully stomps onward. The water deepens, and rises over my boots again. This part of the swamp is different, though. These are stretches of clear water, the bottoms a solid limestone base. White sand sparkles through water tinted in hues of iced tea.

We reach the pine woods. No more swamp! There’s a collective sigh of relief. We have only two more soggy obstacles ahead: the branches of Monkey Creek. Water flows swiftly through the first crossing.

"Watch out for that dark spot!" Kent warns. "It's a deep, deep hole!"  I stop mid-stream in the current to take a photo, fascinated by the layers of color in the water, hues of brown, golden orange, and yellow, like a caramel and fudge parfait.

In the uplands, tie-tie turn the distant woods to a white mist, a brilliant backdrop for the sand pine scrub. We follow an old road, pausing frequently to muse at bear scat.

"Bear aren't stupid," Kent says. "Looks like this is a bear highway, all right. Would you crash through palmetto when you could amble down a trail?"

It's been a good hike, a tiring hike. Unlike last year's crew, who lost a cell phone and a watch in the murky waters, the only tribulations today have been the loss of a water bottle and a forgotten camera, retrieved by the hiker who'd left it behind at lunchtime. Still, my muscles ache. My boots feel like lead.

"You earn every step here," Kent said.

And I did. Whew!

This article has special meaning for me, since it launched my outdoor writing career in Florida and my series of Florida hiking books. After writing up this trip report and posting it to an online hiking group I belonged to, the AT-L, I was contacted by editor Karen Berger to provide a version for GORP.com. That interaction led to my contract for the 50 Hikes series in Florida, and to articles for Florida Hiker magazine and Backpacker.

Reprint rights available
Audio version available
For more information about Bradwell Bay, see FloridaHikes.com