Once at the TA, we looked at our map and were told it was a trek/paddle section, meaning you can do either mode of travel to get to where you need to. Once we examined the map, we set out on foot to grab one easier checkpoint and came back to the TA for a quick nap before heading out for the last paddle leg.
I dozed in and out, resting my eyes but aware of my surroundings. We slept for longer than we wanted but once we were up, we moved quickly.
We set out for the paddle and I felt a new surge of nervousness. I wasn’t a fan of paddling in the night, especially when we were tired. It makes navigation so incredibly difficult. We paddled through the darkness and followed the curves of the river. I wish I had a picture to help convey just how hard navigation was.
We shined our headlamps and paddles along to the quiet night sky, surprised to see fish jumping out of the water snatching the little bugs buzzing above the water. One even jumped a little too high and landed in our canoe! I scooped up its slimy body and tossed it back in the water with a squeal. That was unexpected and let us all have a good laugh.
After about 30 minutes of paddling we came around a bend and saw about 8 canoes sitting up on the sand. This must be the area to dock our canoe and grab the next 5 checkpoints on foot.
We trekked along, pace counting and finding all of them. There was only one checkpoint we initially struggled with but saw the same couple of teams that helped us with navigation before. We also realized that every time we saw these teams, not every member was present. This is illegal in adventure racing. All team member must travel together at all times. We all questioned what was going on but kept to ourselves and repeatedly told ourselves we were going to race an honest race and follow the rules we knew.
As we got back to our canoe, we had a decision to make. Do we go get the last two canoe checkpoints or head back to the TA. We were cutting it close on time but decided we had enough of it to try and get the furthest two.
We paddled along and after a while, David felt a little bit unsure of where we were on the map. I felt like I had a good idea and helped explain where I thought we were. Navigation via map is quite difficult, I found myself correct one time and wrong the next. But between all of us, we finally realized where we were and found where we needed to dock. We were now getting extremely close on time and decided to search for just one of the two checkpoints.
This was probably the most frustrating checkpoint of the race. We set out on trek and went around in circles trying to find it. We then thought we could access it via canoe and once we came around to the other side of the inlet, our boat became stuck in the sand as it was extremely shallow.
We did a shuffle and stuck our paddles in the sand to finally get out of the shallow bits. Forget it. We had to head back.
All of our spirits were a bit low, traveling so much further than we needed and coming up short.
As we headed back in the early morning hours. Fog had moved in and when shining our headlights, it would reflect off it and make it impossible to see. We tried to keep the shore to our right, knowing it was going to be extremely easy to get lost in this area with sleep deprived minds.
We found our way back to where we had gotten off before and saw one canoe still parked on the shore. Just as we were porting our canoe over the shallow sand, the team came out and hopped in their canoe and started paddling with such speed and teamwork, I was amazed. Who was this team?
They zoomed off and the navigator yelled back at us “Turn off your lights! Trust me!” We followed his command and after our eyes adjusted we could see way better in the night than with the light bouncing off the fog. Ooops.
We paddled with such ferocity, I felt like my arms were going to fall off. I wanted to keep up with this team as we could just make out their little green glow stick as they sailed away. Following them felt like we would for sure make it back to the TA.
We were all quite exhausted once we made it back and felt the defeat of missing those far checkpoints. However, we didn’t have time to lose, we needed to get moving. We scarfed down pasta, got our bikes ready, and were one of the last teams to leave the TA.
Now, we needed to make up ground. We had a few more checkpoints to gather before we made it to the finish. The sun was just starting to come up and we cycled with speed. It was game time and we had roughly 55 miles to the finish.
We zoomed down the roads and found the next checkpoint right off a side of a trail. I was hopeful all the next checkpoints would be this easy.
As we all felt the exhaustion, we kept moving as quickly as we could.
We came to our next checkpoint area and cycled around in a frenzy. It’s gotta be here! After about 5 minutes we said forget it and moved on. As we started to go down a new road, I felt like this was now the road on the map. We were close now, I knew it. We ended up going back down another paved trail and asked a man about a “bicycle maintence stand” which was our clue. He pipes, “Yes! Right over there I think!”
He was right, we found it, wrote our clue and pedaled like mad people.
We ended up being those cyclists that cars probably aren’t fans of as we jumped curbs and cycled across roads. We needed to get closer to St. Augustine!
The closer we became, the more and more teams we saw and the more and more energy we felt.
There is just something that happens within us at the end of a race. Other teams will be dead tired and inching along and we find this adrenaline kick, unlike any other.
The more teams we see, the faster we pedal.
We find the few remaining checkpoints before St. Augustine and leave teams in the dust.
The race director was even posted at the last checkpoint before St. Augustine and gave us a quick hint as to where it was. He also let us know that we would make the cut off especially with how fast we were still able to bike.
There was a fierce wind and we lined up behind each other all taking pulls.
We navigated through the town, once again feeling excitement as people in the cars all stared at us, wondering what we were doing. There is something that makes me so giddy thinking… to all these people who just woke up a couple hours ago, that we’ve been up for the better part of 72 hours and have traveled across the state of Florida. What!?
We pedaled harder than we should have and found ourselves on the beaches of St. Augustine and at our final checkpoint.
Yesssssssssss!
We hole punched our passport, filled up our bottle of sand, loaded back on our bikes, and biked the last 5 miles or so to the finish line.
We made it to the finish with time to spare.
We did it.
Crossing the finishing line of this race is one of the best feelings I can experience. To challenge yourself and prove to yourself that you CAN, is such an incredible feeling.
We stayed around for the awards and were excited to see what place we got since we never know during the race. The last team to cross the finish line could win if they got all the checkpoints and nobody else did. So when you see other teams during the race, no one knows who really is in first place.
Due to teams cheating, like we had seen earlier, the director struggled with finding the legit winners. By the end, we found our team in fourth place for our division and 12th overall.
This was a huge, huge improvement from our first year. So close to getting on the podium but… there is always next year. 😉
I’m proud of us for competing and staying true to us. Racing an honest race, no gps, all members traveling together, all struggling together, all supporting each other. I wouldn’t have changed a single thing.
Do epic things and don’t let anyone tell you, you can’t… including yourself.
Izzy + Ozzy 