Juniper Springs to Alexander Springs

                  OUCHCALA  
 Shawn and I had originally planned to go on a camping trip with James for a week. But after much talking we realized that we just couldn't afford to go. So after talking to James we all decided to go on a 3 day 2 night hike in Ocala. As you all should know by now Ocala is not my favorite place to be LOL (I'll say it again ... that place hates me LOL ) But regardless of me liking Ocala or not I was really excited to go on this hike. This would be mine and Shawn's first 3/2 . Shawn talks to Ken and he is able to go. Yaaaaaaaaaaaay !!!!! It was going to be the 4 of us again. Ken had some friends that were going to try to go but all were unable to make it. 
 Shawn and I finished work on Thursday and went to Travel Country to pick up the few things that we needed. Sadly they didn't have anything we needed. So we decided that we would just leave early on Friday morning and stop at the grocery store to grab a few things ( coffee , creamer , water , fig newtons. ) and then stop at 7eleven to get Motrin ( because I forgot them at the grocery store ) and my sleeping juice ( Neurosleep ). Then we make it to Gander Mountain to get a few water bladders and dehydrated foods. Welllllllllllllll... just my luck... the one dehydrated food that I tried at home and set well with my stomach and didn't taste bad ( chicken and rice ) , they were out of. GREAT NOW WHAT ??? LOL So, I decided on some "Mexican chicken and Rice " and some " Chicken Teriyaki " in hopes that I would be able to stomach them both. Fingers crossed here.
 Okay we get the stuff we need from everywhere and off we go. To our surprise we are still on track with time. Shawn and I both hate to be the ones to hold someone up. We hate for people to wait on us. We both hate to run late.
 After realizing that we were still on track we both kinda relaxed some on the rest of the ride to Ocala.
 We get there and the lady told Shawn it was going to be $16.50 to leave the truck there for 2 night. I almost had a stroke when I heard her say this.... WOW that is high. But whatever... what are you going to do you know.
 Shawn finds where we are going to park and we get all of our stuff out and start sorting threw and getting things organized in their own little bags and packed in our bags.
 James and Ken show up and we are almost done. Felling bad for the hold up Shawn apologizes to James... James kindly reminds him that we are on vacation. No worries no stress no agenda ( other than getting to camp around 4pm each day  ). You could see the relief wash over Shawn's face with this.
 We are ready to go ....

The 4 of us all ready to go

James ~ Ken & Shawn waiting for me again Im sure LOL

Okay well here goes nothing. LOL We are up and running ( well walking ). Im so excited to do this hike even with the testy relationship I personally have with Ocala. Im not too worried about much. Shawn had me try some new things to try to keep my feet from getting blisters ( I was hopeful ) and even tho I knew it was supposed to be cold I wasn't worried about that either since last time I stayed pretty warm. I was really hopeful in the whole thing.

 Okay we hit the trail and everyone is talking and laughing and having a good time. 
 Ken takes the lead. Yep this seems to be Kens place in our " walking order " with James behind him then Shawn and then Me. Sometimes I end up between James and Shawn ... depending on whats going on around us or how I'm feeling. 
Here are a few pictures from the beginning of our hike.

Shawn - I love this relaxed smile

Juniper Prairie Wilderness

Ken and Shawn ( with sun glare Sorry )

Juniper Springs & Hidden Pond

  

The hike so far was good. It was a beautiful day. Kinda cool in the morning but starting to warm up threw the day.
 We saw a lot of bear paw prints and bear poop. These things should have made me nervous but I did notice that the prints were not going in the same direction that we were headed so for some reason I was comforted by this. ( Like this bear who left his prints is the ONLY bear in ONF lol )
 We came to a road that we had to cross over and of course boys will be boys and they were dancing in the street. LOL

Shawn dancing in the street

No worries there was NO traffic so they were safe. ;-)

picking back up on the FT on the other side of the street

We walked about 5ish miles on Friday. There isn't much to really tell about the hike on Friday. It was nice and relaxing with great conversation and great company. Here are a few pictures...

Orange Blaze

James checking the Data Book

Ken ~ James ~ Shawn

We came upon a wonderful "bridge thing ". UGGGGGGHHHHHH ... this one has no rails.... COME ON REALLY ????? Okay self you got this one... if you fall off its no big deal its not high and its fry under it... no muck or mush or water nothing ... 

Okay mastered yet another stupid bridge. I have to admit they are getting easier as of now. LOL

SUCCESS LOL 

We get passed the bridge ( the only one on this entire hike BTW ). Here is a picture of the view that we got often this time. Thank God this hike wasn't in the wide open Prairies like most of Ocala's hikes have been. We had a lot of trees and canopy this time. It was so nice.

We push on and come across some Bear Paw prints that were a little too impressive if you ask me. LOL

Front Paw

Back Paw ( looks like a small child's foot print to me )

And one of the 3 guys where we saw the Bear Prints.

I don't remember what but they found something pretty funny

Shortly after this we come to our " home " for the night. James knew about this camp site as he has stayed here a few years before. And all I can say is it was PERFECT !! There was no clearing to be done. Just get the hammocks hung up and the fire wood collected and the fire started. Then it would be relaxing time. Time to chill for the night.

James & Shawn's bags and the fire pit

James getting his hammock hung up

this is the area that I would hang mine & Shawn's hammock

Ken resting before he hung up his hammock

Shawn putting the bottom half of his pants before looking for fire wood

  Hammocks are hung and fire wood is collected ( Shawn has the battle scars to prove it LOL. He got smacked pretty good by an Oak Tree on his hip that left a pretty good bruise. That tree put up a good fight but Shawn won the battle. ;-)  )

warming my piggy toes ( Shawn is too see his feet in the right corner )

Shawn relaxing

Ken & James working on the fire

Our beds for the night

My hammock

Ken relaxing

James doing something LOL its hard to catch him still for pictures on this hike sheeeesh 

 Now we decide its time to get dinner going. I'm kinda apprehensive about dinner because I don't know how my stomach is going to react to these foods. I haven't tried either one of these. 
 I get water boiling to add to these dehydrated dinners. While the water is heating up we all seemed to notice at the same time, the most amazing sunset we have seen on all of our hikes. Who needs dinner by candle light when you have an amazing sunset like this.... I would take camping and eating by a sun set like this over candles in a fancy restaurant any day !!!!

Dinner is done re-hydrating. Shawn seems pretty happy with his lasagna. So that gave me high hopes for this Mexican Chicken and Rice. Smells good ... lets see how it taste.... OMG this is NASTY !!!!!!!!!!  How disappointing.... I ate as much of it as I could but when I started gagging that was it I couldn't eat anymore. LOL Thank goodness I wasn't very hungry. 
 As the temps started to drop we sat around the fire and talked and laughed ( told a few jokes ... haha ) drank some hot chocolate and ate some fig newtons. Shawn and I decided that we should be heading to our hammocks soon as we were both getting tired. So I drank my sleeping juice and staggered off to my hammock. Only to lay there awake most of the night. Not to mention having to get out of the warmth of my sleeping bag and hammock to pee 4 times. Worst part of this camping / hiking thing when its cold I swear .... I hate peeing outside but I really hate peeing outside when its cold.
 On the plus side I didnt get cold in my hammock this time ( again ). So that made me happy. Oh I forgot to mention earlier that my husband was  successful in preventing my feet from blistering. YAAAAAAAAAAAAY !!!!!!!!!!
  Saturday Morning 

Everyone is up and the fire is started. I get the water going for coffee and everyone's breakfast. Shawn's and James' Oatmeal, Kens dehydrated stuff for breakfast burrito's and my grits.

Ken

James

Sorry I didn't get a picture of Shawn and I because we were eating at the same time. LOL
 We get breakfast done and let our bellies settle and we got all of our hammocks broke down and the fire put out and it was time to start the long day of 10ish miles. ( oh my what have i gotten myself into LOL )

The guys are ready to head out ... waiting on me yet again i'm sure lol

As we start out I'm not in the most positive mood. I tend to be a bit on the crabby side when I don't sleep well and knowing I have 10ish miles to walk with that little bit of sleep does't help my mood any. I tell the guys bye and plug my ears with LOUD bouncy music to help me wake up and keep up a steady pace. Yep it works well for me. And it keeps me from being snippy and hateful simply because I can't hear anything that's being said and it doesn't allow my mind to focus on being so tired. That's the plus side of it. The minus side is I missed a lot of conversations. LOL And I missed Kens scare when a turkey jumped up next to him. I saw it but didn't get to hear if he screamed like a little girl. I know I would have had it been me. And chances are it would have scared me so bad I would have cried. LOL
 And because I have the music so loud in my ears and because I tend to look down when I'm walking I tend to run into Shawn when he stops for whatever reason. LOL
 I don't keep the earphones in too too long. Just long enough to get my mood awake and happy. Or at least tolerable lol
 James had decided that we would be taking a 5 - 10 minute break every hour because of how far we were going. And for that I am thankful. Because even tho I don't have blisters my feet are killing me and are throbbing and my left hip is killing me. ( I don't know what that is all about but I have to find out what is causing this mess I don't want to have to keep dealing with this. It's almost too painful at times. Thank goodness for Motrin. It proves to be one of my best friends out there ).
 Here are a few pictures of some pretty cool " curly " trees that are all over the place in Ocala. I have no idea what kind of trees they are but I love looking at them. 

These pictures really do them no justice. They are really cool looking out there.
 We are coming up on lunch time and we hit the blue spur trail that they decided that we would take to get to drinking water so we could refill for the rest of the day , night and next mornings hike out.

Blue marker Spur Trail

OMG A BATHROOM !!!!

WATER 

Shawn refilling our water

 Yea so notice the BATHROOM !!!!! I was so excited to see this bathroom. Oh My Goodness.... let me just say ummmmmmm brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. LOL I went to this bathroom and its a hole dug in the ground with a toilet over the hole. I don't care LOL its a toilet .... lol yea well while sitting on this toilet the wind gusted and OMG it was freezing and my bladder refused to work. LOL Nope it wasn't gonna happen.... uggggghhhhhh come one bladder this is the only bathroom you will get to use till we are done with this hike. LOL So yea with a bit of coaxing my bladder gave in. LOL 
 We all went potty and refilled our water and sat down and ate some lunch. The guys talked to a newly retired cop for a bit. He seemed to be a nice man. I didn't talk to him because I'm me and I don't too much talk to anyone out there.
 Okay bags back on with much dread on my part. I'm pretty whooped at this point and I knew we still had a ways to go. I just wanted to get to where we were going for the night. This whole day was trying for me. Not bad at all... just tired and sore hips and achy and sore throbbing feet. But no worries , I got this. ;-)
 After walking a bit we came across a woman alone who appeared to be in he early to mid 60's who was walking the trail alone. Her husband would meet her at certain points and my guess is she would shower eat and rest and start out again. That was pretty neat.
 Shortly after that we stopped for our 10 minute break and Shawn and James decided that they would like to have some coffee. As odd as I found this because we haven't done that before... I have to say it was so nice to have that coffee in the middle of the hike. That caffeine was much needed for the 3 of us I think.
 As we were sitting there an old man of at least 102 came walking by us. Said hi and something about making that walk 5 days a week. LOL I have no idea what he said but WOOT WOOT for him for being out there. Bless his 102 year old heart  ( i have no idea how old he really was .... and I don't remember how we determined what his age was LOL )
 Okay time to pack it up and move on .... 
 At some point I put my earphones back in my ears because I am really starting to hurt and I need to focus on something besides the hurting ... we are moving right along and all of a sudden Shawn and Ken stop and I almost plowed into Shawn again ( note to self .... start paying attention ). Evidently a snake crossed the trail in front of Ken. 
 And at some point in this same time frame they jumped a deer. I happened to look up and see his white tail flagging and hind end. But that's all of the deer that I saw. But i will say his tail was fat as was his hind end. LOL
 Shawn and James have created a " hand hammock " for themselves while out there. When your walking like this your hands start to swell and then they start to throb and hurt. And they seemed to find much comfort in this. ( I have to wonder what would happen if while using their " hand hammock " what would happen if they tripped over something while walking. Tripping is a big part of hiking especially when your getting tired...."

My AMAZING husband with his "hand hammock "

After a little bit more walking the guys decide its time to start looking for a camp site. We come to the point where if we continue moving on we would be in the prairies and there is no camping there. So they go down this dirt road and find the best available spot. There would be some clearing out that would need to be done for mine and Shawn's " bedroom ( lol ) but Shawn said he didn't think it would take much or be too bad.

This is Shawn clearing out out bedroom so we could hang our hammocks

Now that the space is cleared out and hammocks are hung and ready for a cold and blustery night we can all relax after a pretty grueling day for all of us. I was hurting bad as was Shawn and James was feeling this one too and Ken was pretty worn out too.
 Time for a fire and coffee and hot chocolate and some dinner ( Gosh I hope this one is better than last nights )...

warming my sore swollen tired piggy toes by the fire again

WARMTH 

As we are sitting around the fire the sun sets and the winds pick up for a few minutes and the temps drop pretty quick. 
 We get water boiled and poured in our dehydrated dinners. Shawn had lasagna again and I am trying this Chicken Teriyaki stuff. Let me just say it smelled AMAZING !!!!! Wish the taste matched the smell. This one too was NASTY !!!!!!! Not as nasty as the Mexican Chicken and Rice but it was pretty nasty. I was able to eat enough of it to not be hungry. But no more than that. LOL YUCK !!!!
 James had his steak and potatoes (he brings his food from home wrapped in foil and cooks it on the hot coals from the fire !!! Brilliant !!! Although they things that I can eat at home wont hold up long enough for me to do this ... pouty face here.... gosh that would make my eating so much easier for me LOL )  and Ken had some dehydrated steak fajitas.
 Shawn and I head to out hammocks pretty early. Shawn was hurting pretty bad and I wasn't feeling great. This was a LONG HARD day for me ( and Shawn ).... I was smooth worn out and not sleeping the night before didn't help any. So I drank my sleeping juice and headed to my hammock.
 I am pretty sure I went to sleep fairly quick but before I fell asleep I remember feeling my hammock rocking and hearing the wind gusting. And I was thinking OMG i'm gonna freeze to death tonight with these winds. But to my surprise the idea that Shawn came up was amazing. I never once felt that gusty wind. I was nice and toasty warm in my hammock.
 I drifted off to sleep only to wake up to a full bladder ( uugghhhhhhh this is gonna suck its so cold outside of my sleeping bag and hammock .... ) Yep just as I predicted it was REALLY cold. So I hurry up and pee and jump back in my bag and hammock.... get all comfy ( well as comfy as I can get in that mummy bag .... don't care much for that thing as I can't move in it ) and warm and drift off to sleep again. Only to be woke up by a truck going down the dirt road ( i look at my phone and its 3:45am ). All I could think was who in their right mind would be out on a dirt road at 3:45am on a cold night like this ??? Then I got tickled thinking that as I lay in a hammock strapped to two trees at 3:45am on a cold night like this. LOL
 I drift off again only to wake up another time to pee yet again. OMG I SWEAR IT WAS 5 BELOW THIS TIME. HOLY COW IT WAS COLD !!! And of course my bladder was completely full and it seemed to be a never ending kinda peeing. SHEEEESH 
 Back in the bag and hammock I get all toasty warm and drift off again. This time I am woke up to the sound of someone rattling the little plastic box that I put the lighter in the night before so that whoever got up first would have a lighter to start the fire with.
 I decide that I will go on and get up and see who else was up. It was Ken and he already had the fire going by the time I got over there.
 James had just gotten up as well and Shawn wasn't far behind us.( Thankfully he slept good last night. Bless his heart he was really hurting and was pretty spent )
 I dig everything out and get some water going for coffee and hot chocolate for us. Shawn and James had coffee and Ken and I had some hot chocolate. It was a VERY cold morning and our water was VERY cold and seemed to take forever before it started to boil. I was getting pretty impatient this time. LOL

BOIL DANG YOU !!!!!!!!

We get some warm fluids in us and start warming up and waking up. 

Morning World !!! Shawn drinking his coffee 

James telling me its no long OCALA ITS NOW OUCH-CALA

Shawn saying Good Morning World

You know its cold when James has sweats and a jacket and a hat on

Shawn standing by the fire

Ken standing by the fire

 Now its time to start breaking down camp. Its so cold Shawn and I have to keep breaking because out hands were so cold and we couldn't feel them. Finally we get it all broke down and repacked and its time to get on our way. James asked us who could go another day and who is just ready to go home. I believe all of us said we could go another day. But because I knew it was going home day I was ready. Its amazing how your mind works... when it knows you have another day ahead of you you are good to go but when it knows its going home day its pretty much done. LOL
 We start walking and in go my earphone as I tell the guys bye once again. I have to go to my happy place and get myself going and this is what seems to work. LOL I put the music on and sing to the guys as we walk ( sorry guys LOL ). 

Music going ... 

James 

Shawn eating breakfast while walking

Before I know it we are almost done. Here are a few pictures of the guys. This is a neat place for me. The last time I came upon this spot I was none to happy and was hurting and freezing and just wanted to be done. ( My first cold night in Ocala with Shawn and James a year ago ). This time I was tired and cold and hurting but it was all different. This time I enjoyed every bit of it as odd as that sounds.
 As difficult as this hiking can be I have really grown to love every bit of it. I don't enjoy the pain but I have learned that some of that is to be expected and is just part of it ( and age doesn't help any LOL ). You learn that with the good comes the bad. But luckily the good out weighs the bad for me.

Happy Shawn

HAHA James as "Wilson"

HAHAHA GOTTA LOVE HIM !! <3

Happy Ken

 Thanks again guys !!!! I had a blast. And once again I am looking forward to the next one .... where we going next time ??? and for how long ??? 5 days ???? Isn't that what I heard ???? HMMMMMMMMM LOL I have to say this I have no complaints about this hike at all. With the exception of my dehydrated foods that were nasty. This is my favorite hike by far !!!!!! Love ya'll !!! Thanks for doing this with Shawn and I !!! Thanks for putting up with me and my ouchy-boo boo's and whining all the time and thank you all for encouraging me to keep going. Ya'll are the best !!!!
 Shawn.... what can I say ??? Thank you for everything. Thank you for your uplifting words and looks when I am beat up and down on the trips ( and in life ). Thank you for being so encouraging when Im not so sure I can keep going on. Thank you for helping me find me again !!! Thank you for being the most amazing husband and for being my best friend !!!!!! I love you honey more than you will ever know !!!! <3 <3 <3  

Here are links to Shawn and Ken's blogs ( just click their names )
Shawn
Ken