Trip Report: FL>LWRSF>Isabel Creek>Nov30-Dec2, 2012

[samsara]

Another great hang to report! The weather was perfect (highs around 80 and lows at 55-60). As is becoming our custom we arrived in waves with olddog and grinder blazing away before anyone else. This time grinder was determined to beat olddog out to the site and he was successful

hangNyak arrived at the meeting spot an hour early and got nervous when nobody else arrived, even posted a question on the forum two minutes before the scheduled arrival time. I arrived one minute after the designated time (I'm holding out for exactly on time... by my watch ). We headed to the Lake Godwin parking since all of the other attendees were planning on coming out on Saturday. Our hike started at dusk and it soon became dark so we hiked with our headlamps on. hangNyak decided to leave a single bread crumb on the trail... in the form of one of his crocs We arrived to the welcome sight of a comfortable camp fire and olddog and grinder greeting us. We set up our hammocks in the dark, made dinner, and visited with olddog and grinder until late in the night.

The first night had a little bit of excitement when there was the sound of a gun shot followed by expletives. It was actually the stitching of the tree hugger for olddogs hammock coming loose and letting him know which was gravity works Fortunately he was hanging over some big, fluffy cutthroat grass so he didn't bruise anything. He made quick repairs and was back in his hammock to try to let the adrenalin work its way out of his system. The next excitement (it wasn't very exciting but it was odd) came at 5:50 a.m. when a pickup drove through the camp (it has a closed service road running through it but there shouldn't be any vehicles there). I'll definitely be talking to Fish and Wildlife game officers on Monday.

After a nice breakfast and relaxing around the fire we welcomed lilricky and Great White into camp. lilricky did his normal trail clean up on his way in and found a croc We visited with the newcomers after they got settled in and made plans for our hike in the afternoon. We were waiting for Shannan and his daughter to arrive but I needed to start the hike because I was heading into town to decorate our float for the parade and then for the parade itself. We started walking, got about 100 feet into the trail and saw Shannan and Patches (his daughter)! They were hot and tired and ready to relax for a while so they went to set up camp and we headed out on our hike.

We were hiking to Grave Island camp site (the original destination for this hang until we had a few too many people for that site) and the hiking bridge over Livingston creek. It was tough going in a few areas due to hogs, downed trees, and equipment problems for the FL Trail Association maintenance crew. The FTA crew had been blazing the trail earlier that morning so we just had to walk through the woods from point to point. We took a break at the Grave Island camp site and then headed on to the walking bridge. After a short stop at the walking bridge grinder and I headed out to continue the hike and the rest headed back to camp (a couple of miles each way). I headed to the house and grinder kept going on his big loop for the day on his way back to the camp.

I did the parade stuff and hit the trail back for the camp site at about 9:15 and arrived to a roaring fire and a great group of hangers. We visited around the fire and watched Patches tend to the fire. Everyone headed off to bed a bit earlier than the first night and we had a calm, quiet, and event free night. We woke up early, started the fire, and everyone got breakfast. We packed up our gear (I had trouble putting my new Warbonnet bridge away... sooo comfy) and got ready to leave. Shannan and Patches were running a bit late so we let them break camp and headed for the cars.

We had a nice hike out, arrived at the cars and said our goodbyes. As always... it was a great weekend and I'm thankful that we have such a great group of friends to hang with.

Thanks guys! Now post those pics

Dave