Our Motorcycle Trip to Florida (and Where We Shouldn’t Have Camped)

Photo by Rohan Makhecha 

Florida in September was warm and balmy, I discovered as we, my sister-in-law Alice and I, disembarked from the plane outside the terminal at Orlando. We were to meet our husbands, Marty and Carl, who had headed out on a ‘manly’ trip on their motorcycles two weeks prior from Colorado. We flew to meet and ride with them down to the point of the peninsula and camp along the way. After a couple of days in Key West we’d drive back up to Fort Lauderdale where we’d spend another few nights before we all headed back home…Alice and I on the plane and the guys on their bikes.

It was an exciting adventure for me, and I was happy to be behind Marty hugging his body as we flew down the road on two wheels. Our first night was spent in a motel, however, since the two men wanted to freshen up and take advantage of real beds before we were to rough it inside a tent for a week on a two-inch mattress pad in a sleeping bag.

Our second night was at a State Park somewhere in the Keys where we had to fight off raccoons. We had been warned by the park rangers of their ever-persistent antics and were told never to feed them when they would come begging. We were to put all food items in a bag to hang from a tree limb high up enough so that the little bastards couldn’t reach them from above or from below. We complied with the rules about the food and knew not to encourage the critters to hang around.

When we went to the restroom before retiring, we noticed a pop-up trailer. It was the kind that was pulled behind a vehicle looking like a flat cube with wheels until it was parked for the night, then it popped up like a tent with a floor. We saw the family standing wide-eyed just inside the door looking out in horror. We could see that there were about 50 raccoons surrounding them, chattering and looking in expectantly.

“Looks like the kids didn’t pay attention to the rangers’ instructions and fed a few,” I stated.

“Yeah, and those they fed told all their friends about the generous kiddos,” Marty responded sarcastically.

We both shook our heads at their stupidity as we walked past the horrified family unable to exit their temporary home for the night.

When we returned, we were reminded that nothing should be stored in our tents that would entice the nasty creatures to come scratching at our door, so we put everything we thought they’d bother with hanging from the tree but we kept our clean pots and pans in a large trash bag out on the picnic table. We didn’t think the critters would be interested in mere pots and pans with nothing in them.

Wrong.

At two in the morning, I thought I heard something outside and opened my eyes. I looked at Marty, whose eyes were also open.

“Did you hear that?” I whispered.

“Yes,” he said quietly. “I’m going to go check on the bikes. Someone might be messing with them.”

Before he could pull on his jeans, we heard a lot of loud clatter and rattling, both threw on clothes, and dashed out of the tent expecting to see someone trying to rob us. Carl and Alice had dashed out too and we four stopped to stare at a group of raccoons that were going through our big, plastic bag of pots and pans throwing things every which way.

Photo by Jack Bulmer

It took some effort to shoo them away, but they finally wandered off. We gathered up the scattered remnants of plastic baggies containing napkins, silverware, salt and pepper, and other spices that had the animals curious. We saw that the four-legged nuisance-makers still lurked at the periphery of the trees watching us. I imagined them laughing, knowing they weren’t finished with us yet.

We ran them deeper into the forest, but that was about all we could do. We weren’t allowed to shoot the little shits, not that we had weapons to use if we’d considered it, so, we just tied up the bag more tightly and went back to bed, hoping they got the hint and would look for adventure elsewhere.

Not to be. We were awakened three more times. We finally dozed off sometime after 4:00 a.m. after finally putting the bag into our tent, but unable to close our eyes for fear of hearing their scratches on the nylon trying to get in.

Our next stop was Key West. Unfortunately, Hurricane Lilly was hanging around the Caribbean aiming for the Florida coast at that time and it was pouring rain. Our tenting experience was not so good, although it did stay dry inside our tents and we debated on whether we’d wait it out and stay the three days we’d planned or leave.

We donned our rain gear and did tourist things like seeing Hemingway’s house, took pictures at the Southernmost Point, shopped, ate, and drank at some of the famous local establishments. It was a fun time, albeit wet. The locals assured us that they had never been hit by any of the potential hurricanes and were not likely to be hit this time either.

Over shrimp tacos and beer for supper, we were of the mind that maybe we could wait out the hurricane. We were psyched up about being able to say that we tenters-on-motorcycles weren’t going to let no stinkin’ hurricane scare us away.

Morning brought on more level-headed thoughts, and we packed up and left. We were afraid of being stuck on the highway back to the mainland if the Keys were evacuated and we wanted to be safe. After all, we were on motorcycles and felt very vulnerable.

Photo by Sean Foster

We got to the mainland where the weather was much better, and Carl and Alice wanted to go visit some friends who lived in the area. We didn’t want to go with them, so we made plans to meet at a place on the map which showed a campground near the beach and parted ways.

Marty and I drove around looking for the spot that we could see on the map, but it wasn’t a campground at all. It was just a beach entrance that people had to pay to get into. It was closed since it had gotten dark.

Because it was too dark to drive around looking for a better place to camp, and we had no way of telling Carl and Alice about our change of plans without cell phones at that time, we just sat on the grass before the beach entrance and waited for them. It was a pleasant place with a pond and some palm trees on one side, which left plenty of space for two tents.

When Carl and Alice arrived, we all decided that it was best to just set up camp near the pond, and hoped we’d be gone by the time the beach would open for business in the morning. And that was what we did.

We had a thrown-together supper and retired early for the night. Come morning, we were awakened by a police radio and some chatter.

By the time we climbed out of bed and got dressed, we heard a vehicle drive up. As we all stepped out of our tents, we saw that there were two sheriff’s department cars sitting and waiting for us to show ourselves.

“Oh, God,” I whispered. “We’re going to be arrested for camping illegally.”

“Mornin’!” the man in the sheriff’s uniform, including a mountie-like hat, said gruffly to us as we walked toward the two men.

Before he could put handcuffs on us, Marty explained that we were camped there because it was too late the night before to find another place and pointed out to him on the map that it had, indeed, shown a symbol for camping.

The sheriff, after assessing our demeanor and seeing no weapons chuckled while handing each of us a paper cup full of wonderfully smelling coffee.

“My deputy just saw two motorcycles and called me thinking you were part of a gang. I always bring coffee, in case there might be some antagonistic people involved, but I’m glad to see that you’re not of that ilk.”

“No sir, we are not. We’re just retirees out for a motorcycle trip across Florida,” Carl responded.

“Glad to hear it,” the sheriff said. “And now that you’ve had a little caffeine, perhaps you won’t mind hearing the scary part.”

We all just looked at him, wondering what he could be meaning.

“See that pond over there next to your tents? Pretty, ain’t it?”

We all looked over at the pretty pond and nodded our heads.

“Well, the scary part I was referring to is the fact that in that pretty pond lives a twelve-foot-long, not-so-pretty alligator, and there’s not much to eat in that small pond. You really lucked out. That was another reason my deputy called me to come and investigate. He didn’t know what he’d find in the tents…bodies dead or barely alive.”

Photo by Bharathi Kannan 

We each had the reaction of knees nearly buckling when we heard about our near-death experience with an alligator, when the sheriff said, “Pack up your stuff and we’ll all go have breakfast. I think you might need it.”

Along with a big shot of tequila, I silently added.

We dismantled the tent, trying to avoid getting too near the pond, packed up the motorcycle, and then followed the two sheriff’s vehicles down the road. Breakfast was tasty but eaten with shaky hands.