Total: 10 miles. We hopscotched from oceanside to bayside (checked out the no motor zones around the Cotton Keys--awesome bird-watching!), stopped at Lorelei's for a break (met some super Canadians, Rob and Lori, who will paddle with us tomorrow), went back to the oceanside to say hi to Sparrow at Bud & Mary's, then back to the bayside to arrive at the famous Robbie's Marina.

This is just one of the things that makes paddling in the Keys so extraorindary: pretty much wherever the wind is blowing from, you can find a sheltered lee either bay or oceanside, slipping between the island and often times under remaining segments of Henry Flagler’s famous railroad.

Feb. 1: Day 2 Paddling the Florida Keys

We left the Elks campground in Tavernier with a send-off from our hosts, Dave and Lynda, joined by two other paddling buddies, Cynthia and Christine. From Community Harbor, we paddled south, around the entrance to Tavernier Creek and proceeded past the Cowpens and through “Toilet Seat Pass.”

Now for those not familiar with this Keys phenomenon, Toilet Seat Pass is an official boat channel, marked by, you guessed it, toilet seats. This one, the original, has more than 100, posted on PVC pipe, by individuals, groups, Boy Scout Troops, family reunions, veterans, you name it. This particular one happens to be courtesy of the WWOW (Wild Women on the Water), of which both Christine and Cynthia are proud members. They’re mostly powerboaters, but these two are trying to get them to convert to human-powered paddling!

Mary & Bill Burnham, author of the Falcon Guide, Florida Keys Paddling Atlas, are on a 100-mile book tour by kayak, from Key Largo to Key West.

 Data

Thursday's weather: Partly cloudy, winds southeast 15-20 knots. In Buttonwood, waves were about a foot. An occasional set washed over our boats. You couldn't tell from standing on land, but the wind was strong out on the open water.

Mileage

We did 14.8 miles, probably our longest day of the trail.

Recap

Back a few years, Mary and I paddled the Big Bend Saltwater Paddling Trail, a ten-day trip marked by horrendous weather and animal greeters. That's an "animal greeter?" you ask. It could be a dolphin, an otter, ducks at Steinhatchee Landing -- any kind of animal that we'd spy in the wild, close up, that became our good luck totem for the day's paddle. We came to count on them, and animal greeters are now a personal superstition, something I look for on every trip. It's like they're saying, "I've got your back." Or, "You're with us now, on the water. Let's go."

I'm changing my tune on this two-week trip down the Florida Keys. This time, it's the great people who anchor the start and end of our days, that are giving us the "good vibrations."

At the launch, Frank and Monica Woll, owners of Florida Bay Outfitters, MM 104 B/S in Key Largo. Monica works for the state parks service on the Florida Keys Overseas Heritage and Paddle trails. An old friend, Mike Metzger, helped carry boats to the water. A new friend, Tom, who works in the shop, lent me a dry bag, last minute. And at the tail end, Dave and Lynda Williams met us and fed us at the Elks campground in Tavernier. I wolfed down three helpings f salad and a healthy portion of stick-to-your-ribs goulash.

The day's highlights was Dusenbury Creek and a series of canopied mangrove creeks nicknamed "The Grottos." Paddling them reminded us of our friend Josh Gregory, who showed us these gems some four years ago. He's in Kansas now, or Kentucky -- wherever. Josh, if you're reading this, call us or post on the site. We miss you.

I'm noticing a rather dispiriting aspect to aquatic life in the Upper Keys: the seagrass is coated with algae, which is also covering and choking the once-plentiful sponges on roots of the mangrove trees. I can only attribute this to an overall degradation of water quality. Honestly, it's hard to be effusive about the "beautiful nature of the keys" when the grass beds are brown and the sponges are dying. It's a bellwether for fish and birds, too, which seem to be scarce.

Coming out of Dusenbury, we got our first taste of the stiff southeast wind that would buffet us across Tarpon Basin and Buttonwood Sound. I was keen on reaching the Swash Keys -- the water here is that mythical tropical green so often associated with "Caribbean." I kept to the leeside of the islands as long as I could, but Mary opted for the direct route, slipping outside where she waited in the shelter of a small mangrove
island. Although about a mile apart, we kept in touch via radio. Eventually, the call had to be made. We slogged into a direct wind to reach the shoreline of Key Largo, where we enjoyed a quiet lee for the rest of the trip to the Elks campground in Tavernier.

See you on the water.

In a few days we’ll embark on a book tour like no other: Paddling 100 miles to the southernmost point in the US. Follow the adventures of travel writers Bill and Mary Burnham, authors of the FalconGuide Florida Keys Paddling Atlas, Jan. 31 through Feb. 13, from Key Largo ending with a finale party in Key West.

We’ll do book-signings, slide shows and “paddle with the authors” events to promote the new Florida Keys Overseas Paddling Trail and responsible travel along the fragile coral island chain. Check www.FloridaPaddling.com for the full event schedule and sign up for automatic updates if you’d like (“under newsletter”).

Dean Thomas chickened-out.

As we drove down the last beach in Texas, his nearly non-stop stream of one-liners and bon mots slowed to a trickle, then stopped.

I glanced in the rearview mirror to find him casting a pensive eye over the surf. It was rolling.

The forecasted 2-3 foot seas had turned into honest 3-5s, with an occasional higher wave breaking on the third bar.

“I’ve got to be honest with you,” Dean says. “I’m not comfortable with this, without wet suits. Those rollers out there beyond the break mean we will be in the water.”

hat was hard to hear. Because it reinforced my own growing trepidation, and because I had invested months of planning in the notion that – today – I would start paddling at the mouth of the Rio Grande. Not to mention I’d just shelled-out $40 for a driver to take the truck back to South Padre Island.

Dean, a kayak fishing guide in Aransas Pass, paddles about 300 days a year. He’s also not uncourageous. It pays to listen to him. I did. We decided to wait to see what the weather would do Saturday.

In the interim, well, we could always go fishing. After dropping our driver back at our home away from home -- the Brown Pelican Inn on South Padre Island – Ken Larson of Rockport, Dean and I headed back across the causeway and through Port Isabel to State Highway 48 and our top-secret kayak launch on the Brownsville Ship Channel.

By 2:30 we were on the water, and 30 minutes later a feisty 14-inch snook attacked my lure. Half an hour after that, I had a 35-inch fish on the end of my line.

The stiff east wind that had whipped the surf into unexpected vigor also funneled down the ship channel, but as long as it was at our backs and we were catching fish and waves weren’t breaking over our boats … well, who cared?

The Brownsville Ship Channel has always, for me, been a remarkable study in contrasts. Deep-water haven for tropical fish species; salvage yard and repair shop; trans-shipment point for oil, asphalt, grain and other commodities … its banks are lined with the rusting hulks of ships awaiting the breakers’ torches.

On a moonlit night, with a breeze that has faded to just a whisper, one can easily imagine the lives that have played-out on the decks and among the cabins and spaces of the once-proud ships that have arrived at their final destination.

During the day here, ospreys “kee” as they soar and plunge on unwary fish, and as the sun sets over the upper end of the channel coyotes can be heard singing off to the south, in the narrow strip of land between the river and this 20-some-odd-long mile incursion of the Gulf of Mexico.

It is a strange and special place that in many ways reflects the hard practicality with which Texans have almost always approached and used our land and water. It also demonstrates, as do so many of our scarred landscapes, the amazing resilience of the creatures that make their livings here too.

Sunday morning, as I write this, I am graced with a very different view of deep South Texas. Sitting on the verandah of the inn, I look out over the flat – and in this light, blue – expanse of the Laguna Madre and watch a pair of white pelicans straining breakfast from the water.

Black mangroves in the inn’s resident wetland hide the horizon to the north – the route we’ll take tomorrow.

Today, I think we’re going to take advantage of our weather window and make-up some of the leg we lost yesterday; I have to, at least, paddle through the mouth of Brazos Santiago pass.

We’ll make our way back up the inside of Padre Island and back to the inn this morning. If the predicted front is slow enough in coming, or quiet enough in its arrival, maybe we’ll even head back up the ship channel this afternoon for another shot at some Texas linesiders.

Dean hooked two yesterday – solid fish in the 24-28-inch slot – and got the thrill of seeing them jump and shake their heads, but not the joy of actually putting his hands on one.