Bill made it to Checkpoint 3 around 6:00pm.  I wish I could say he sounded great and was looking forward to the dash across Florida Bay to Key Largo tomorrow.  Instead, I got a whole lot of “jiminy Christmas!”  Followed by a slew of “brutal, absolutely brutal.”  And as badly as I wanted to say to him, “Suck it up Skipper, you volunteered for this, remember?” I chose instead to sympathize with him.  (For Janice and all the other TECO ladies I say, “Isn’t HE lucky to share MY space?!?”)

This is probably the worst I have heard him sound in all the years he has done this race.  (Yes, Bob Hobkirk, even the year ya’ll duct taped your hands to the paddles to get to the finish line.)  The weather has certainly taken its toll and racers are dropping like flies.  I’ve never seen so many “DNF’s” on the results page as this year.  I am heading to Key Largo tomorrow to take him new supplies and after that, it’s all new for both of us.  Keep praying to those weather Gods for fair winds (preferably from the South) and following seas!

Late last night Bill’s SPOT started tracking him again and was putting him towards Highland’s Beach.  He has camped there in previous years so I figured that was where he was going to stop for the night.  This is a tough area as there is no cell phone reception so I don’t hear from him at all until he hits Checkpoint 3 in Flamingo. In any event, it looks like he is well underway and heading for Whitewater Bay and then on to CP3 by this afternoon some time when I look forward to hearing his voice.

I should also mention that Bill had all intentions of doing the Wilderness Waterway this year.  Doing this adds an additional day to his time and due to weather at the start and being so far behind (about a day and half behind last year’s schedule) he must have chosen not to do it.  I’m sure he is disappointed as he has yet to do the WW and no one has done it and completed the Ultimate Florida Challenge.  Not to mention the fact that he has not had an opportunity to use his “python eliminator!”  There is a lot of race left though. 🙂   Until next time…

Bill’s SPOT is still not tracking him.  The last communication I received was at 12:23pm and was a Check in/OK.  I believe the SPOT was not activated for tracking but at least we know he is moving at this point and can see where he is every four hours.

I would like to take this time to give a huge shout out to our dear friend Bob Howard.  Bob and his wife Sonia are our neighbors and Bob got sucked into the Bill Whale kayaking vortex a couple of races ago.  He followed and charted Bill last year and would tell me where he thought Bill was going to camp, and what time he should be pulling in to the checkpoints and did this with incredible accuracy.  (Bill is not making that so easy this year, huh Bob?)  His knowledge of familiarity of the waters Bill is traveling in is just priceless and we are blessed and fortunate to have him and Sonia in our lives.  THANKS!!!

Until the next time…

Wasn’t it just mere hours ago I was saying how wonderful technology was?  I received my text message this morning from Bill @ 6:05am stating he was launching.  My first thought was it was much later than he had wanted to leave.  And then, nothing.  Typically, (key word — typically) I receive the first SPOT notification of OK followed by the tracking notifications shortly thereafter his text.  Still nothing.  Finally, @ 8:23am, I received a “Check in/OK” message from SPOT which still shows him at CP2.  Here it is about an hour later and I know two things for sure, (1) I have no clue what is going on with Bill and (2) I’m going to need a lot more coffee.   I’ll have a cafe mocha valium latte to go please!  More to come….

Brutal!  That’s pretty much how Bill described the day.  Winds were really bad and he was paddling right into them.  Around 4:00pm he took a route I had never seen him take before in the Ten Thousand Islands, nor was it in any of the float plans left with his pit crew.   Apparently Bill had gotten this route from a couple of fellow Watertribers and it was exactly what he needed to get to get out of the wind and into Checkpoint 2.  (I will be sure and do a proper shout-out to them in a future blog–bad cell phone reception once again left me with a puzzle to piece together.)  Technology has given me a lot of peace of mind allowing me to know exactly where Bill is (as long as the SPOT is functioning properly).  However, communication is still so difficult.  I am lucky to get the one call a day and hope that reception is good enough to hear him.  But when there is important information to get to him, I can only send him a text and/or wait until he calls and then it can be too late.  Tonight was a perfect example of this.  I was glad to see him keep going until he got to CP2 as Chief announced today there were no more deadline extensions.  The deadline for CP2 was 3/7 @ 10:00am.  [Insert sigh]  In sum, Bill made it to CP2, getting some sleep, heading out early, and would REALLY like a break in the weather.  I didn’t have the heart to tell him it would be the same tomorrow — ummm today — oh goodnight!  🙂

Bill started the morning leaving CP1 @ 4:30am.  Did lots of paddling thru the pass then sailed the rest of the way to Sanibel.  After the turn at Sanibel it was all paddle sailing the rest of the way to camp tonight.  A total of 64 miles today — not too shabby.  I wish I had something more interesting to report but there’s a lot of race yet to come and we still have the Everglades portion so stay tuned!!

Bill is settling in at Checkpoint 1 for the night.  I guess it is true that there can sometimes be too much of a good thing.  In this case, wind.  It was great having the wind at his back in order to sail, but not this much wind.  As I understand it, there was some malfunction having to do with the shackle that controls his sail rigging.  In the amount of wind he was in, it was very difficult controlling the sail and due to the loss of the use of the shackle his arms became the control rods and he had to hold the line himself — for over four hours.  He seemed confident that the issue was taken care of and he was going to get a good night’s sleep and be on the water by 5:30am.  On a much happier note, friends of ours, Bob & Cindy Howell, who happen to live close to CP1, were there to greet Bill upon his arrival.  I know it meant a lot to him and was a great surprise.  Not bigger than the surprise I had when I found the attached video in my email from them.  Hopefully I did him proud explaining the equipment issue.  It’s not easy catching every other word through the wind blowing into the mouthpiece of the phone, and he never seems in a good enough mood to have me ask him to repeat things.  🙂

Bill has made it to Checkpoint 1 in Placida.  He experienced some equipment failure with his sails and at this point is planning on spending the night in Placida and heading out early.  He is going to call back later with more information and changes if any.

Well as bad as it was yesterday, and believe me it was bad, Bill is off and sailing today.  Clocking him at just over 5 knots at times!!!  The morning call was pretty short and sweet, “I’m heading out and the winds finally turned.  Pretty rough out here last night.  Heading to CP1.”  After checking the race website, I learned that there is an official weather hold covering everyone in the race and no one will be dropped for missing a deadline at the checkpoints.  WHEW!!!!  The bad news is I didn’t have the information to tell him when he called.  The good news is maybe not knowing will give him a little extra kick to push a little hard to make up time today.  Easy for me to say, right?  I know last night’s blog entry wasn’t pretty but hopefully you can see the video.  Until the next time….

Today proved that no matter how much you practice, train and prepare, you can’t change the weather.  Upon arrival at the beach this morning, Bill attached his amas to the kayak.  For those wondering, these are inflatable “pontoons” that are on either side of the kayak to give stability.  Or, as I like to refer to them, kayak training wheels.  They would probably slow him down, but at least he would not get dumped in the waves.  Normally Bill is excited on the morning of the race.  Not so much today.  I think everyone on the beach took a collective breath as Chief, the race coordinator, walked up and down the beach announcing the race would start at 7:00, but it was their choice if they launched or waited.   In the past I would have to wait anxiously for a phone call to find out where Bill was and how he was doing.  Now, I know exactly where he is every ten minutes thanks to SPOT.  I finally got my phone call at 12:38am.  Bill had stopped on a little spoil island.  Considering what his day had been like, I think he sounded pretty good.  The calls are typically short and to the point…  “Hey, what a day.”  “Glad I had my amas.  It got a little spooky out there at times.”  “I’ve never not made it to checkpoint 1 the first day.  I don’t know if people will make the deadline of noon tomorrow.”   “If today was the last easy day, I think I’m screwed.”  I’m going to attempt to attach some pictures and a video of this morning’s start.  Good night!!