Crew Zen and Boo! Zen
Howl at the Moon
October 27, 2001
story by Paige
There is no better way to celebrate Halloween than to “howl at the moon” with your friends. Carey, Nancy and Paige howled together as Crew Zen, while Mindy and Chris Jackson zipped along as Boo! Zen. Chris is a seasoned adventure racer and friend, who was kind enough to join us for this swamp fest. Little did we know as we were gathering and preparing our equipment that we would also need snorkels. Us Gulf Coasters didn’t realize how much rain you Space Coasters had received this past summer.
We all rolled into Jupiter, Florida on Saturday morning in anticipation of a 3pm start at a motel outside of Jonathan Dickinson State Park. It was good to see racing friends, but there were still some that we missed that couldn’t be there. Check-in began at noon with the race meeting at 2pm. Everyone completed last minute gear checks and milled about the motel parking lot (also the race starting point) wondering if we had brought enough warm clothes. There was a decent wind and the temperature was supposed to drop into the upper 40’s during the night and we figured correctly, that we would be wet most of the race….brrrrrr!!! Oh well, we are tough eco-racers and nothing bothers us…yeah, right!
At 2pm, the race meeting began, instructions were given and the maps passed out. We intently poured over our maps and passports paying attention to all the details, including protecting the maps with contact paper. You never know when your map will inadvertently go for a swim. Much to our chagrin, time was passing all too quickly. The race start was now only 10 minutes away and we hadn’t even taken our pre-race potty break…RUN!! Crew Zen made it to the starting line with 20 seconds to spare. Boo! Zen, already ready to race, must have gone in their pants because, they always have “to go”!
BANG!! We are all off and running, a couple of miles down the road, hop the fence, do some serious bush whacking and…into the swamp. At least it was good to be dry for the first few minutes anyway. Never mind that the water was waist deep on some of our height challenged teammates, at least it felt good on our scratched legs. With more bush whacking and running, some teams were starting to drop off and others were already lost. Fortunately, we have the best navigators around, in Carey and Mindy. Our teams raced together for a while and then, started to leap frog each other, as we would all night long.
We picked up our bikes and bolted down the road to find more miles of swamp riding, with water levels about as high as the tires at some points. I tipped over at one point, going for the “total swim” with my bike. Carey and Nancy tried to knock each other into the mud. Mindy accidentally found the deepest pool and promptly endo’d, completely submerging her brand new Cannondale. Chris, glad that Mindy was in the lead, had to fish Mindy and her bike out of the murky depths. Everyone persevered to the next checkpoint where we were able to drop the bikes.
For the next trekking section, we would have been grateful for a machete. We bushwhacked through thick palmetto-laden, briar infested “jungle”. Just when you thought it was safe to move forward, a vine would grab you around the neck and yank you off your feet. Thankfully, we made it to more swamp and a nice swift canal swim. Nancy led us into the canal where the bottom dropped suddenly. She led us across and both Carey and Nancy had to pull me out of the water. Apparently, Boo! Zen hadn’t had enough of the “jungle trekking” and continued in another direction for a while hence, the leap frogging. Thankfully, Mindy guided them back on to the proper course.
The next checkpoint brought us to the canoes, pumpkins and nightfall. Time to pull out the headlamps and put on the bug spray. This trip on the Loxahatchee would take us approximately 8 miles back toward Jonathan Dickinson State Park. It felt a little more like 80 miles in bumper boats. The going was slow and arduous for a while. Everyone in the boat was working hard except for the pumpkin, which just rolled around the boat. Nancy and I tried to find the path down the river, while Carey steered the quick current. Hitting trees, cypress knees and other boats was unavoidable. Some paths around trees and strainers were not even big enough for one canoe. After a lot of finesse, awesome steering, bumping and some brute force paddling, we made it through the bumper boat section. Mindy and Chris recalled a similar experience through this section and they also loved a couple of the small “rapids”.
We were now back on foot to trudge back to the bikes approximately 5-6 miles away. This was the most tedious section for me as I found myself dozing a couple of times. We completed this part with Boo! Zen and Chris kept me going with some colorful limericks (I think I blushed after hearing them). Nancy and Carey are machines and kept plodding along. We finally found the bikes, where Chris and Mindy took off just ahead of us. Both teams took creative routes to the next checkpoint, but made it ahead of the cut-off. We picked our pumpkins back up and continued on our bikes into the night. Boo! Zen diverged from the course at this point, I guess to see some of the other sites in the park…in the middle of the night (hence, more leap frogging). Both teams, however encountered lots of sand, our favorite nemesis.
Crew Zen arrived at the last checkpoint just ahead of Boo! Zen (about two minutes). Carey jumped on the zip line, while Nancy and I carved the pumpkin…Nancy is very talented! We had the competitive juices flowing against Boo! Zen. They left the last checkpoint, headed for the final bike sprint to the finish one minute ahead of Crew Zen. We pushed as hard as we could and finished just two measly minutes behind Boo! Zen.
We all finished scratched, wet, sandy and smelly, but happy and tired. Both teams had an awesome race (Boo! Zen – 13H: 1M ; Crew Zen – 13H: 3M) and a great time! Adventurous Concepts made it a tough race, but did a good job. The post race pizza and beer at 4 in the morning was appreciated. See you at the next race!