Thank you for reaching out guys. It's a very long story about what happened. I recovered all my equipment yesterday. I set my pack down next to the FT sign at Ecofina State Forest in Putnam County after walking 16 miles that day. The water source was 3 minutes in the opposite direction of where the trail was to continue. I simply placed my pack next to the sign and took my phone, camera & water bottles down to fill up. All I did was fill up each bottle and drink one entire bottle full of water at the fountain.
While I was at the fountain I heard a rumble behind me, and I saw a very distinctive silver pickup truck proceeding down Powerline Road toward Halloway Road where my pack and the trail was located. I didn't think much of it, as I was almost filled up and ready to walk back to my pack.
As I proceeded down the road I found that my pack was missing and I scoured the area to no avail. Zero chance it could of been a bear, so I was freaking out. I proceeded to Halloway Road and flagged down a compact car that approached 5 minutes later, and told this nice you lady about my misfortune and asked if she saw that silver truck going against her, to which she replied, "No."
Two minutes later, a huge white Ford Super Duty truck was coming up Halloway Road proceeding north towards us and I recognized it was a Forestry vehicle, and I then relayed my ordeal to the Ranger. He didn't see anything either. I was freaking out, my house is in that pack. I do not use any equipment that you can acquire from a brick & mortar store, except for the obvious bladder, filter & electronics. All of my stuff sacks and dry bags were completely custom camouflage cuben fiber and no other Hiker out there has it because ZPacks & Hammock Gear have a monopoly on the material and they do not perform custom work...
However there is a third individual, who I am not allowed to share with the public per his request, that can create these custom projects for me and it is very difficult with the back and forth to deal with him. The hammock, quilts, tarp, pack, sacks and rain gear are all handmade by American ingenuity and everyday I look upon them, I think of the individual who made it and I feel that it is not just me out there...they are with me too, their spirits are breathed into these items and it would been devasting to think that their hard work and effort would of been trampled upon by a cruel and mischivious individual who drives a silver pickup truck.
I had the same clothing setup I've had for 3 years on my body when this happened and it was getting cold because it was almost dark. I placed my pack down at 4:22 pm, I approached the fountain at 4:25 pm, and I returned at 4:32 pm to discover it had disappeared. Based on the remoteness of where I was, I deduced that this was in the same realm of probably as being struck by a bolt of lightning. The Putnam County Sheriff's Department did not respond to the scene until 6:15-6:20 pm and it was within 10 minutes of being pitch dark. The deputies had flashlights and they expressed that they wanted to look around for the pack, to which I scoffed...I knew it took 20 minutes to get from the Sheriff's office to the location and they could of been there well before it was too dark...but they had other axes to grind I suppose... My father was camped out with these RVers at Salt Springs, so the deputy agreed to drive me just a mile past the county line to the entrance gate of the Park, and let me out there. I then proceeded down into the park shivering, in shock, and with only my two water bottles, phone & camera in my arsenal.
I ended up just grabbing blankets from people and sleeping on a picnic table Wednesday night thru Friday night. Spent thanksgiving completely devasted and miserable, and angry at the world. I prayed really hard that the lord would make something happen.
On Black Friday, my father wanted me to walk him through the crime scene and piece together the time line of events as they occurred to the best of my knowledge. We left Salt Springs and proceeded up towards Palatka. Just a couple miles north of Salt Springs I witnessed this gigantic black bear laying down in the grass to the right of the road, and I immediately proclaimed to my father to stop or turn around so I could investigate further. We turned around up ahead and began coming back. He was being downright ornery, and was acting like "Driving Miss Daisy" instead of being in lethal action mode, like I was. He missed the bear again, and then we had to turn around a second time...
Finally we pull over with the hazard lights on and I tell him to grab the pistol and follow me. I grabbed my weapon...a Sony RX100m7...and proceeded towards the target. The bear had sadly passed away, and I began going to work on it with my camera, and it yielded some National Geographic quality footage:
IMG_0425.jpg
IMG_0420.jpg
IMG_0421.jpg
IMG_0426.jpg
IMG_0427.jpg
Then 2 minutes after I went Ansel Adams on it, a park ranger pulls up to retrieve the bear, and we had to depart. We arrived at the location of the crime on Black Friday at 12:15 pm. I timed the distance between the kiosk and the water and make detailed notes on the area and we proceeded past the gates down Powerline Road to see where that silver truck could of come from. It was the ranger station for the forest, and I looked around every where and saw no silver truck. We looked everywhere on Powerline Road once again and came up empty handed. Then we proceeded a little north on Halloway to look for the pack to see if the assaliant may of tossed it, and came up with nothing. Then we proceeded back down Halloway Road to FL-100 looking everywhere and still no trace of the pack. We then proceeded to the Putnam County Sheriffs department and found that they were closed for Thanksgiving until Monday. So then we proceeded back to Salt Springs.
On Saturday I rode shotgun back to Sarasota very dejected, the entire ride I was thinking about the Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail & the Continential Divide Trails and all the times I created everlasting memories with that pack and with articles in that pack, some of which I have carried with me for over 6,000 miles. The trail name that was given to me was Rebel, and that Bandana was acquired in Gaitlenburg, TN and has been with me everyday I have ever been hiking since. My dog died next to me in 2015, and I woke up and felt his cold fur and I would never forget that feeling....it is what gave me the anger and the drive to do what I do and the ability to conquer all obstacles that lay before me. That bandana was my new dog, it was my superpower. When I fold it up and adorn it around my head, I turn into Rebel, and I found out that Rebel has special power and gift that no other thru Hiker or backpacker had on those trails...I'm not going to go any further into that because I think it's pretty obvious the raw power that thing is about to yield. It is like the staff that Moses used to part the seas. I was the the most feared, libeled, slandered, controversial & hated hiker because of the pigments on those cotton fibers... The people that actually walked for a time with me and got to know me, knew that all those people were liars and scoundrels...but it's incredible to have the ability to walk into a room and smile, and make people jump out windows or grab everything and run out the back door.... all because of a red, white & blue piece of cotton...
On Monday morning I called the Sheriff's office to speak to an investigator. I spent all day on Thanksgiving from the time the sun came up until 4:30 pm on that picnic table, trying to rewind that 2 second span where I saw the silver truck. I remember thinking man that is a sweet truck, those headlights are very distinctive. It was 100% not a Chevy, and it looked like a late model. I literally spent hours thinking about those headlamps. I knew it was either a Ford or Dodge. Eventually I crossed out Ford, because the new Fords are super weird and these headlights looked like a Mercedes type thing. So I remembered that Mercedes & Dodge used to under the same umbrella. I knew it had to be a Dodge.
So I looked at the Dodge Ram 2019 models. I remembered 4 things about that truck from the two seconds of memory recall. It was silvery, it had those weird headlamps, it had 4 doors & it was not a heavy duty twin rear-axle. When I looked at the Dodge website & glanced at it, it was like seeing the devil staring at me. I immediately knew 110% the Make/Model/Year/Color of the perpetrator.
A 2019 Dodge Ram 1500 "Limited" - Granite Crystal edition
I wanted to tell the investigator about it, because I knew that I could solve this crime in 20 minutes if I has access to Florida DMV records. All that would have to be done, was look up all the owners of that exact make/model/year/color vehicle in Putnam and the surrounding counties and then cross reference that with who would have a reason or purpose to be out in the middle of nowhere there on the day before Thanksgiving...& then I would go back to Palatka, round up a posse and lynch the S.O.B.
Who could be so cruel to do this to somebody? Someone who has the means to afford a $50,000+ 2019 pickup truck...that person is not a tweaker or a a typical low life individual that you or I would be able to deduce with our eyes alone. It sickened me, that scum like this are allowed to walk this earth among us.
Around 9 am Monday I called the Putnam County Sheriff's office and they told me that the Forestry folks down Powerline Road had a backpack in their possession that matched the description that I gave deputies. Now I don't have a car, and I was planning on taking Amtrak up to Palatka and then hitching or taking a cab out to the Forestry office on Tuesday morning to investigate this pack that was found. Instead my dad was admiment that I drive up there immediately, so I literally had no breakfast and got in the car and proceeded up I-75.
On I-75 I saw the devil, and I was determined to catch him. However I was only in a little V6. The last car I ever owned was 8 years ago, and it was a supercharged 400 hp / 450 torque AMG Supercar, so anytime I ever get behind the wheel of a vehicle and I see some young punk pulling tricks I just laugh, and know that air would shread him in MY car. I drag raced a brand new corvette and I smoked him in 2011. This guy was a **** Yankee and had was driving a 2019 Dodge Ram 1500 "Limited" - Granite Crystal color truck and he was weaving in and out of traffic like Ricky Bobby, so I tried to catch it knowing that 99% it couldn't of been the same person because we were north of Tampa, but the stars aligned perfectly... he got away because he was going 115 mph and I could not keep up in this cruddy V6...but I used my camera to acquire the target:
IMG_0423.jpg
When I arrived back on Powerline Road just after 2 pm I approached the office and found my backpack and everything was still in it just the way it was. The nice lady told me one of their Forestry workers named "Lance" saw it on Powerline Road and he was the first person to arrive in the morning and that no one had been there since the day before Thanksgiving in an official capacity.
Lance showed me exactly where the pack was found and it must of been thrown from a vehicle into this ditch exactly halfway between the kiosk and water fountain. A lot of the contents were strewn about in the grass and Lance had gathered them all together the best he could and brought it down to the office and then eventually when the secretary arrived, she delivered word to the Sheriff's office.
I had walked that exact spot on Friday afternoon, and nothing was there, 48 hours after the theft occurred. So the individual must of thrown my backpack with all my gear into that ditch somewhere between Friday night and Monday morning. I thanked Lance for the bottom of my heart and told him that he was my angel and how much that pack meant to me. He agreed to take a photo with it.
IMG_0419.jpg
So I do not think that Putnam County will ever put in the leg work to try and solve this case. But I know that there is one man at Hangcon who has the resources to access the Florida DMV records and zero in on who this person was. Because it 100% was a Putnam County resident, otherwise hpwhy would they have returned to the scene of the crime and toss the pack back out 3-5 days after the fact if they were from out of town... no.... Occum's Razor states that it was a resident of this county.
Thank you all for you prayers, I am very gracious to have my gear back...but I will forever be scared from this ordeal. From Wednesday to Monday my life was in shambles. The man upstairs listened to my prayers. I will never step foot on the Florida Trail all alone ever again, and I will probably just never go back to that trail period, end of discussion. It is cursed to me, I mean I have never had my pack stolen and I've gone from Mexico to Canada 2x and walked from Georgia to Maine...
Florida....
IMG_0428.JPG
So mods, please delete my original message, thx.
Bookmarks