It's a late February morning in full splendor. Warm temperature, bright sun, clear skies, and the humidity won't be back until spring. Everything combines for a perfect winter day. It's a Monday, so everyone is in work mode except for a few ditch-side cane-pole fishermen on the road to Everglades City-and me. I have the day off from my job as a physician's assistant in the emergency room of a Naples hospital, and I'm in the mood for a brief walk through the wilderness.

Monday Morning

the florida trail runs 1,300 miles from Pensacola to the Keys, and a portion of it goes through the Everglades. The desk ranger at the Big Cypress National Preserve Visitor Center on Tamiami Trail (not far from Shark Valley) eyes me with a disbelieving smile. "You plan to walk the muck in sandals, do you?" he says. "Well, the entrance is out the door 150 feet to the right."

Back at the car, I drop off everything except my cell phone and keys. Put on my hydration pack, half full of water, load two Power Bars in it, grab my hiking boots, strap my sandals to the belt loops on my shorts, and it's off to the Florida Trail. I don't see a sign-in station. But I think, "So what, it's Florida, it's flat, it's early, I will be out before I'm missed." What I don't think is that by not signing in, I am not going to be missed at all.

It all seems straightforward enough. If I take the first option I recall from the map, at three miles per hour, I'm out of an 11-mile loop by 1 p.m. Even if I miss the first loop and go 22 miles on the second loop, I'm out by 4.

The muck starts immediately. The swamp buggies and Park Service vehicles have pulverized portions of the ground into a sticky, slippery silt. It's like walking on plastic-plastic with suction. Luckily, the Florida Trail quickly crosses these roadways and becomes a trail of not-so-slippery muck winding through forest-an enchanting array of pines, palms and cypress sprinkled with fields, hedges and borders of yellow, blue, purple and white wildflowers. You can't see these colors as you whiz by in a car on your way to Fort Lauderdale or Miami.

By 11 a.m., I reach a swamp-buggy shack deep in the woods. I know it is 11, but not because of a watch. A watch was among the important trail survival items-matches, compass, flashlight, map, whistle-that never got packed. But this pinewoods clubhouse with a Seminole-style chickee hut has a sundial out front. I roam around the grounds for a half-hour, checking out the vintage park signs and messages. Then my internal hiking gauge signals, "Back on the trail if you plan to get out by dark."

Problem is, as I turn back toward a trail I cannot find my blazes-the blue marks painted on trees to guide hikers like me. I begin doing bigger, concentric circles around the clubhouse and meandering down the buggy roads until I find a set of blazes crossing the trail-a single blaze to the right and another to the left. Unfortunately, the sun is high overhead, the water shines like a mirror and is disorienting, and I can't tell if I should go back or ahead. So, I punt, and go ahead. Now I am at the mercy of Big Cypress. I don't really admit it. But I sense it, because watery portions of the trail are slowing me down. Still, I ramble on, enjoying the sun's warmth, the aroma of pine needles and a kaleidoscope of migratory winter residents: shrikes, jays, bluebirds. I barely notice the ubiquitous turkey vultures, as predictable as city pigeons, but am surprised to see wintertime dandelions blooming.

I start rationing my water supply under the winter's warm subtropical sun. A Power Bar becomes the first meal. Not long on taste, but it is reassuring to have some calories. I don't have any idea it is the only food I will see for a few days.

By mid-afternoon, knee-deep water has become the primary footpath. A muscle mutiny is brewing. I think: "If this is the Pineland portion, seen on the map back in the car, then we are heading south, and south is out. Got it?"

Monday Evening

eventually, I come upon a red plastic sign: "Seven-Mile Camp." I see some blue paint on the trees but no loop intersection. I think, "Seven miles at three miles per hour; that means I'll still be out by dark." I trudge on, until I see a "10-Mile Camp" sign and realize that this is the triangle I remember on the map back in the car. Is this the halfway point between Tamiami Trail to the south and Alligator Alley to the north? It hits me: Buddy, you are spending the night in the Everglades.

I walk on, still looking for the intersection of the far loop and the northern trail to Alligator Alley. I never find any definite marking to believe that I am on the loop trail leading back south, but I convince myself that I am. By now my right knee really hurts from a full day of slipping and sliding.

I stop for my first rest since morning. Sitting on a fallen tree, I bow my head and pray: in front of me, the setting sun; over my shoulder, the rising moon. Insects and birds begin a serenade. Warm, wafting breezes dry the sweat and swamp water from my soaked clothing and exposed skin.

Looking across a wide expanse of swamp-buggy trails and roads, I surmise that this must be the largest swamp-buggy crossing in the park. Maybe one will come by in the morning. With whatever neurons are still functioning, I burn into my mind the location of my present blazes and every detail of which way I will head in the morning.

It is time to find a place to sleep in the Everglades Ritz. Looking down one roadway, I spy what I think is a deer, but when I get closer, I see it is the rusting chassis of a Plymouth truck, a true godsend. I position my body diagonally across the decaying truck bed. Who cares if it is short and lumpy? I settle in for my night outdoors.

Now I begin checking my cell-phone display for service. But all my efforts to reach anyone fail. I don't think of calling 911. I turn off the phone to keep some battery juice in hopes of a call out tomorrow.

The full moon lights up the swamp as the last strands of purple and red abandon the western sky. Reptile and insect noises begin to fill the night. Moonbeam gems sparkle in the swamp water. Owls, very close, call out. Small mammals must cringe at that sound as they scurry like soldiers in besieged cities. Compared to those field rodents, my plight is manageable.

But as the night advances, so do the mosquitoes. From dark to dawn, the buzzing and biting are relentless. I try not to move much. Every motion causes the rusting metal of my truck bed to sag and separate. Occasionally, I turn my collar down enough so I can peek out. The moon-drenched sky is too bright for the Big Dipper to show. Too bad. I am looking for some assurance of my bearing.

I am glad I don't have a watch to annoy me. Instead, the night ebbs and flows and the universe ticks along just as the Almighty set it in motion eons ago. My mind reruns my present life activities until they seem as trivial as a Platinum Visa card in the middle of the wilderness.

Tuesday Predawn

the moon reaches its zenith, then falls fast to the western horizon. Dawn approaches from the east in fiery power and possibility. Awak-ening with a shiver, I attempt to control my shaking because it's rattling the collapsing truck bed. By now I am at nearly a 45-degree angle to the ground, with my head only inches from the water.

Even before there's adequate light, I arise, put on my sandals, take a drink, try the phone, thank God for the new day and head out. I walk directly toward my blazes and say to myself, "Remember, up the road, to the right, head into the opening, across from the fallen tree." But there are no blazes! Was I so exposed and delirious yesterday that I imagined everything?

I roam up one road after another, slipping in the muck with every step. My right knee is already twinging painfully. Finally, I choose a road, thinking, "Stay on the buggy road, a ranger or Seminole will be along with a load of smiling ecotourists, and you're out."

Eventually, a set of blazes appears. It's difficult trekking these buggy roads, which the Florida Trail has been crisscrossing ever since I left the visitor center. "This is a no-brainer," I decide. It's easier walking, the knee is sore, and it's probably a shorter distance to wherever I'm going. I decide to follow the blazes. Which way? Who knows? Off into a pine stand I head.

Tuesday Morning

the trail is an assortment of dry earth, spongy muck, creek, lagoon, bay and submerged unknown. It rises out of the swamp intermittently to a rocky floor of irregularly shaped flat slabs and potholes. I fall more than a few times, leaving painful cuts and lumps.

From early Tuesday morning to late afternoon, I slog through water up to my crotch. I believe I am going the right way, south, based upon my previous night of star and moon gazing. The Florida Trail has turned quickly from path to creek and is now a seemingly endless link of orchid-filled cypress lagoons. Each lagoon is more enchanting and mysterious than the previous one. Orchids and other airborne plants hang from the trees. I gaze deep into distant sunlit cypress grottoes, primeval and sacred looking. The bright flowers in the trees, however, look so much like blazes that they complicate staying on course.

Tuesday Afternoon

the sun is hot and my water is gone. Knowing that coliform-laden swamp water isn't a great beverage, I avoid it as long as possible. Eventually, I scoop it up by the handful to refresh my mouth. I begin to recognize the signs of exposure and dehydration: a feeling of lightheadedness, with hair rising on the spine. Though surrounded and immersed in water, I am starving for fluids.

In those endless and holy cypress bayous, I look down to see wildflowers reaching up through the swamp water. I begin to pluck and eat them. The purple and blue are tasty, and the white. The yellow ones taste chalky and bitter. Swamp fast food, for the busy lost hiker. I tell myself that whenever I need something, God provides it. In the heat was the cool swamp water. For rest, flat cypress knees rise from the murk. For food, there were flowers.

Ahead I see a sign for Oak Hill Camp in a dense palmetto-pine stand. It looks too uncomfortable for a rest. I don't recall from the map a third campsite on the loop. I do remember a tent symbol halfway north between the loop and Alligator Alley. Am I heading north? For the first time I admit the obvious. I am lost. I am not on the loop heading south back to the Tamiami Trail.

Instead of stopping in the camp, I wade on. Not too far ahead a relatively dry, shady place appears. The body collapses onto its back. It sleeps. It rests. It awakens-refreshed but confused. It says, "Where is that old guy you were walking with? He can't make it alone. Get up! Walk on ahead! He can't be far. He's limping."

"Back to reality, buddy," I yell from my brain's survival-control center. "What are you saying? You are out here alone. You haven't seen anyone for nearly two days. You are that old man."

Later the surface of the Florida Trail changes. Tufts of swamp grass start appearing-less slippery and easier on my sore knee. Sometimes the grass hides a nasty, submerged cypress knee to trip me up. From overhead, a fork-tailed Florida kite swoops down to pluck snails from the water.

As dusk approaches, my right knee gets too sore to drag. Taking a chance, I turn on my cell phone and dial the operator. Finally, a voice! I say: "Operator, can you connect me to Everglades National Park Headquarters on Tamiami Trail?"

Operator: "There is no listing on Tamiami Trail. How about Everglades City?"

"Sure."

Someone: "Hello, Everglades National Park."

"Can you help me out? I'm lost on the Florida Trail, north of the Tamiami Trail visitor center. I'm out of water and have injured my leg."

Someone: "This is Everglades City."

"Can you call them?"

Someone: "What is your phone number."

I give it.

"OK, we'll call the visitor center."

Yes! Thank you, Lord! I'm out of here! They have my cell number. They will track me to the microwave tower, send out a chopper and swoop me up.

According to the incident record, the Big Cypress Preserve received a call from Everglades City at about 3:15 p.m. A search party assembled and made unanswered calls to my cell phone. The calls were coming in, but I didn't have enough signal and battery to answer. A ranger was dispatched to the visitor center to investigate. No one had signed in, and he didn't find the abandoned automobile. Without any evidence of anyone missing, with no answer on the cell, the ranger in charge called off the search.

Tuesday Night

too exhausted to go on, i pick a cypress tree to lean against. With my walking stick and some branches, I make a foundation on the wet ground. I set my shoes and butt on this frame in an attempt to stay dry. Fat chance! I quickly sink into the muck. Tonight I will be sleeping in water.

The muck comes alive. Crawdads, insects and fish are actively foraging, building, planting, harvesting and scurrying busily around. They remind me that I am really hiking a river and lake. I think about doing this same trip by kayak. I settle in again for another night. First, I dry all my clothes in the evening sun and breeze. But after I get my clothes back on, I am too tired to keep standing and must inevitably resort to sitting in the water. The moon rises full again and the sunset makes the western sky radiant. I look at my trail blazes and realize I've still been heading north, ever deeper into the park rather than returning to my car on Tamiami Trail. I thank God for providing me stamina, cypress-knee lounge chairs, flowers and that cell call. Let the night begin.

I've seen some big cat tracks. A snake has raced ahead of me through a cypress bay. Alligator trails weave through the swamp grass. From not too far away, a bull 'gator bellows into the night, but nothing treacherous comes near. Nothing but mosquitoes.

Small, mosquito-eating fish nibble at my ankles and thighs. Noisy little frogs slither in the muck around me, jumping around my legs. I spend the first part of the night standing and leaning against the tree, expecting to be rescued any minute by an infrared, heat-seeking, satellite-connected chopper. Eventually, my determination to remain upright so I can hail a low-flying aircraft is replaced by episodes of prolonged shaking as the night temperature falls. I drop into the muck and warm myself by breathing inside my shirt. I notice spells of rapid breathing and my pulse seems to race.

My thirst is enormous. Throughout the day, with all my water gone, I had begun collecting my urine. All those survivor stories recommend it. But I just can't stand to drink it. I decide that, bacteria or not, in the morning I am going to collect my urine and cut it with swamp water.

I nod into a fitful sleep. As the moon drops, the sound of distant vehicles wafts in. The diffuse sounds of acceleration and changing gears become audible.

Wednesday

even before there's adequate morning light, I wander out into ankle-deep water looking for trail blazes. Maybe park headquarters in Everglades City didn't get the correct cell number and I am still on my own. In the deeper pools, I submerge my hydration pack to dilute the urine I'm counting on for minerals and electrolytes. My pulse is still racing and I'm too thirsty to care about disease. I quench my thirst at the bottom of a swamp pool. Bacteria never tasted so good.

A night's rest has brought my right knee little benefit. My gait is slow, clumsy and leading left while dragging the right leg along. The terrain changes back to palms and pines, hardly any cypress. The highway noise gets louder.

The trail turns unexpectedly away from the welcome sounds of civilization and my better judgment. I pace up and down the paths visiting and revisiting the tree with the double blazes, signs of a direction change. I think about my experience over the last three days. The trail signs, the old blazes barely visible, the high, distant blazes like harbor lights and beacons. "Look how far you have come. Trust the custodians of the trail," I tell myself.

Trusting pays off. The path turns into a service and buggy road. In another few miles it turns into Alligator Alley. Barely able to limp now, I drag into the rest area. My first stop is the water cooler, but I can't force myself to drink. Guess it doesn't have enough bacteria in it for my taste. After a few pay-phone calls, I arrange a ride. For the next hour, I stay mostly in the men's room warming my body and drying my clothes under the hand dryer.

My boss, Dr. Joel Moll, picks me up in his sports car. I plan to work my scheduled shift in the E.R. The staff sent a blanket and a sandwich, but I can't eat.

As I walk into the hospital, I see disbelief on the faces of my coworkers. Showered and in clean scrubs, I am ready to see patients. Before starting, I mention my fast heart rate to the doctor in charge. He has a nurse get a set of vitals. Blood pressure is way too high and the pulse is way too fast and irregular. Now I become a patient in a monitored bed, with fluids running and labs pending. My electrolytes are quite abnormal and my urine bloody. Doctor's prescription: "No work today."

After a brief nap, I awake to see a large man, dressed in park-service attire. Ranger G. B. Wangerin explains to me that Wednesday morning, the ranger who had led Tuesday's aborted search-and-rescue effort had received a phone call from staff at the visitor center. An abandoned automobile, unnoticed yesterday when sandwiched between two large RVs, had been found. From the license plate the ranger was able to connect to a name and address.

A Collier County deputy dispatched to the address found no one who knew of my whereabouts. A new search began, including a plane, helicopter, three swamp buggies, a couple of ATVs and 15 people on foot.

Wangerin tells me that I walked 31 miles from the Tamiami Trail to Alligator Alley-about the distance from Naples to Fort Myers. He reviews with me the appropriate sign-in and sign-out procedure, then lets me down easily by admitting that three to four like-minded lunatics get lost in Big Cypress annually.

After Wangerin leaves, I'm discharged from my patient's bed. I take inventory: dehydration, electrolyte imbalance, exposure, substantial muscle destruction, swollen, tender, cut and bitten lower extremities and, perhaps, a sprained knee. I feel humble and thankful to have survived.

Some months later, Wangerin and I meet for breakfast. He tells me that something good has come from this experience. The National Park Service has put GPS coordinates at one-mile intervals along the portion of the Florida Trail that passes through the Big Cypress Preserve.

What a great idea! There are many adventure-seeking, absent-minded folk like me eager to experience wildly beautiful places like the Florida Everglades. As the Gulf of Mexico side of the Everglades becomes more populated, more will be enticed into this enchanting and perilous place. I'm grateful that the stewards of these wild lands are mindful of our safety even while preserving adventure for us and for future generations.

Sean Ryan, a physician's assistant in Naples, still continues to hike, kayak and enjoy the Gulfshore outdoors.