209 Mile Hike, Day 4 Finish: 11K+ Raised For Gold Star Families, 11K+ Blisters On My Feet

Geezus lady… we get it. You went hiking.

Ok, I know, I know. There’s been a lot of hiking posts this week. But bear with me because this is a recap of Day 4 – the final one! And it was for a most excellent cause; The Marine Raider Foundation/funds for Gold Star families… so GET OFF ME.

After the last hike of Day 3, I got about an hour of sleep underneath an airplane at the U.S. Air Force Armament Museum. Then, sometime after midnight on Day 4, I put my hand in a large pricker plant, almost cried, peed behind a tree covered in roaches, almost cried again, and started getting ready for the next & final big stretch of road.

Delirious, I grabbed some moleskin and put it all over my feet, covering every fragile blister with the very sticky tape that, fun story, is never supposed to directly touch your blisters. Then, without realizing what I’d done, I wrapped it all up tight with tape, so as to inadvertently maximize my future pain.

We spent much of this stretch on the side of a huge, empty highway & it was fun to wander onto it in the darkness and dance around a bit, because you normally don’t get to do that unless speedballs are involved. Much like speedballs, that novelty soon wore off & at one point I got so tired my eyes literally started criss-crossing.

When the conversation switched to YouTube videos around 4AM, trip organizer SSgt. Daniel Campbell pulled up a motivating graduation speech about doing good in the world. In turn, I was excited to spread the gospel of Canon Ball Dookie (Take One) and Hippo Butt Explosion. (I consider myself to be the Johnny Appleseed of these two ancient videos, sharing them wherever I go around the country.)

Soon we started smelling smoke and a thick haze rolled in. The air was humid & eerily still, and stunk like a BBQ cooking up moldy, mesquite soaked cardboard. On the plus side, we were off the highway and back towards civilization again, where I could keep my mind occupied by judging everything around me with my beady, little Yankee eyeballs.

And then there it was amongst cotton candy sunrise clouds… An inland lighthouse acting as a beacon for all that is good and syrupy. With the end of our last 7.5 miles nearing, and the blisters between my toes developing a heartbeat, Waffle House came into view.

Upon passing off the flag to Group 2, we headed over to the restaurant. All entirely unhinged from exhaustion, everything became extremely funny. Somehow we started replacing words in everyday phrases with the word ‘cuck’ & it brought hysterical tears to our (just my) eyes. Anyway, things had really come around full cuck and I was excited for some Waffle Cuck.

I started this hike with 4AM Waffle House,

and I’d end it with 4AM Waffle House.

After grubbin’ & only a few miles out from the end destination, the Raider 7 Memorial in Navarre, FL, we gathered in a parking lot and waited to re-unite with the other two teams for the final march. I went off to a shaded area to blog until I heard a commotion; someone had stepped in a big ‘ol pile of dog crap and the group was delighted.

Finally we were all together and it was time to step off to the memorial. Along the way, SSgt. Campbell pointed out the bridge near the Black Hawk crash site that took 7 of his fellow MARSOC Marines. Entering a beautiful park on the water, the memorial came into view & we circled around it. After a moving speech by Campbell, we all took a moment to reflect.

I thought about my own friends who didn’t make it, and especially about these men and those like them, and their loved ones. Emo vibes started creeping in pretty hard & I excused myself to the water where I teared up & gave my own little moto-speech on the Zero Blog Thirty instagram page. The message was powerful, especially the ending where I couldn’t figure out how to make the camera stop recording & just looked intently into it, confused, for about 2 minutes.

After gathering myself & mingling and meeting some of the hiker’s family & friends, I ran into the ocean with my clothes still on & floated around with some Auburn U. NROTC folks & my new Marine friends. The moleskin was still stuck to my wounds, but I no longer smelled like Satan’s grundle.

I’d become so impressed with the women & men of Auburn’s NROTC along the way. Some of them were leaving for OCS (Officer Candidate School) in a matter of weeks, and were still willing to risk physical damage on this ruck… A ruck they stayed behind in a post-finals-college-ghost-town to attend. They were tight-knit, positive, ridiculously funny, tough AF and kind; a clear reflection of their commitment, and also of the Marine instructors with them.

Some went the extra mile to look out for others, & it made me feel happy to know some wacky enlisted Marine like myself would have them as a solid leader someday. They also took the time to bring me up to speed on Juuls, Fortnite, Spring Break butt-chuggin and more. Guess the kidz these days are all about icy beers and pink eyes.

Eventually some of us headed over to a tiki bar where no one let me pour my five Pina Coladas down their butts and into my mouth, but they were still delish. With a good buzz going, we came up with a list of lessons learned for long rucks, which are indisputable facts since we are experts now:

-Crocs over flops for down time. 1) Because Crocs are just fucking cool and 2) In case you get a blister between your toes like I did & Crocs would have cut your bitching down by 72%

-You can eat whatever you want. Don’t listen to the health nuts. We found time for fast food every night & crushed it. I made the journey on smothered hash browns, a Big Mac, 6 Hooters boneless hot wings, a Hot Dog, vanilla ice cream, Hardees strawberry shortcake biscuits, peanut MnMs and an enormous jug of iced coffee. Besides all the painful shitting in the woods & leg cramps, I felt like a spring chicken!

-Drake might disagree, but good socks over everything.

-Take advantage of every public bathroom you come across, even if you don’t think you have to go. Toilets become a luxury that you’ll miss when you’re squatting 1/2 way inside a holly bush with a bunch of cows staring at you.

-Sleep whenever you can. At certain points I couldn’t tell if some of these southern ROTC folks had heat stroke, were just exhausted or if it was simply a ridiculous southern accent. (Thankfully always ended up being the latter.) But I know some instances where I stayed awake to blog instead of nap & when I read it later, none of it made sense at all so I should have just slept anyway.

-Bring a leash in case you stumble across dogs who want to follow you & run into the street. One group had to hold on to a dog for miles as they marched along, and even named him something nice like ‘Bingo’, until an old farmer came along to collect ‘Stonewall Jackson”.

By this point at the tiki bar I could hear myself getting loud & obnoxious, so I decided to go wade in the water by the van heading back to Auburn, until it was time to go. Slowly we said our goodbyes & the group dispersed. Before I drifted off into a rum induced slumber (I’ve been informed I snore like a buzz-saw now?!), I checked my own & Zero Blog Thirty’s DMs.

Both had messages from Stoolies sending words of encouragement for our group, letting me know they’d donated, and some in Alabama & Florida offering to stop by & buy us drinks, or meet up with us along the hike & bring supplies. I had military members & veterans who just wanted to tell me about their own friends who’d been killed in training or action. Others letting me know about events they were hosting, set to honor & remember as Memorial Day draws near.

When I mentioned this to SSgt. Campbell earlier, he showed me messages from family members of the fallen thanking the group for remembering their sons, husbands, friends… My heart strings were getting tugged so hard I thought they were gonna snap.

You don’t need to walk 209 miles or perform some grand gesture to honor those who have given their lives in service to this country;  you really don’t have to do anything at all. But I’d highly recommend it, because whether you think so or not, it has an impact on those who have to go on living with the losses of these young men & women, and you’ll be a better person for it, too.

I know it can be awkward because you don’t want to say the wrong thing or overstep, but if you reach out to someone with good intentions it will be appreciated 99.9% of the time. Ask about the people on a vet’s memorial bracelet. Help plant flags at a cemetery. Send a simple message to a buddy who’s lost friends overseas.. ‘Hey, thinking of ya, let’s grab a beer soon.’ Volunteer in your community in honor of a local military member or gold star family.

Back at the hotel, I could smell myself walking through the lobby. As soon as I ordered $35 worth of delivery from Pizza Hut, I braced myself to hop in the shower..

When the pizza guy arrived, he forgot to give me a fork but I was too sore to chase him down & murder him. So I tore a plastic bathroom cup apart & layed on my back dumping 5,000 calorie pasta into my mouth like the disgusting human being that I am.

By Mother’s Day afternoon I was in the air heading to Philly, reflecting heavily on the whirlwind trip (because I forgot my headphones in the overhead bin). Without getting too brown-nosey, I’m so grateful to Barstool for being the rare kind of place that says ‘yes’ to ideas way more often than ‘no’, even when you reach out on a Monday morning with a long rambling email about a trip you want to take on Tuesday:

Yes, I went to write about it, but I also went because it was meaningful & important, and I got so much out of it. I walked (hobbled) away with amazing new friends, a respect for our future leaders, and in this 17-year-old war, a much needed reminder of the sacrifices still being made at home and abroad, and the people it effects.

Finally back in the ‘burbs, I headed over to my parents to celebrate my Mom by letting her feed me a huge dinner & putting my disgusting laundry in her washer. An amazing trip ending with the best lady around. Appreciated it all a bit more than usual. Not a bad week.

*SSgt. Daniel Campbell & all the hikers raised over 11K over 4 days for Gold Star Families through the Marine Raider Foundation. If you’d like to check it out or donate, click here.*