Orange Blaze: A Florida Trail Podcast

The podcast is taking a massive hiatus in 2024! I will be back. If you'd like to be a guest on the podcast, leave a comment or email me at orangeblazepodcast at gmail and we can go from where. Thanks for listening over the years! Burnout how gotten hold of me and I need to reinvigorate my interest in the podcast with a long break.

As a nature lover, I am drawn to those who share the the wonders of Florida's natural history as they document their hikes along the way. Claire's Instagram account caught my eye well before their 2022 thru-hike and still captures my interest today even though they are no longer on a thru-hiking journey. The perspective Claire offered on both their Florida Trail and subsequent Appalachian Trail th...

For several years now I have been following the news about the push to Free the Ocklawaha River from the Rodman Dam, first via the Florida Native Plant Society, and later through other entities in Florida. The idea intrigued me because the Rodman Reservoir and the Kirkpatrick Dam as well as the Cross Florida Barge Canal are all intertwined with the Florida Trail. The reservoir was created when the...

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Hattie Spring (@searchingforspring) Earlier this year I put out a call for Ocean to Lake hikers to come on the podcast and share their stories so I could get their perspective on that segment of what isn’t really the Florida Trail but I think we’ve all come to think of it is as a special little piece of the FT. We’ve heard from Sandra Friend who helped...

Earlier this year I asked for folks who had hiked the Ocean to Lake Trail to reach out to me if they would like to share a bit about their experience on that trail for a short series wanted to do here on the podcast. Josh '301' Widdowfield was one of those hikers who offered to chat with me on the podcast and I’m glad he did. Josh thru-hiked the FT this year (2023) but has done several LASH (Long...

I've been wanting to get Jim Kern, found of the Florida Trail, back on this podcast since he was first on the podcast, the very first episode that launched the podcast in 2018. It took me a while but I finally made it happen. This episode is likely to stir up some thoughts and hopefully some positive conversations. I read Jim’s book Broken Promise: The Plight of our National Trails this summer wit...

Today's podcast guest is Sandra Friend, someone you all should know well by now! If by some chance you are new to the podcast and new to Florida hiking, well this is your lucky day and you caught the right podcast to listen to! Sandra Friend and her partner John Keatley are the folks behind Florida Hikes and much of the guidebooks related to Florida’s hiking trails out there in publication. John w...

Episode 88's guest is Florida Trail Association Executive Director, Royce Gibson. It’s been a while since I’ve had a representative from the FTA on the podcast and when I saw the latest campaign from the FTA, the Close the Gaps campaign, I knew I needed to get someone on to speak directly to this. Royce was the natural fit and it was great to sit down and hear what the current plans are for closin...

Darby Calm is a hiker based in SE Florida and this interview with her is probably long overdue as I’ve long been a fan of her Instagram account and persistence as a hiker. Darby is a day hiker and by day hiker I mean, she is out on a trail most days of the week . And if she’s not out on a trail, she’s walking through her neighborhood or out on the water exploring Florida’s waterways. When Darby is...

Earlier this year I interviewed Mills Kelly, historian and host of the Green Tunnel Podcast, which as the podcast website declares, "delves into topics including the quirky history of trail food, the shelters and structures built along the trail, and dangers you might encounter during a hike". Mills and I have kept in touch over the last few months and we’ve decided to do a podcast episode swap to...

This is a bit of a different episode, one from my gardening podcast, The Garden Path Podcast. You are probably already familiar with Valerie Anderson as she has been on the Orange Blaze Podcast before to talk about the plight of Split Oak Forest near Orlando. I had Valerie on my garden podcast to talk about the Florida Native Plant Society and thought it would be relevant to many Florida Trail hik...

Today's episode features the Florida Madcaps, a trio of Florida outdoor enthusiasts some of you may already know: Chris and Chelsey Stevens of the Sunshine State Seekers and Ryan Worthington the Florida Excursionist. Chris and Chelsey have already been on the Orange Blaze podcast before, in February 2019 and May 2020, but this is the first time I’ve gotten to speak with Ryan. Chris, Chelsey, and R...

Hello hikers! I have a fun and different episode than usual—this is the book club episode I mentioned in my last set of episodes released. I chose Life and Death on the Loxahatchee by James Snyder for the book club and several folks reached out to say they were interested in having a zoom book club discussion about it! My guests in the conversation are David Magness, Paul Arsenault, and Leslie McC...

Late last year I decided to start a book club for the podcast and chose Life and Death on the Loxahatchee, for a few reasons, one of them being that it had been sitting on my bookshelf for far too long and I knew I needed to read it. Another, because of the interesting folk history of the area along the Loxahatchee River, an area that the Ocean to Lake Trail traverses and an area that many Florida...

Eleni McDaniel was first on the podcast back in March of 2019 and a lot has changed in the four years since then. She’s changed trail names for one and expanded her career and hiking life beyond Florida, though as you’ll hear her ties to the Florida Trail still reel her back into the state every Florida Trail hiking season. I love chatting with Eleni, not just because we are friends but because sh...

Day hikers make up the bulk of hikers on the Florida Trail, just like on other National Scenic Trails. I think we all tend to focus heavily on thru-hikers for these trails because of their epic nature and the way long distance hiking intrigues a lot of us, but the day hikers are the ones getting to know certain localities of a trail in a more intimate manner. They are out there for quick weekend j...

New this season is the Orange Blaze Podcast Book Club! Our first book will be Life and Death on the Loxahatchee: The Story of Trapper Nelson . If you have spent any time around Jonathan Dickinson State Park or the Loxahatchee River you may already know the legend and lore of Trapper Nelson. I've had this book on my shelf for years and it is about time I read it! Reading along and if you want to pa...

After our 2011 thru-hike I wrote a post on my blog detailing some of the more important notes needed for thru-hikers on the Florida Trail. There wasn't a lot out there at the time on social media, though there were Trail Journals and the books produced by Sandra Friend---there just wasn't the community in 2011 that there it today. That said, I think this episode is long overdue and should have bee...

When the Green Tunnel Podcast debuted in late 2021 and I began listening to episodes I quickly realized this was not your average hiking podcast. Mills Kelly and his team at R2 Studios at George Mason University have put together a stunning series of podcast episodes that rival some of the NPR-style podcasts out there. Covering history of the Appalachian Trail from Benton MacKaye to the Roller Coa...

Jason ‘Out and About’ Tompkins is a 2022 Florida Trail Thru-Hiker and progenitor of a new eastern route called The Carolinian. A Florida native, Jason has spent many years living and exploring regions outside of Florida but returned to Florida in late 2021 to begin a year of thru-hiking. He first kicked off by hiking the Ocean to Lake Trail and getting his legs literally and figuratively wet for t...

Maria caught my eye as someone to interview for the podcast because I though she offered a unique perspective to podcast listeners. Having discovered hiking during the early parts of the pandemic in 2020 as a way to get outside and not go stir-crazy, she began exploring Everglades National Park and other parks closer to her home in Miami. As you’ll hear Maria say, Miami residents aren’t often know...

Welcome to a new season of the podcast! The podcast in 2022 floundered a bit and if you saw my social media posts you will know that I lost a lot of momentum to keep the podcast going in late summer. If you’ve listened to podcasts with any sort of high frequency over the last 8-10 years you will have noticed how podcasts typically fade with time. Some because they had a certain lifespan to begin w...

When I launched the podcast I had no idea how many people I would connect with via podcast interviews and social media, muchless the other podcasters within the hiking world. Lori Prima is one of those delightful people I’ve gotten to know a little bit and she’s been kind enough to have me on two episodes of her podcast over the years. I thought it was high time I reciprocated and invited Lori on...

Back in 2007 (I figured out the date, the year I mentioned in the podcast is wrong) my husband Chris was exploring in Big Cypress National Preserve in some of their cypress domes and sloughs. Some of these are very remote and require bushwhacking or hiking into from swamp buggy trails. He was out looking for plants and just exploring the area. This podcast details an encounter with a Florida black...

Ultrarunner Amy Ansbaugh together with her crew chief and partner Dani set out to set the women’s supported FKT along the Florida Trail, with a western corridor focus, earlier this year. Amy’s long history of running and the challenge to set a women’s record on the Florida Trail originally enticed Amy and her sister Kitty to attempt an FKT of the trail. When Kitty bowed out due to injuries, Amy de...