Night three. Somewhere past Lignumvitae Key, where the chart turns vague and the islands become silhouettes in a still-burning sky. In January of 2009 we were deep into our Florida Keys expedition; Sean Fitzgibbon, Bryan Doleman, and myself three paddlers with too many miles behind us and salt in our eyes looked towards rest.
We had made landfall on a key that looked like it had never heard the sound of human voices. No footprints. No fire rings. Just brittle mangroves, crushed coral, and a whispering wind that seemed to retreat the moment we arrived. It was the kind of place Florida doesn’t put on postcards too wild, too quiet, too… watchful.
Sean strung his hammock between two clawed black mangroves. Bryan did the same. I set my tent in the clearing, staked to the edge of the brittle brush. We were bone-tired, sunburned, and too dehydrated to question the strange shape of the clouds, or the way the dusk held a strange hum; like breath held under the roots.
I was zipping my tent shut when we heard it.
Scrape. Shuffle. Tap.
We glanced at each other. “Other paddlers?” Sean guessed.
“Could be,” I said, hoping that was true.
We walked to the shoreline, headlamps off, feet soft in the coral sand. The moon wasn’t up yet. The only light came from the stars and the dim, ambient glow of the sea. But there were no kayaks landing. No paddles clinking. No voices.
Just silence.
And not a single footprint.
I crouched, ran a hand over the sand. Nothing. Not even raccoon tracks.
Still, we stacked coral stones on the hatches and hoisted our food in a drybag-bear-bag hybrid, dangling it in a gnarled mangrove tree above the tide line. Just in case. Sean muttered something about how in the Everglades you don’t ask questions you just hang the food and hope you’re not sleeping above a snake hole.
Back in camp, the noises changed. From below to above.
Rustle. Pat. Scratch.
Eyes. Tiny, gleaming orbs, catching light like sparks in the mangroves.
“Rats,” Bryan whispered, and pointed.
Dozens. No, hundreds. A team in fur and shadow. Watching. Not moving. Perched on branches, knotted in vines, motionless but breathing.
“They’re waiting,” Sean muttered.
“For what?” I asked, trying to sound amused. I failed.
We went to bed anyway. What else do you do out there? We were hardened paddlers, accustomed to raccoons stealing Clif bars and fiddler crabs clacking in our cookpots. This was just another wild night.
Except it wasn’t.
It started with a hiss of nylon. A shivering sound across my tent wall. Then a thud. And laughter.
Not human laughter. But play. Excited. Rodents playing.
Thump. Slide. Thump. Slide.
A rat had run up the outside of my tent and slid down the rainfly. Then another. And another.
Outside, the hammocks swayed.
Sean whispered something sharp, almost a curse.
“They’re… they’re sliding down the guylines.”
No food had been stolen. No gear had been gnawed. But these rats, these sentient shadows of the island were having a party.
They climbed, dropped, scampered up the tarps, launched themselves down like children on a playground. Over and over. A grotesque, joyful ritual.
And somewhere in the trees, more eyes watched. Silent. Unblinking.
We lay awake, not afraid exactly but aware. This island was not empty. And we were not alone. The rats were not just rats. They were… hosts.
In the morning, the clearing was as it had been untouched, unmarked, unbothered. No chew holes. No stolen gear. Just a smear of tiny tracks near the rainfly, and a perfect, eerie calm.
We packed quickly. No coffee. No oatmeal. Just paddles in the water and an unspoken urgency to move.
As we pushed off into the tide, Bryan said, “You think they do that every night?”
I didn’t answer. I was watching the trees.
And they were still watching back.
Illustration by ©2010 Paddling.net Inc.
Field Note:
The wild gives us more than weather and waves. Sometimes, it offers mysteries. And sometimes, the only mark we leave behind is a tent-shaped memory and the sound of laughter in the trees.
Are You Ready to Paddle Into the Unknown?
What began as a simple night on a forgotten key became one of the most unforgettable encounters of our expedition. That’s the strange beauty of wilderness travel. You never know what the water, sand, or the rats have planned. These stories aren’t found in guidebooks. They live out there, in the in-between places, where the tide whispers and the trees watch.
So ask yourself: What strange and wonderful stories are waiting for you?
At Liquid Rhythm, we don’t just paddle coastlines we guide explorers into mystery, memory, and the wild heartbeat of Florida. Whether you’re new to sea kayaking or ready to plan your first full-blown expedition, we’ll show you the ropes and the rats.
Go forth. Paddle far. Bring back stories.
Join us: https://liquidrhythmkayaking.com/expeditions
-Jeff Fabiszewski
Liquid Rhythm Adventures' Journal 