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Florida Travel

Florida’s destiny has been molded by water. Jutting into the Atlantic for 450 miles, this most celebrated of America’s peninsulas has no point more than 60 miles from its coastline. Rainfall averages more than 50 inches a year, making Florida one of the wettest states. As a result, some 30,000 lakes are scattered throughout its interior, ranging from pint-sized ponds to the 700-square-mile Lake Okeechobee, the second largest natural freshwater body entirely within the United States after Lake Michigan. Water draining from Okeechobee flows slowly southward, creating the vast marshlands of the Everglades. A ribbon of islands, sandbars, and coral reefs festoons the coast, culminating 150 miles off the southern shore at the tip of the Keys.

These warm and sheltered waters attract one of the most astounding arrays of wildlife found anywhere in the world. Alligators, crocodiles, manatees, sea turtles, more than 350 species of birds, and 700 species of fish can be found in or around Florida’s ponds and coastal waters. Since the turn of the century, Florida has also attracted another sort of inhabitant, whose numbers constantly grow. More than 40 million tourists now savor the state each year, most of them headed for the good life on its sunny coast.

Fort Matanzas National Monument, Florida

The city of St. Augustine in northeastern Florida is among the oldest settlements in America. And just a short drive away, you can take a free ferry to see little-known Fort Matanzas, built by the Spanish in 1740 to protect the city.

African Queen Steamboat, Florida

We were surprised to find the African Queen, the steamboat immortalized in the 1951 movie of the same name, docked in a canal in Key Largo, Florida.

Built in England, the 36-foot steel-hulled boat was originally named Livingston and toiled as a ferry on Lake Albert.

Sumter County Farmers Market, Florida

Flea markets abound in Florida, but Webster's extravaganza--among the state's oldest and largest--astonishes even seasoned flea market goers like me.

Ted Williams Museum, Florida

Entering the Ted Williams Museum and Hitters Hall of Fame in Hernando, Florida made me feel like a kid again, listening to Boston Red Sox games on my grandmother's Philco radio and hearing the crowd go wild as "The Splendid Splinter" steps to the plate.

Homosassaga Springs Wildlife State Park, Florida

On our annual trip to Florida, a local man told my husband, Robby, that we had to see Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park in Homosassa, near central Florida's Gulf Coast. We're sure glad we took his advice--it's like no other state park we've ever visited.

Gatorland in Orlando, Florida

Exhausted by the frantic pace of central Florida's theme parks? Gatorland is a delightful change of pace--and only minutes away from those better-known attractions.

This 37-acre wildlife preserve is home to more than 1,000 alligators, 200 crocodiles and thousands of birds. It features a three-story observation tower overlooking a 10-acre breeding marsh and a 2,000-foot boardwalk leading through a cypress swamp to the Everglades' headwaters.