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The Real Florida
by Ken Gambier

My wife and I have an ambition to visit all 50 of the United States, having so much enjoyed our visits to nearly 30 of them over a number of years. A newspaper advertisement by United Airlines, offering big reductions to several places in USA including Miami and Tampa, gave us the idea of adding Florida to our "been there" list. We booked two return flights to Tampa for about the same cost as one normal fare. We used the internet to book a car for two weeks and a hotel near Tampa airport for the first night. We devised a rough itinerary from the Lonely Planet and Dorling Kindersley guides and an Insight Travel Map, and off we went a few days after the start of the Iraq war. One slight drawback of our UA flight was that we had to fly to Washington and carry out immigration there before taking a domestic flight to Tampa. This added a few hours to our journey but it was all during daytime.

The title of this piece is taken from the cover of the booklet describing the Florida State Parks, which we quickly found covered many of the things we like to see in a new place we visit. There are 156 parks covering nearly 600,000 acres (which my calculator tells me is over 900 square miles). We also found that a $10 weekly pass would admit a car and its occupants into any of the parks instead of an entry fee of $3 or so.

We drove south from Tampa to visit the Myakka River State Park and went for a walk beside a shallow lake. We were immediately rewarded by seeing several large alligators swimming in the lake or basking in the sunshine on its banks. We had hoped to see alligators but had not expected it to be so easy or so soon. The profusion and variety of wildlife in that park was quite astonishing and this was to be our experience in all of Florida's State Parks. In addition to alligators in various parks we saw deer, turtles, snakes and lizards. The bird population was prolific, with pelicans, anhingas, herons, egrets, ospreys and raptors.

The next day we drove to Corkscrew Swamp in the north of the Everglades. It has a long boardwalk across the swamp with a nature trail describing what can be seen at various stages of the walk, particularly the plants which are suited to a wet habitat. We again saw alligators and began to expect to see them on any of our wildlife outings. We got a taste of what makes Florida so wet when the heavens opened and the rain pelted down several times in the couple of hours we were there. Fortunately we had got umbrellas in the car and were able to stay relatively dry. We next drove to Shark Valley where we boarded a "tram" to take us through part of the Everglades with the driver giving a running commentary on what we could see. At one place alligators were lying on the bank so close to the path that it would have been easy - though unwise - to touch them.

The following day we drove the length of the Keys from Key Largo to Key West. The sun shone warmly and we marvelled at the engineering expertise which had been used to build the bridges which link up scores of little keys (islands). The first bridges were built to take a railway down the Keys but with the advent of the motor car they were soon converted for road use. In places the old railway bridges can still be seen, and many old bridges - rail and road - are used nowadays by fishermen. Fishing and boating and water sports of all kinds are enjoyed by millions of people all over Florida.

We paid a brief early morning visit to Flamingo, at the south end of the Everglades and when we got out of the car we were instantly attacked by a horde of mosquitoes. We hastily sprayed our arms and legs with insect repellent but it was too late and we came up in numerous lumps. In spite of applying "bite cream" as we call it, we had those lumps for a couple of days. We bought an extra can of repellent and from then on always applied it when we got out of the car.

Then we turned the nose of the car north and over several days drove the length of the Atlantic coast of Florida. We purposely avoided Miami and Daytona Beaches, though we saw many miles of beautiful sandy beaches along the way with hardly anyone on them. It was hard to believe that (at the end of March) this was still in the high season for Florida.

We were captivated by the beauty of St Augustine and spent three days in the area visiting the many places of interest in the old town and in the area around. With our State Parks pass we went to the Washington Oaks Gardens which were designed in the 1930s for a private home and are beautifully laid out. We also went north (over the ferry to avoid Jacksonville) to Fort Clinch, which was occupied by both Union and Confederate troops in the Civil War and still has a number of guns and other relics from that time.

It was time to turn west to visit the Panhandle area so we headed for Tallahassie, one of the unlikely State Capitols (like Albany NY and Little Rock Arkansas). After driving round several times to find a car park we were able to visit the Capitol building, free of charge and with little security check. In one room there was an exhibition explaining the problem which was created during the last Presidential election when the Florida result was challenged. The ballot forms looked frightfully complicated and we were glad the British voting system is much simpler. We took the elevator to the top floor to get a birds-eye view of the city. We then walked across to the old State Capitol building which was originally intended to be demolished but part of it was retained to preserve its history.

We motored to Pensacola expecting to see brilliant sunshine on the Gulf Coast. Instead we found fog which hung about much of the day; however it was still very warm with no need to dress up. We drove out to Fort Pickens and the sun came out as we toured the site and inspected the fortifications and the armour. This part of the trip was confusing as to the correct time as the line between Eastern Time and Central Time passes west of Tallahassie AND the clocks had just gone forward for daylight saving.

The geology of Florida is a flat layer of limestone which has been raised from the seabed. The limestone tilts down from north to south so that the general flow of water is towards the Everglades from where it is very slow to drain to the sea; hence the large area of marshland. Florida is so flat that the highest point is only 250ft above sea level. In the north the limestone gives rise to caves and to sink-holes where the roof of a cave has fallen in. At Florida Caverns State Park we went underground to view the stalactites and stalagmites on a guided tour.

We now started on our journey south back towards Tampa. We went to Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park to see manatees. These are large gentle creatures which live in shallow water and resurface for air every few minutes. They are in danger of being injured by careless boaters and there are warnings about this wherever these animals are to be found. In Homosassa Springs there are several manatees recovering from injury being cared for by park staff, and they are fed at set times so that visitors can watch. There is also an underwater observatory from where manatees can be seen close by.

We stayed all round Florida in Super8 motels which we found reasonably comfortable and inexpensive, averaging $50 a night. We have a VIP card which allows us to telephone a central number and book into any one of their 2000+ motels at a 10% discount and a minimum of formality. The Super8 booklet gives a precise location of each motel and we have little difficulty in finding them. The exception to this is when we try to be clever and approach the motel by a different route from the one advised!

For the last two nights we stayed near Clearwater, on the Gulf coast to the west of Tampa. We went to the Henry B Plant Museum in Tampa which displays the lavish hotel that the eponymous rich businessman finished building in 1891 with money made from steamboats and railways. It was too large to be an ongoing commercial success and part of it now houses Tampa University. We drove the length of the waterfront from Clearwater to St Pete beach, then caught a bus from Treasure Island to make the journey to St Petersburg Pier. This turned out to be a mistake as the bus journey was slow and uninteresting and the sky got blacker by the minute.

Fifteen minutes after arriving at the pier and looking over the waters of Tampa Bay, the heavens opened and an inch of rain fell in about 30 minutes. The return bus was several hundred yards up the road so we bought a couple of plastic macs and waited for the rain to diminish. Then a free bus turned up to take us off the pier and we caught our return bus to Treasure Island without getting wet.

On the last day we handed back the car with over 3000 additional miles on the clock. We had seen a different kind of Florida from those who go to Orlando or Miami, but every bit as spectacular and fantastic.

First published in VISA issue 52 (September 2003)

Another view of Florida
Pictures