Hike Bike Paddle Camp Florida with authors Sandra Friend and John Keatley as your guides
Parks, natural lands, and trails notable for wildlife encounters, the whole range from armadillos to alligators, Florida black bears to gopher tortoises, and manatees to whales.
Providing a walk through the mangrove-lined edge of Florida Bay and the unique coastal prairie habitat within a short loop, the Bayshore Loop takes you what’s left of the fishing village of Flamingo.
A patch of wild in a sea of suburbia, Bear Creek provides nearly a mile’s worth of exploration atop sandy bluffs in a shady creekside hammock in Winter Springs.
Paralleling the former Homestead Canal, the Bear Lake Trail takes you on a journey through tropical hammock and mangrove forests along a road scooped from the canal diggings.
At Blackwater River State Forest, each of the recreation areas offers access to hiking, and popular Bear Lake is no exception. A 4-mile trail loops around this impounded reservoir, which flows into Sweetwater Creek.
Jupiter has bears? Today’s the first time I’ve seen them along a trail: the Longleaf Pine Trail, an interpretive nature trail at Busch Wildlife Sanctuary, a lovely family escape just south of Indiantown Road near I-95.
With a 1.8-mile loop through the uplands of Washington Oaks Gardens State Park, the Bella Vista Trail offers a close look at the variety of habitats found on this barrier island
Betty Steflik Memorial Preserve protects more than 200 acres of mangrove marsh, mud flats, and coastal uplands right on the edge of downtown Flagler Beach
Deep in the heart of an ancient swamp, the Goethe Giant – one of Florida’s largest cypress trees – stands tall at the end of a boardwalk in Goethe State Forest.
Near Perdido Key, Big Lagoon State Park is best known for its (really big) lagoon, but the scenic trail system through the scrub is a delight for hardy hikers, involving much trekking through soft white sand.
The Big Oak Trail is one of the most scenic hikes in North Florida. Much of the hiking parallels the Suwannee and Withlacoochee Rivers, which meet here at a confluence.
At Big Shoals State Park, see Florida’s largest series of rapids, churning the Suwannee River with hydraulics in Class III whitewater at certain times of year.
With airboat and swamp buggy rides as well as interpretation of native species, Billie Swamp Safari is an attraction providing immersion into the Big Cypress Swamp, ancestral home of the Seminole Tribe since the 1800s..
