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Florida

January 2003 .........

Everglades National Park: Known as "The River of Grass", is essentially a slow-moving freshwater river 50 miles wide and a few inches deep. The park contains 1.5 million acres, half of them water. The highest point in the park is 8 ft. above sea level, the lowest is 16 ft below. The only fresh water source is the runoff from rains as far North as Lake Okeechobee. Elaborate water controls now disrupt the natural flow. Short of clean water at critical seasons, and in correct quantities the Everglades will die. In one of the worlds largest ecosystem restoration project the Park Service is working with the US Army Corps of Engineers and other water management jurisdictions to adopt natural rainfall models of manipulating water supplies.

The Everglades is among the few remaining places where the Manatee (sea cow) and the rare American Crocodile are assured a permanent sanctuary. It's the only place in the world where the Crocodile (prefer salt water) and the Alligator (prefer fresh water) co-exist. In the park we saw Dolphins, fish, birds and LOTS of mosquitoes.

We took a ranger guided canoe trip in Nine Mile Pond. That's where "Fred" the gator was waiting for us. The ranger told us not to get between the gator's and deep water, and not to canoe over a submerged gator. Good advice we thought. We saw 6 to 8 gator's in all during the trip. Went through the Mangrove forests into the wetlands where the water was only inches deep. Canoe trips into the bay are also available from the visitor center. We wanted to go out into the bay, however the water was too rough. We also took a sunset cruse into the bay in a sail boat. While in the park don't miss the Anhinga Trail, it's a half mile long loop trail and offers one of the best opportunities to view wildlife, including gator's and birds. On this trail we saw over 50 gator's, some of them babies, and a gator stalking and then trying to catch a bird. It's amazing how far they can jump out of the water, but the bird was faster and got away.

There is a visitor center, restaurant and a marina where you can rent boats, canoes and kayaks. If you want to spend time in the park and don't have an RV, there is a lodge, sort of 60's style but looked clean by the visitor center.

We stayed in the Flamingo campground, which is at the very end of the park. It's 49 miles from the park gate, and is dry camping only (there are bathrooms, showers, dump stations and water is available) The campsites are large, far apart and it's so quiet. Just a great place to relax and get in touch with nature.


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Everglades National Park