We stayed at Flamingo campground which is in the Everglades on the southernmost tip of the mainland of Florida.
There are several short trails you can walk between the Homestead entrance to the park and the Florida Bay. Each one is very different from the previous.
After seeing the Everglades by land the next day we decided to see it by water. We took a free ranger-led kayak tour of the Florida Bay. Along the way we saw crocodile in the distance and a small shark swimming after its prey. Unfortunately we didn’t get any pictures. That afternoon we took a boat tour through the mangroves and the Evergaldes back country.
The Everglades is a migratory spot for lots of birds. Here are a few of our favorites.
The Everglades is the only place in the world you can see both alligators and crocodiles. It is the northernmost point for crocodiles and the southermost point for alligators. The differences between them are crocodiles like salt water, are gray, have a narrow nose, and when it’s mouth is closed you can see it’s top and bottom rows of teeth. Alligators like fresh water, are a dark green almost black color, have a broad nose, it’s eyes are not as recessed as a crocodile, and when it’s mouth is closed you only see the top row of teeth. I posted side by side comparisons of some of the ones we’ve seen below. The crocodile was on the boat ramp where we launched our kayaks from earlier in the day.
Throughout the Cold War the U.S. thought any attack from the Soviet Union would be coming from over the North Pole. All air defense was set to defend that. The Cuban Missile Crisis exposed the south as also being dangerous. Immediately following they built the Nike Hercules Missile Base in the Everglades. The base was for anti-aircraft missiles, some fitted with nuclear warheads up to 40 kilotons. For reference, the Hiroshima bomb was 15 kilotons. Nothing was ever launched and the base closed in 1979.
We want to take an airboat ride and go to the observation tower in the Everglades, but that is easier to get to from our next stop in Miami.