The Everglades is the largest tropical wilderness in the U.S. and the 3rd largest national park (after Death Valley and Yellowstone). The park was established in 1934 to protect the quickly vanishing Everglades and is home to 36 threatened or protected species, including the Florida panther, the American crocodile and West Indian manatee.

We drove south to Florida City and then headed west to the park entrance at the Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center. The entrance fee was $25 but we got in free with Richard’s National Parks Pass. Yay! We stopped at Long Pine Key for a bike ride. We were able to ride around a bit and explore the lake and campground but unfortunately the path we had planned to ride turned out to be too muddy due to lingering hurricane Irma damage. More on that later…

After leaving Long Pine Key we drove 37 miles down to the southern tip of the park at the Flamingo Visitor Center. We had been forewarned that the visitor center was closed and that there were no services due to hurricane Irma damage. Some of the stops along the way, like the Snake Bight Trail and Rowdy Bend Trail, were closed due to flooding. The visitor center was eerily deserted when we got there with only a few people walking around. We did see a couple of American crocodiles near the bridge and a giant Osprey nest along with a friendly park ranger trying to make the best of the situation.

Richard spotted this pink bird among all the white ones. We thought it sort of looked like a Flamingo. Plus we almost ran over this 4′ rattle snake in the middle of the road near the campground. I took this picture from the safety of the car!

This is just one small part of the Everglades National Park but we enjoyed our visit.