Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Welcome to Florida
A hundred worlds - from magic kingdoms and Latin American
and Caribbean capitals to mangrove islands, wild wetlands
and artist colonies - are all contained within this flat
peninsula.
Seaside Fantasy
Maybe there's no mystery to what makes the Florida peninsula so intoxicating. Beaches as
fine and sweet as powdered sugar, warm waters, rustling mangroves: all conspire to melt
our workaday selves. We come to Florida to let go - of worries and winter, of inhibitions
and reality. Some desire a beachy getaway of swimming, seafood and sunsets. Others seek
the hedonism of South Beach, spring break and Key West. Still more hope to lose them-
selves within the phantasmagorical realms of Walt Disney World and Orlando's theme
parks.
Sexy Swamps
Within Florida's semitropical wilderness, alligators prowl beside waterways, herons strut
through ponds, manatees winter in springs and sea turtles nest in summer. Osprey and
eagles, dolphins and tarpon, coral-reef forests, oceans of sawgrass: despite the best efforts
of 21st-century humans, overwhelming portions of Florida remain untamed, sometimes dis-
concertingly so. We come to Florida to experience this taste of wildness, to paddle so close
to our toothsome Jurassic-era friends that our palms tingle. To meet loggerheads and
manatees underwater, eye to eye.
Tropical Mosaic
While many know Florida for beaches and theme parks, few understand this is one of the
most populous states in the country, a bellwether for the American experiment. And that ex-
periment - and this state - is more diverse than ever. From rural hunters and trappers in her
geographically northern, culturally Southern climes, to Jewish transplants sitting side by
