There were a few things we thought we needed to tick off before leaving Miami and the Everglades was one of them. When we initially started talking about this we had grand ideas of getting our boating licenses specifically for the Everglades (there is a special one just for here) and renting a houseboat for a few days, but ultimately we just grabbed a room at the National Park Hotel. Having stayed at National Park hotels in the US before and having looked at the restaurant menu we didn't have high expectations (unlike Canada)
The Flamingo Everglades Hotel was about 40 miles into the park, but the #1 rated walk on AllTrails, the Anhinga trail, was just after the entry booth so we stopped on our way. We quickly learned that an Anhinga was a native bird and we saw many. The trail was along a boardwalk and short, but we brought our NOCS and had a great time using Merlin and finding birds- and on our way out we spotted an alligator.
 |
| Achinga bird |
 |
| Grasshopper |
 |
| Boat-tailed Grackle |
We got to the hotel around 4 and checked in. We were pleasantly surprised by our room and the small, elevated balcony of the back overlooking the water. We spent most of the afternoon on the balcony - looking and listening to the many birds - and then took a short walk along the water before dinner.
We appreciated the simplicity of the restaurant - they were open from 11-8 and had one (mostly bar-food) menu. You ordered and payed at the counter, set and bused your own table, but they brought your food from the kitchen. Our dinner was a pulled-pork sandwich and a fish wrap- both of which were fine and the fries were great. (The pulled pork was good enough that we ordered it for one of us at all 3 meals that we ate here.)
In the morning we picked out two hikes, Bear Lake Trail and Snake Bight Trail and did them both. Ironically we saw 3 snakes on Bear Lake Trail (but no bears) and no snakes (nor bears) on Snake Bight Trail. They were pretty similar in that they were both very straight point-to-points, ~3.7 miles each beside a canal and ending at a body of water. As far as hikes go, they were both very easy, flat walks and would likely be really enjoyable in the winter, but today it was hot, humid, and dusty, so were happy to be finished. We saw lots of reports of bugs on AllTrails and while there were a few buzzing annoying ones, it wasn't that bad (could have also been the massive amounts of bugspray we used).
 |
| Dry and cracked marsh on the way to Bear Lake |
 |
| Intercostal Waterway at the end of Snake Bight |
In the end, we were happy to have made the short trek to the Everglades. We definitely saw some unique sights (mostly birds), we had a great time playing with the Merlin app, and we supported the National Parks System (and we got our National Park Pass for the year).
Comments
Post a Comment