Unlike the Mississippi unit where access to all islands in the park requires a boat, here at the Florida unit the two islands, Perdido Key and Santa Rosa Island, are accessible by vehicle thanks to bridges connecting them to the mainland. The Florida unit consists of six different areas. I am a writer and photographer for National Park Planner () and I visited the Florida unit of Gulf Islands National Park in April 2015. I think NPS does an excellent job of preserving the dune system by building beach access boardwalks, interpretive signing, and roping off areas where there are sensitive dune grasses trying to become established. The main administrative site, near the gate, has toilets and drinking water. The Naval Air Field acoss the bay keeps the sky busy with fighter jets, but is pretty quiet at night. It also makes the beach nice and quiet after sunset. There is a requirement to be inside the gate by sunset, but going to the village for cocktails, is not a bad walk. No trees/shade, and very bright sand, but it's a great place to chill out with a book by day, and beach camp on the cheap by night. The wide open exposure to the hurricanes has left a stark, yet beautiful, landscape. I saw no trash on the beach, and no sign of the BP oil spill either. I came here for the long desolate beach and for the hike in camping that is free (not to be confused with Fort Perkins Campground on the other side). I'm only writing about the Perdido Key side of the island. This is great for a walk on the beach with the white sand. We did not find deer ticks on myself or on my wife's skin anywhere, but they were for sure deer ticks. This was in late December, when there were hardly any bugs around. After doing the Andrew Jackson and the Boy Scout Trail and going through the Fishing Trail, my wife had several deer ticks on her pants. The different landscapes some of the trails have are neat to see. There are nice views of the ocean off some of the trails. We also did some of the Andrew Jackson Trail, the Boy Scout Trail, the North Bay Trail, the Borrow Pit Trail and the Fishing Trail. I hiked the Beaver Pond Trail and never saw a beaver dam. Some are unkempt, overgrown, and unmarked. Nice long beach with many places to go and see. Not much to see, and small beach.īeautiful drive. Part of the parking lot was flooded, and I spent about 1 minute here. This area has a pay gate.Įasily the worst area. I recommend watching the video in the visitor center. You're supposed to stay off of the cannons, but many people go on them because there is no staff to enforce. This is a large fort you can basically do whatever you want in. The only staff I saw at all areas were the Fort Pickens Area gate person, the gift shop cashier, and a ranger that came at night to tell everyone to leave. There was no staff in the Fort Pickens visitor center. There was a visitor center at Naval Live Oaks that was open with no staff. I found it strange how little staff was available in the park. All areas technically require payment, but I doubt most people pay in most areas since only Fort Pickens had a gate that required payment. I visited several different areas of the park. You do need to be careful of various species of snakes though since they are out in the wooded areas, but I still never had this issue all the times I've been walking on the paths either. There were birds of course and the occasional squirrel, as well as anole lizards, but really nothing else really. If you think you may end up going, it's a good idea to take along some toilet paper and remember to did a hole of sorts if your insides suddenly have a great desire to explode!Īlso, I never ran across any animals really ever when going through where I did and I walked the trails alot. If you just need to de-stress a while, going to some of the various areas of the Gulf Islands National Seashore will help incredibly for short term relief.įor any amenities, including restrooms, there are a few spots spread out along the way, but if not camping or such, either go before you come to one of the Seashore's areas, or just step off the path briefly at any point and do your business if absolutely necessary. There are some set walkways in some parts, a few camping areas that can be reserved by groups also, such as Scout camping trips. Most of the time, I would never ever run in to anyone else and it was always incredibly quiet. I used to go through the trails all the time and on both sides of Highway 98. To start with, the portion of the long stretch I usually visited, was in Gulf Breeze.
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