Nicknamed Island City, Wilton Manors has come through an incredible transformation since the early 1990s. What was once a relatively deprived area is now blossoming, and famed for its LGBTQ+ community. This is a gayborhood with few rivals, becoming only the second city in the country to have an all-LGBTQ+ governing body in 2018. There’s …
On Biscayne Bay in South Dade, Palmetto Bay is a village that was incorporated as recently as 2002. The neighborhoods here have been around for much longer than that, and had to deal with a calamity in 1992 when Hurricane Andrew made landfall near here. Close to the shoreline in the east of Palmetto Bay …
East of Jacksonville, this city is in a long row of coastal communities, collectively known as The Beaches. By a strange quirk of local administration, residents of Jacksonville Beach are still able to vote in Jacksonville’s mayoral elections. Anyway, Jax Beach was hooked up to the railroad in the 1880s and quickly developed as a …
This suburban village was developed in the Florida land boom of the 1920s as Miami’s Biscayne neighborhood. Miami Shores was incorporated not long after, in the middle of the Great Depression. As the name suggests, the village is on Biscayne Bay, and you can survey the water at the scenic Bayfront Park. I was surprised …
At the far end of the Overseas Highway, and at the southernmost points of the continental United States is an island and city unlike anywhere else in the country. The modern history of Key West begins in the early 19th century. The Florida Keys had long been a graveyard for overladen and misguided ships. Their …
It’s easy to fall in love with this historic seaside city on Florida’s central east coast. One of New Smyrna Beach’s draws is the Atlantic shoreline, with 17 miles of perfect white sands. Some beaches, like at Canaveral National Seashore, are wild and remote. For something more social, the lively town beach is right on …
In 1715, eleven Spanish treasure galleons were shipwrecked in the Atlantic next to Sebastian. Naturally, this stretch of shoreline has come to be known as the Treasure Coast. In and near Sebastian you can visit two museums charting the events of 1715, and showing items salvaged from the wrecks. I also need to talk about …
True to its name, this understated city is right on the Indian River Lagoon, just south of New Smyrna Beach. Though not a major destination in its own right, Edgewater is within striking distance of a lot of exciting places. First off, the Mosquito Lagoon section of the Indian River is right there. This shallow …
Crammed onto the narrow neck of Cape Canaveral, Cocoa Beach is a world-famous beach city. With the ocean on one side and the Banana River lagoon on the other, it’s an emblem of the Space Coast, and somewhere I think everyone should see at least once. Cocoa Beach is the spiritual home of surfing on …
In Central Florida, Haines City rests in a landscape of rolling sandy hills, lakes, and citrus farms. This place has a social calendar that would put most towns twice its size to shame. A lot of the annual events go down at the stunning Lake Eva Park. If you’re around outside of the summer months, …