Park Adventures in South Florida

This weekend I headed north again and ended up at the John D. MacArthur Beach State Park. If you are a nature person like me (minus camping - ick) you will love this place! It reminds me of a mix between Cape Cod and the Pacific Northwest with palm trees. You arrive and drive through a jungle of palms and banyan trees and then to get to the beach, you have to walk over a lagoon where you'll see all sorts of water birds and fish jumping. I didn't see any gators or manatees but I bet they are there somewhere....lurking.

Once you get to the other side you walk through a mangrove estuary and all of a sudden you're looking at a vast expanse of beach that at the time was relatively vacant. There were tons (TONS) of dragonflies too. We didn't have the best weather and had to hide out under the boardwalk while a monstrous storm went out to sea but once that passed it was really nice and we had our own private beach :) The nature center has little creatures you can look at too if you're caught in the rain and the most awesome manatee pillows I've ever seen. Below are some photos, rain and shine:

The Road In:

The Beach:

Dragonflies:

The Rain:

Hiding:

After The Rain: