Brian's Place

Some Places To Enjoy Life... In Florida

This photo taken at Destin, near Pensacola, is reproduced here by kind permission of Dr. Steve Shepard. Click the image to see some other great photos by Steve.

Many people will come to Florida for the sunshine, the theme parks and the Mouse, and I appreciate these as much as anyone!

However, for what it's worth, my recipe for really enjoying Florida is:

1. Search for places and activities that allow you to enjoy Florida's superb wildlife, e.g. try here. This is perhaps your best chance of experiencing what is left of the old Florida - the Florida of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings.
2. Get hold of a boat - or make friends with someone who has one. It's possible to enjoy life in Florida without a boat, but so many great experiences (especially those involving wildlife) need you to be on fresh or salt water at some point!

Here is a small selection of places that we have particularly enjoyed.

• Gulf Coast: Palm Island
• Epcot
• Orlando: Morse Museum and Winter Park
• Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress
• Key West: Mallory Square at Sunset

• If you follow the links in the right hand panel, you will hopefully find a lot of useful or interesting information. The first (reddish-brown) link will take you to a map of Florida marked up with our favourite sites, restaurants, hotels etc.
• Links in that panel will generally open in a new window.

Gulf Coast: Palm Island

My wife and I once spent a very pleasant week in this area, sharing a beach house with our American family (for a good description of Palm Island, go here).

Below the house was a creek with a small jetty, from which we would sometimes fish. If I stood there quietly, it wouldn't be long before a feeling would creep over me that I wasn't alone, and that I wasn't the only one doing the fishing! I would glance up and see this splendid fellow (or lady) perched on a rail some two feet above my head, quite unconcerned with my pathetic efforts...

The highlight of our trip was a night fishing expedition in our cousin's husband's boat. The nights are dark here - lighting is restricted for 6 months of the year in order not to disturb the turtle hatching - and we had a beautiful starlit sky. We moored to a post in the mouth of the Peace River (not something I would have attempted if I had rented a boat myself) and just enjoyed being out there, very close to Nature. We did in fact catch a number of ladyfish, all returned to the water - but it wasn't long before we heard the "whoof" noises of dolphins close around us, invisible in the darkness. It was a quite magical experience.

(We visited this place in May, which is a good month to go. Don't leave it too late, though... I am told that on May 21st the rainy season starts.)

On the way from Orlando to Palm Island we stopped for lunch at Linger Lodge Resort, which I can highly recommend. This is a unique place on the Braden River just off I-75, a little to the north of Sarasota.

Epcot

Epcot is, of course, one of the theme parks at Walt Disney World. Strangely named and perhaps not quite as well known as the Magic Kingdom, it is still my personal favourite.

Epcot was originally intended to be EPCOT, standing for Experimental Prototype Community (or sometimes City) Of Tomorrow. Walt Disney's original concept never came to fruition, but the theme park that resulted still carries some of his original vision. Actually, Epcot is a park with two different themes: the Future World pavilions, showcasing technology and science with a learning element, and the Community of Nations, a lake surrounded by pavilions showcasing the culture, food and products of different countries.

I have visited Epcot several times over the years, and it changes all the time - perhaps not always for the better. Some thrill rides, for example, have now been added. It is still a great place to spend time - lots of time. To see everything would take many days!

Nowadays we take it slow and concentrate on a few favourite places. We always stop at the Mexican Cantina on the shores of the lake, outside the Mexico Pavilion, just to sit and watch the world go by. We always visit The Living Seas (as it was called last time we were there), an aquarium so vast that it is like a miniature ocean, with a "sea base" for viewing and for educational and research stuff submerged in the middle of it. We have supper at one of the many excellent restaurants in the Community of Nations (which you should reserve places for on arrival at Epcot). After dark we stroll around, and enjoy the spectacular IllumiNations firework and light show.

There is much more to Epcot than I have described here, from random jets of water dancing from one flower-bed to another to the awesome Universe of Energy pavilion. However for me, it is the Community of Nations that encapsulates much of what Disney wanted to achieve.

Orlando: Morse Museum and Winter Park

Winter Park is an attractive older part of Orlando that many people don't see. It is home to the Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art, which houses many of the beautiful works of Louis Comfort Tiffany, including Tiffany jewelry, pottery, paintings, art glass, leaded-glass windows, lamps, and the chapel interior he designed for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Highly recommended!

After visiting the museum, we often eat at the nearby Briar Patch restaurant. Oddly enough, I have yet to see a good on-line description of this rather charming place!

Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress

If you want to spoil yourself, I can really recommend the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress Hotel. We were there for only a couple of days, and it was cold and rainy the whole time (very unusual for Florida!). Although we couldn't properly enjoy the superb outdoor water features, the food and the service indoors were just great. As you can see from the photo below, the design of the hotel's interior is particularly attractive.

This hotel is also very conveniently located for the Disney attractions.