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Biscayne National Park
A park that is 95 percent water, at Miami's doorstep
Ninety-five percent of Biscayne National Park lies underwater, so the best way to see it is by boat, kayak or snorkel. Within sight of the Miami skyline, the park protects four connected ecosystems, the longest stretch of mangrove forest on Florida's east coast, the shallow nursery waters of southern Biscayne Bay, the northernmost islands of the Florida Keys, and the upper end of the Florida Reef, where loggerhead, green and hawksbill sea turtles cruise among coral. Elliott Key, the park's largest island, is fossil reef raised above the sea.
In the 1960s developers planned a city called Islandia on these keys and an oil refinery and seaport on the mainland shore. Local conservationists fought back, and in 1968 Lyndon Johnson signed a bill creating Biscayne National Monument, which became a national park in 1980. The park preserves about 10,000 years of human history, beginning with the Tequesta. The Maritime Heritage Trail, the only underwater archaeological trail in the park system, leads divers to shipwrecks and Fowey Rocks Lighthouse. Boca Chita Key's ornamental lighthouse and the remaining stilt houses of Stiltsville recall the bay's 20th-century playgrounds.