This is a park located in Palm Beach county, Lake Harbor, Florida. It's not a large park. In fact…read moreit kind of reminds me of a rest stop on steroids. Maybe because it's like a loop where you can enter at one end and exit at the other. A person could walk the entire length of the park in 30 minutes (or less). There are lots of big shade trees for their many picnic tables. There's a pavilion for large parties (call the number on the display board to reserve) with a small, fenced in playground next to it for the youngsters. There's also a full sized basketball court. Importantly, not far from the entrance there's a block building with restrooms. It's located adjacent to the Herbert Hoover Dike which encircles Lake Okeechobee and was built in response to the great Miami Hurricane of 1926 and the Okeechobee Hurricane of 1928 which killed thousands of people when the Lake breached a small simple earthen dike. It was designed for the purpose of flood control, water conservation, prevention of saltwater intrusion, and preservation of fish and wildlife populations. For the engineers or mechanically inclined, you'll find some old retired pumps on display, that you may find interesting. I enjoyed my brief visit as it gave me a chance to get off my bike and stretch after a long ride. Next time I think I'll walk up onto the dike. Park hours are sunrise to sunset. Dogs must be on a leash. It's worthy of a stop.

This beautiful huge park is located along the south edge of Lake Okeechobee and adjoins the Lake…read moreOkeechobee Scenic Trail. The park has a basketball court, access for kayaking or canoeing, a large multi-purpose field and several picnic areas with grills. There is a large playground that is suitable for ages 2 to 12. Lots of parking and lots of space. I had a good walk and a nice picnic that was socially distanced and included lots of fresh air. [Review 14812 overall, 314 of 2021, number 1302 in Florida.]

I really wanted to love Lakes Park Children's Garden because honestly... the park itself is…read moreBEAUTIFUL. The location is great, it's gated, and at first glance it feels like the perfect spot to take kids, especially if you're just trying to kill time like we were before a flight. But I'm going to be real, the safety concerns completely changed the experience for me. It gets VERY crowded, and there's a big mix of people coming in and out. There were tons of kids, which is expected, but a lot of them were not supervised and were honestly pretty rough/mean. It didn't feel like a calm, safe environment where you can just let your kids play without constantly hovering. Also... the slides were SO hot. Like, borderline unusable hot. That alone was frustrating. The biggest issue for me though was the bathrooms. They are far from the main play area, and as a mom, there was no way I felt comfortable letting my kids go alone. When I did go, the bathrooms were extremely dirty, and I noticed syringes in a nearby area which was honestly alarming. That completely shifted my level of comfort. It also gave off the vibe that it's a place where people hang out who aren't necessarily there for the park, if that makes sense. I will say again, the park itself is beautiful and has so much potential. But just because it's gated doesn't mean it's actually safe. If you go, just be VERY vigilant, especially if you have more than one child. This is not a "sit back and relax" kind of park in my opinion.

All Children's Park is a brand new playground along the Caloosahatchee River in Centennial Park in…read moredowntown Fort Myers. The full name of the playground is the Lizbeth Benaquisto Inclusive Playground, in honor of the former state senator who pushed the legislation that set aside state funds for the playground."We were very particular there was going to be a playground that was successful for kids with very unique abilities," Benaquisto said at a January 2021 council meeting. "They have never had a safe place to play." The playground has swings, slides, and numerous climbing structures. I love all of the uniquely Florida touches like the puffer fish, manatee, and the Model T car in honor of Henry Ford who had a winter home in the city along with Thomas Edison. This is one of the nicest playgrounds I have ever seen and the kids playing on it we're having a ball. Best of all it is ADA accessible so children of all abilities can enjoy it. The new playground is a fantastic addition to Centennial Park.

Well as long as looking at manatees IS NOT a goal, I recommend this place. We spent about 45…read moreminutes here hopeful to catch a glimpse, without success. They have lined the bottom of the viewing area with black plastic and the water looks very murky as a result. We saw a few fish leap out of the water, less than a dozen lizards VC and the top few inches of one alligator. Parking was $2 an hour and easy to pay with a C QR code. The bathrooms were clean and there is a cut gift shop with a nice variety of items. The walking trails were plenty close to nature while still feeling protected from the alligators. They had a few volunteers available to talk to as well.

quiet, nature-filled spot with walking trails, wildlife viewing, and access to the water. There's a…read moresmall entrance fee along with a nominal parking fee (about $1.50 per hour). The park's trails are short and easy to navigate, winding along shaded paths that take you along the water's edge. While we didn't spot any manatees on this visit, it was still a nice, relaxing stop. Instead, we saw plenty of rabbits, squirrels, and lizards along the way. There's also a small fishing dock where people were casting lines, and if you're looking for something a bit more adventurous, you can rent kayaks at a nearby location within the park. We stayed for about an hour, enjoying the sunshine and slow pace before heading out. It was the perfect low-key outing -- light activity, peaceful surroundings

This very well manicured park is located along the road that cuts across central Florida through…read moreClewiston. It was a great stop to stretch my legs and get some fresh air in between long drives. The park has walkways, picnic tables, gazebo and a playground. There are also some cute swings if you want to sit and watch the traffic that you're about to rejoin. The center of the park showcases a memorial honoring the WWII British Cadets. [Review 14814 overall, 316 of 2021, number 1303 in Florida.]

What a cute little park. It is the type of park that sticks out because of how well kept it is. Its…read morelocated in the middle of Clewiston. It is a small park. There are no fees to pay. It does have parking spaces next to the park. It has a small walking trail all around great for exercise. The view is nice if you walk it. I think it will probably take 10 minutes to complete the entire walking trail. The parked is well maintained. It has beautiful flowers planted all around. It has big beautiful trees and a good variety of plans too. This is one pretty park. I saw a really cute gazebo too. This place is perfect for an afternoon. I saw tennis courts next to the park. I don't know if they are part of the park or they just happen to be next door.

The Hamrick Butterfly Garden opened on June 30 of 2020 and it is the most recent addition to the…read morefive block Flagler Park that runs along the center of Main Street. The garden was created through a partnership between Okeechobee Main Street, Waste Management, Inc and the University of Florida's Okeechobee Extension Office's Florida Yards and Neighborhood Program. The garden is designed in four sections with red, white, blue, and yellow butterfly attracting flowering plants. The low maintenance plants were chosen by the Florida Master Gardeners and volunteers from Riverwoods Nature Center. They are drought tolerant and designed to exist on rainfall and not need further watering. Park benches made from 100 percent recycled materials were then added to the garden. The garden was built with donations from local businesses and the city is also selling personalized bricks that will be installed in the walkway. Installed in the garden are 8 large artist designed butterflies and 2 smaller student butterflies that were painted by Okeechobee High School students with the Grand Oaks assisted living center residents. I love how the real butterflies attracted by the plants mingle in and out of the butterfly sculptures. I saw several Monarch Butterflies circling around. You can get food, coffee, or ice cream from one of the restaurants lining Park Street and enjoy it in this tranquil oasis of nature.

This was my first time camping since I was a kid in Girl Scouts. The area was just beautiful. The…read moresite (63) was big enough for two cars, two tents, a hammock and two tables under a tailgate tent. There was a port-a-potty close by and a real bathroom with showers about a 4 minute walk. Staff cleaned the restroom often and the port-a-potty was well maintained. We rented bikes. Next time we will rent kayaks. There were hiking trails and lots of wildlife. It was a great time!

Not too far but far enough. Great campground with lots of sites. Laundry and showering facilities…read morewere very cleans lots of alligator to see, grab a kayak or a canoe and paddle the waterways. Seemed like all Sites had a fire pit and the store you were able to grab firewood for a small fee. Easy to find, beautiful drive out there. Very great trip.

Florida panthers are a subspecies of mountain lion and the only one to still exist in the eastern…read moreUnited States. They used to roam from Florida to Louisiana throughout the Gulf Coast states and Arkansas. Today they are only found in the southwestern tip of Florida in the Everglades and here in Big Cypress Preserve. They are usually solitary unless mating and eat white-tailed deer, feral hogs, raccoons, birds, and other medium-sized mammals and reptiles. Hunting has decimated their population and they were added to the endangered species list in 1973. Today there are only 120 to 130 panthers left in the wild and with so few left they are also susceptible to disease, genetic disorders, and car accidents. The land that is now the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge was once owned by the Collier family who were the largest land owners in Florida in the 1920's. They used the land for private hunting cattle grazing. In 1989, the US Fish & Wildlife Service purchased 24,300 acres from the Collier family for $10.3 million dollars to create the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, under the authority of the Endangered Species Act for the purpose of protecting the the Florida panther and its habitat. Another 2,000 acres were purchased from the Collier family in 1996 to expand the preserve. It is believed that 12 to 16 panthers currently roam the refuge along with black bears, bobcats, white-tailed deer, Big Cypress fox squirrels, alligators and wood storks. You can access the hiking trails through the Leslie M. Duncan Memorial Trails in the southwest corner of the preserve by taking the Everglades City exit off of Alligator Alley. The preserve backs I-75. This is one of those places that I have wanted to explore but never had the time. How fast things can change in two weeks. At the gravel parking lot there is a port a potty, a board with trail information and access to two trails, one a third mile and one that is one and a third mile. You are only allowed access to a small portion of the preserve in order to not disturb the panthers. Bring your own water. I read the U,S. Fish and Wildlife Service Service website regarding this trail before attempting it because it seems like it could be dangerous to hang out with panthers. According to them "Panthers are rarely seen on the refuge. I have since learned that panthers are most active at night, during the day the rest. However, if you do see a panther, follow these guidelines: *Keep children within sight and close to you. Pick up small children. *Give the panther space. Give them a way to escape. *Do not run. Stand and face the animal. *Avoid crouching or bending over. *Appear larger. Open your jacket.(it was pushing 90 degrees, I didn't have a jacket) *Throw stones, branches, or whatever you can reach without crouching or turning your back." I chose the one and a third mile trail. You can access it through a gate in a fence from opposite ends of the parking lot. There is one look out area with a bench on the trail which is very narrow on natural ground. The trail is cut out from Big Cypress Preserve and meanders through the refuge through tropical hardwood hammocks, acres of slash pine, and wet prairies. Over 700 species of plants have been recorded here including lobelia, tickseed and prairie milkweed. Rare orchids and bromeliads are also found here. At times the plants and trees were as tall as my head on either side of me as I walked the trail. I didn't come across any panthers and didn't see so much as a footprint. In fact the only creatures I saw were some grasshoppers, bees, and a vulture. The path is in full sun and some shade but I was very hot by the time I got done. If you are looking somewhere off the beaten track to explore than this would be a good choice. The hike is not difficult and you can social distance safely. Although I saw a couple of cars in the parking lot I never encountered anyone on the trail.

Nice little park. It's right off I75 at fl29. The preserve its much larger than your access to it…read more The area you can hike is two trails, one .3 miles and the other 1.3 miles. It's next to big cypress preserve, so expect plenty of muddy parts. In November there were still some blood sucking insects, but the hordes of mosquitoes were gone. The policy of national parks was not lost on Florida Panthers. They left only footprints! I saw two prints and they followed prints by a deer. The prints were clear and probably hours old. There are little lizards everywhere. The flowers were long gone at this time of year.

I literally spent two hours on Father's Day just to see if this park was a Leathers & associates…read morepark like Jim Space in Arcadia. Sure enough!! Jim Space has a rocket-NASA theme, this is so Okeechobee it's not funny. The Mud-buggy playground, the boat, it's all right on par for the creativity of L&A and the uniqueness of Okeechobee. A well-deserved civic asset!

The playground at the Okeechobee Sports Complex is a well-hidden GEM, I tell you. I'm guessing all…read morethe locals know about it, but I did a couple of pretty thorough (or so I thought, anyway) internet searches and never came up with anything even remotely resembling a playground anywhere near here. Luckily, we have the awesome breakfast lady at Hampton Inn to tell us about such things. And even draw us a MAP. Score! :D I felt like I was privy to some insider info that I was most definitely Not Supposed to Have, which only makes it that much more cool. So this place is probably the most awesome true playground I've ever seen. Not like I'm a huge playground aficionado or anything, but still. It's this ENORMOUS collection of wooden fort-like structures with all kinds of slides and swings, tons of stuff to climb on and explore and have an absolute blast. The entire thing looks to be relatively new, and they definitely are keeping up with stuff like mulch on the ground and maintenance on the structures themselves (I saw a couple of pieces of newer wood, in comparison to the older more weathered stuff that the rest of it is built out of). There's a little area of sand, which kids looooooove and moms hate. Ugh, sand on my floorboards. And in his shoes. And his socks. And then the floor inside when he takes off the shoes. *laughing* There are also a couple of park benches along a little path for the moms to hang out, and a pretty large pavilion right there next to the play area with a whole bunch of tables, a water fountain, a Coke machine, and I'm guessing restrooms somewhere as well (Speculation! Pure speculation!). The good news / bad news is that this thing is huge and sprawling. Good news for the kids: bigger = better, and spread out = more room for running like wild beasts! But somewhat bad news for the moms: there's absolutely no way you can actually keep your child within eyesight without moving around, and moving around a LOT. The structures themselves prevent you from being able to see much more than little bits of blonde hair go running by, a glimpse of legs and shoes elsewhere... you get the idea. And that's fine, really -- I am perfectly okay with not being able to see my kid at Every Possible Second and don't feel the need to Helicopter parent him. But. BUT! The place isn't enclosed on all sides, and there's not a single stationary vantage point where you can ensure that your child hasn't wandered out of the area completely. I'm pretty laid-back about a lot of stuff, but I'm totally not okay with the idea that my kid could walk off (or be taken off, yikes!) while I idly sit in the shade sipping on a frosty beverage. Not a big deal with older kids, but at his age? Yeah. I still need to watch him like a hawk. Anyway, allllll of that was to say - moms, watch your little ones because they can slip right out the back side and you would never know it. And take note playground people, you could totally make this SO MUCH MORE SAFE by extending the fence line a little further around the back side so the only way in and out can actually be seen from one place, be it a bench or the pavilion or even hanging out on the sidewalk somewhere. I don't need creature comforts, I just need to be able to make sure my kid hasn't escaped. A few other things that keep it from being a whopping 5 stars as well. No shade for the kiddos, like every single playground ever in the history of mankind. I dutifully greased up the boy with sunscreen before heading out and of course he still ended up with a slight burn. And nothing that can really be changed on the part of the playground folks, but something for potential playground-goers to be aware of: at 215ish, there was a massive influx of teenagers that walked over after school and completely took over the pavilion. They weren't hanging out in the play area while we were there, but rumor has it that they're always there in the afternoons, and that they do sometimes decide it's fun to play on the equipment. Not sure if they get rough and rowdy or not (they were perfectly well-behaved in the few minutes we were all there together), but something to keep in mind if the "big kids" make you antsy. Because I'm lame and the only picture I took is crap cell phone quality and is only a portion of the entire play area, you can check out some pics at the page I pulled off the county website (and see some of the other little hidden playground areas too, those scheming playground-hiding punks!!), just scroll on down to the sports complex. And be warned, their photos don't do it any justice either: http://co.okeechobee.fl.us/sites/default/files/files/PRBallFieldsParksPlaygrounds030211.pdf All told? SUPER COOL playground. 5 starts from a kid's point of view, only 4+ stars from mom due to lack of shade and effective kid-containment.

There's a small parking lot you can use for free with bathrooms. However as soon as I exit and walk…read moreto the beach I noticed dogs are not allowed so I left.

I loved how laidback the atmosphere was here; it was not touristy when I visited on a Friday. The…read morewater was very warm, clear, and gentle. I saw lots of fish and crustaceans, and of course an abundance of shells. Truly a beautiful and peaceful beach that is a rare find. Parking is free at the nearby Beach Park North parking lot, and there is a foot wash station conveniently located at the lot. I would come back anytime I am visiting Bonita Springs!

The Charlotte Harbor Preserve State Park is peaceful and tranquil place with lots of hiking…read more trails.The trails are muddy and wet most of the year however definitely worth a great outdoors experience. There were not slot of people our there so if you want hiking with out a lot of people this is the place. There are some dry trails all year that go around lakes with boardwalks , picnic areas and a nature center. Also on Tuesday and Friday they have native plants for sale. Amazing beautiful place.

We visited this nature preserve 2/11/22 while waiting for our plane to leave from the Punta Gorda…read moreAirport and saw turtles, armadillo and fish. No alligator sightings or feral hogs but others out there had recently seen both. This was a very nice hike on a beautiful day before we head home to 12 degree weather.