Alligators & Airboats

When you think of the Everglades, you immediately think of alligators and airboats. Living just a short distance from the Everglades, we had to check out Everglades Holiday Park. The Everglades National Park is a subtropical wetland ecosystem that spans 1.5 million acres across south Florida. This park was manmade by the Army Corps of Engineers to help with the torrential rain fall during the summer months. It’s actually the largest and slowest rivers in America, flowing at 1 meter per hour. It’s also the only place on earth where alligators and crocodiles and co-exist.

Everglades Holiday Park

The park was only about a 40 minute drive NW from Fort Lauderdale. It wasn’t too crowded and we were on the boat within 15 minutes of arriving.

When I think of airboats, I was thinking of a smaller version, something like this below.

Instead, we were on a much bigger boat that could occupy up to 30 people.

Our tour guide is very passionate about the Everglades and the alligators. The tour was more educational than I was expecting. If you are wondering if the engines are loud – they are!

Here Alligator

Our airboat took off right away and we headed down the Lilly pad covered river.

Our guide knows each of the alligators and is familiar with their resting spots, so we headed towards one of his favorites. Low and behold, there he was. He had just returned for mating season.

The park is also full of rare plants, mangrove trees and birds. Airboats can easily glide over the water avoiding any fouled props since they use giant “fans” for propulsion.

As we were learning about different plant species, this baby alligator came over to say hi. Isn’t he cute?

In Search of More Alligators

We thought our tour was at the end, when a tourist spotted another alligator. Our airboat headed over to her direction and there she was. Turns out, she’s not a friendly one and headed straight into the mangrove trees.

After the tour, they also have a fifteen minute presentation by an alligator rescue handler. He actually is not employed by the park, but rather he rescues nuisance alligators. Here they are rehabilitated and they use them to study their life cycles.

When the presentation was over, we then got to hold a baby gator. It did not have the feel I expected. The skin was actually very smooth and weird feeling.

I expected the tour to be a little bit hokey, but it was very informative and we learned a lot. You can’t live in South Florida and not have an understanding about what the Everglades are. Be sure to check out the park if you are in the Fort Lauderdale area.

As always, thank you for following our journey and we would love it if you would subscribe to both our blog and our vlog (see below). You can also follow us on social media at @boatingjourney #boatingjourney.

Cheers, Scott and Ally