Travel Trip:
Southeast Florida - Boynton Beach, Delray Beach, Green Cay and Wakohatchee Wetlands, Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge and the Everglades

April 2009
Doug and Ellen

Doug and Ellen took a trip to southeast Florida, visiting relatives in Boynton Beach, walking the beach at Delray Beach and watching and photographing birds and other wildlife at Green Cay and Wakohatchee Wetlands, Laxohatchee National Wildlife Refuge and Shark Valley in Everglades National Park.

We don't have a full trip report, but you can view Website photos, with captions and slideshow (with music):

Green Cay Wetlands and Nature Center, in Boynton Beach, a county owned and maintained, man-made 100-acre wetlands & 1.5-mile boardwalk for water bird watching, plus a nature center. It was especially prolific with wildlife because this was nesting season;

Wakodahatchee Wetlands: is a park located in Delray Beach. The park was created on 50 acres (200,000 m2) of unused utility land and transformed into a recreation wetlands open to the public with a three-quarter mile boardwalk that crosses between open water pond areas, emergent marsh areas, shallow shelves, and islands with shrubs and snags to foster nesting and roosting. The boardwalk has interpretive signage as well as gazebos with benches along the way. This site is part of the South section of the Great Florida Birding Trail;

Loxahatchee NWR & Everglades NP: The Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge is a 147,392-acre (596.47 km2) wildlife sanctuary is located west of Boynton Beach, in Palm Beach County, Florida. It includes the most northern remnant of the historic Everglades wetland ecosystem. They also visited Shark Valley, part of Everglades Natiional Park, which is a geological depression at the head of the Shark River Slough in far western Miami-Dade County. It includes sawgrass prairie that floods during the rainy season, hence the name "river of grass", Pa-Hay-Okee;

Wakodahatchee Wetlands at Dawn: a return to the wetlands at dawn, providing the animals and birds under special light and color onditions;

Lion Country Safari & Delray Beach: Lion Country Safari is a drive-through safari park located in Loxahatchee, in Palm Beach County, Florida. Founded in 1967, it claims to be the first 'cageless zoo' in the United States. Final stop was at Delray Beach, enjoying a morning in the sun complete with parasurfers and sand sculptures.

You can also view Doug's slide show composite video of the trip on YouTube.