Travel Tips

This is the tower were most of the park can be seen. To the west is like jungle and if you look east you can see the Atlantic Ocean.

The Park is named after Jonathon Dickinson, who's vessel shipwrecked here in 1696. His party was captured and later released by the local Indian tribe called Jobe (Hoe-bay), which was later changed to Hobe

The town in this photo is Hobe Sound.

This is the end of one of the trails. This is a small stream that feeds into the Loxahatchee River.

This is an old boathouse that used to be used by trappers. One of the earliest industry in this area was trapping. There is wildlife of all kinds.
The animals I saw today were gators, raccons and river otters.

There are many gators in the river. This one was about 7 feet long. I also saw a baby gator about a foot long and another about 2 feet.

Our boat got stuck on a sandbar at low tide. About 15 of us got out and pulled the boat thru this one area where the river was low. I didnt see any gators while I was in the water.

And how do you know how long a gator is when it's in the water? You measure the distance between the bump on its nose to its eyes, if its 7 inches then the total lenght of the gator is 7 feet. A foot for each inch.

Gators by nature are not agressive animals, they are laid-back. People kayak and canoe in areas populated by gators. By law, you cant feed them and its recommended that you stay at least 15 feet away. This is to protect the gators as much as people.

There are manatees in the river too, but didn't see any on this trip.

This is about the widest part of the river. This is where kayaks and canoes can be rented.

There is also a boat tour of the river and includes a visit to an old trappers homestead. Its well worth the 15 bucks. You get to see the river, the animals and learn about the history of the area from the guides, all of which work for the state parks system.

This photo of Cabbage palms was taken from the boat. The fruit of these trees are edible. There are many different kinds of palm trees, more than I knew about and some grow close to the ground.

There are coconut palms in Florida, but they are not native to Florida or to the western hemisphere for that matter. They were imported from Southeast Asia.

There are many ospreys along the river. You can tell from the large nests they build. This one had 2 babies in it. I didn't get a picture of them, but I did get a good look using binoculars. They would stick their heads out of the nest. I need a camera with a good zoom.

Again, another pic along the river. It was getting dark. Our trip lasted much longer than it should have because of our getting stuck. I took about 30 photos. I can't wait to go back and kayak this river.