The best state and national parks near Miami for adventuring in nature

If you’re truly the outdoorsy type, head to Oleta and book a cabin. They’re rustic little numbers made of logs, with not much more to them than a couple of bunks, a picnic table out front and direct access to the wide-open woods. The crazy thing about staying at these quaint, $55-a-night cabins? The whole time, you’re blocks away from a bustling Duffy’s Sports Grill right on the bay. It’s what makes Oleta so unique: a park full of mountain bike and hiking trails, an incredible spot to launch kayaks or paddleboards, and a three-mile paved loop for the runners and rollerbladers, all steps away from the city.

Google this place and the first phrase that auto-populates is, “What is special about Biscayne National Park?” Um, everything? Unlike most parks, this one is 95 percent water, a stretch of inland bay and clear-as-glass ocean. From a good chunk of it, you’ll still have views of the city’s skyline. The park stretches south from Key Biscayne, including Stiltsville, those historic homes somehow holding on in open water. Head south and there are reefs for fishing lobster, remote islands perfect for a weekend picnic and shallow inland waters where a kayak can find a zoo’s worth of wildlife hiding in the mangroves.

Time Out tip: Camping is available on Boca Chita and Elliott Keys, islands accessible only by boat. For the less adventurous, take a guided tour that includes snorkeling at a shipwreck.

Technically this park includes 100 square miles of mostly open water, but the reason to make the two-hour boat trip from Key West is Fort Jefferson, a 19th-century brick fortification just smack in the middle of the sea. Snorkeling along the walls of the fort is surreal, but so is a tour of its dark caverns and old jail cells, one of which once held the doctor who treated Abe Lincoln’s assassin. Random, right? Those into roughing it can camp overnight in the center of the fort, but the rest of us can day-drink our way back to the Keys on a ferry, or, if you have the means, arrive baller-style by seaplane.

For many, the first thing that likely comes to mind here is the rockets and space shuttles that have launched nearby. But this 25-mile barrier island preserved by Congress is the longest stretch of untouched natural beach in Florida. Take a kayak into the Mosquito Lagoon, explore the less-than-a-mile-and-always-breezy Castle Windy Trail or arrive just before a launch and plunk yourself on the beach for a stunning view of where nature meets the space age.

This is a park with lots of claims to fame: the largest wilderness area east of the Mississippi, the biggest tropical forest in the nation and the number one place to dump incriminating evidence. OK, maybe that last one isn’t a good idea. But it’s true that the park is crawling with gators and pythons and even far friendlier wildlife, which you can spot on even the shortest of hikes. Yeah, you can camp in the wilds, kayak into the sawgrass or bike the levees, but there’s also the super chill tram ride in Shark Valley out to a Frank Lloyd Wright-esque observation tower with views for days.

Time Out tip: Nature lovers can now check into the only hotel in Everglades National Park, the newly christened Flamingo Lodge. Nestled on the edge of the picturesque Florida Bay, Flamingo is a unique destination at the southernmost tip of the Florida peninsula.

You’d be forgiven for thinking you need to go to some faraway location to find world-class snorkeling. But Pennekamp, the nation’s first underwater park, is a living aquarium of coral and tropical fish. The waters are often calm and ideal for snorkeling or diving, but it’s nearly just as stunning to see it all from a chill seat on a glass-bottom boat.

Picture what it would be like to camp the night at a state park in Florida and it’s this: tents lined up right there on the Keys sand, nothing but the wide-open sea spread out in front of you. Sunsets and sunrises and all the midnight swims you can handle. Booking the campsites and three duplex cabins along the shore at Bahia Honda State Park will take some forward-thinking, but the payoff is camping in true Florida beachfront style. 

We’re not hating on South Beach, because all of us have, from time to time, wanted to carry a slushie from the daiquiri place across to the sand and drink with 10 thousand of our new best friends. But sometimes you want a beach that looks the way it did when explorer Ponce de Leon showed up there in 1513, where you can grill your lunch in the shade of a gazebo, or ride your bike on the paved and gravel paths, or cast your line along with all the hobbyists, or just chill on a blanket with the seagull-white lighthouse just right over there.

If we boil down outdoorsy photos in Miami to one single, most popular image, it’s the lifeguard stands on South Beach. But a very close No. 2? It’s the sunset/sunrise shot at Matheson Hammock, looking out across an atoll pond just before the dune, palm trees dotting the horizon, the ocean beyond. But this iconic park isn’t just about that one shot—there’s also a ton of activities like biking, paddleboarding and hiking. And of course, you’ll score some sweet new content for your socials.

A neighbor to Everglades National Park, Big Cypress encompasses a vast stretch of 729,000 acres of mostly swampland that feels very much like the world once inhabited by dinosaurs. The muck-adverse might not appreciate flooded trail systems, but rangers offer guided tours that’ll take you deep into the wilds, including an astronomy trip to dark recesses where the sky is full of nothing but constellations.