Boardwalks, hiking paths, kayak routes and boat excursions guide ENP's 1 million annual visitors into varied habitats, from coastal marshes and hardwood hammocks to cypress swamps and low-lying watery bastions called sloughs. And the terrain is as diverse as the park's species. Here, within 1.5 million acres of protected habitat known as the River of Grass - a name given to the area by conservationist Marjory Stoneman Douglas in her 1947 book, The Everglades: River of Grass - is a fragile ecosystem that's home not just to gators and crocs, but also to such diverse and endangered animals as the Florida black bear, Florida panther and West Indian manatee. instead of Australia's rugged Northern Territory, it's safe to say this park would have made the ideal backdrop: The Everglades also happen to be the only place in the U.S. If the 1980s blockbuster Crocodile Dundee had been filmed in the U.S.
A largely impenetrable web of wetlands and forest that make up Everglades National Park, the country's largest subtropical wilderness, dominates the Sunshine State's southern tip. En español | If you think Florida is just sandy beaches and sprawling development, you've missed a big part of the picture.
