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Jonathan Dickinson State Park

Photo: Ebyabe / CC BY-SA 3.0 · source

🌲 Forests

Jonathan Dickinson State Park

Hobe Sound, FL · Treasure Coast

About

Climb the wooden tower atop Hobe Mountain, an 86-foot ancient dune that counts as the highest natural point in South Florida, and the sand pine scrub rolls out to the Atlantic in every direction. Down at the river, the Loxahatchee was Florida's first federally designated Wild and Scenic River, and you can paddle it upstream to Trapper Nelson's 1930s homestead deep in the cypress. Across 11,500 acres you get scrub jays, river-swamp boardwalks, and the Camp Murphy mountain-bike trails on old World War II Army roads.

Highlights

Hobe Mountain observation towerWild and Scenic Loxahatchee RiverTrapper Nelson's homesteadSand pine scrub and scrub jaysCamp Murphy mountain-bike trails

Getting there

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Curated guides that feature Jonathan Dickinson State Park.

Florida State Parks26 places

Florida State Parks

Florida's park service runs about 175 state parks, and these are the ones worth planning a trip around. Wild barrier islands and sugar-sand beaches, deep springs and dark caverns, 19th-century forts and prairies where bison still roam, from the Panhandle's emerald coast to the coral reefs of the Keys. The definitive short list, not the whole directory.