After a 2 1/2-hour boat ride it finally comes into focus: an enormous fort in the Gulf of Mexico that seems to rise up out of the water. Beneath it: a tiny island known as the Dry Tortugas.
Kristen Marks is giddy with delight. Not only is she checking another national park off the list, she is also visiting a place that not many people ever get to explore. With only about 70,000 annual visitors, Dry Tortugas National Park, about 70 nautical miles west of Key West, happens to be one of the least-visited national parks.
Why? For starters, it’s tricky to get here. The options include a long ferry ride, a 30-minute seaplane flight or going by private boat. In other words, it’s a remote spot in the middle of nowhere.
But that’s exactly its appeal.
“It’s an effort to get there, but you will be rewarded with amazing views, compelling stories and the feeling of really escaping it all,” says Allyson Gantt, acting chief of public affairs for the Everglades and Dry Tortugas national parks.
Once your feet touch the sandy shores, the best way to while away the day is to take a dip. After all, nearly 99% of the park’s hundred square miles is submerged beneath the picturesque waters. With an amazing coral reef system and loads of sea critters like moray eels, Goliath grouper and candy-colored fish, it’s easy to spend hours flipper-kicking your way around.
Not to mention, there’s a very good chance you’ll see turtles. Juan Ponce de León did name this archipelago Las Tortugas, after all, when he discovered the islands in 1513. It’s not uncommon to spot loggerhead, green, hawksbill and leatherback turtles. When explorers found out there was no fresh drinking water around, they renamed it Dry Tortugas.
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