Whether it’s day hikes, wilderness hiking, or hiking along the white-sand shores of the Gulf of Mexico, visitors looking for ecotourism and birding walks will find them plentiful in Northwest Florida. There are 19 Florida State Parks and four state forests in addition to two national park areas that offer hiking trails, horse trails, nature trails, and camping.
Hiking Trails in Florida Parks and State Forests
Blackwater River State Park lies within the 206,000-acre Blackwater River State Forest in Santa Rosa County. The forest is known for its longleaf pine/wiregrass ecosystem, which connects to both the Conecuh National Forest and Eglin Air Force Base creating the largest contiguous ecological community of this type in the world.
Hiking Trails here include the 1.2-mile Chain of Lakes Trail, the 1.3-mile Sweetwater Trail, the 4-mile long Bear Lake Loop Trail, the 3.8 Karick Loop Trail, and the 13-mile long Wiregrass Hiking Trail among others. These trails interconnect and eventually lead to the 21.5-mile Jackson Red Trail. Portions of the Florida National Scenic Trail also pass through this area.
Anchoring the Northwest Florida beaches on the east is Tate’s Hell State Forest, 202,000 acres of wetlands and pine forests. It is home to both the bald eagle and the red-cockaded woodpecker as well as the Florida black bear and the gopher tortoise. The Florida Division of Forestry is currently working to restore the more than a dozen former ecosystems that once thrived here.
Hiking trails wind their way through this once dense swampland where in 1875, so the story goes, a farmer named Cebe Tate was lost for days. When he finally emerged, looking years older, he declared that he had just been through hell - and promptly died. The High Bluff Coastal Trail between Apalachicola and Carrabelle isn’t nearly as terrifying today and travels about 5.6 miles over dunes covered by scrub plants and sand pines.
Hiking Trails in the National Park Areas
Apalachicola National Forest is the largest forest in Florida at 571,088 acres, including 2,735 acres of water. It offers several attractions such as, Leon Sinks, an unusual geological area of caverns and sinkholes, as well as two wilderness areas that show what Florida looked like before "civilization" arrived.
Hiking trails include the 1.2 mile Camel Lake Loop, a short hike on high ground, and the 4.6 mile Wright Lake Loop, which is great for day hikes and features several pitcher plant bogs and a long narrow bridge with a cable for a handrail. Although not a long hike at less than a mile, Fort Gadsden is a must-see for history buffs. This was the site of a British-built fort, where in 1816 some 250 African Americans were killed.
At the western end of the beach and skirting the white-sand coastline from Mississippi to Florida is the Gulf Islands National Seashore. Encompassing some 55,816 acres of islands and reefs, there are several trails that provide a variety of experiences. One of the most popular trails is the short (.8 mile) Breckenridge Nature Trail, an interpretive and scenic trail that includes an observation deck.
The 3.4 mile Andrew Jackson Trail was the site of the first road connecting east Florida with west Florida. The Beaver Pond Trail is a short one mile that travels through several plant communities typical of southeastern forests. Old Borrow Pit Trail is .9 miles in length and was where sand was taken for the construction of U. S. Highway 98. The trail leads through longleaf and sand pine communities.
Hiking the Florida National Scenic Trail
The 1100 linear-mile Florida Trail (1400 miles including the spurs) is one of only eight National Scenic Trails designated by Congress as America’s premier hiking trails. More than 250 trail miles travel through Northwest Florida and four official trail hiking chapters can be found here. The Apalachicola National Forest is home to a stretch of the Florida Trail that Backpacker magazine rated one of the toughest hikes in North America.
The trail also extends about 114 miles across Eglin Air Force Base, through the Blackwater River State Forest where it splits. A northern branch travels up into Alabama and connects to the Eastern Continental Trail. The southern branch leads to the gulf coast beaches and coastal dunes and to historic Fort Pickens on Gulf Islands National Seashore.
This list is just the beginning of all the hiking trails to be found in the region. For more information about hiking trails on the Northwest Florida Gulf Coast, visit the Florida Division of Forestry and Florida State Parks.
Pamela Watson - I first hit the road at the tender age of three weeks when my career-Army dad packed up my mom and me and moved us from Indiana to New ...
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