Everglades Tours

What to wear to the Everglades in the summer

Posted July 21, 2014 by Cristina

heaving goldie

What to wear for Everglades Climate in the summer time?

At Everglades Adventures, we want your Everglades tour to be enjoyable. Consider these tips when visiting the Everglades area.

From the end of May through November, the Everglades are hot and humid with temperatures at 90 degrees and humidity over 90 percent. In the afternoon, rain showers are common and often welcome to cool us off! When you visit, it is wise to wear light colored clothing (apparently, the skeeters like dark colors? That’s what we’ve heard anyway so we roll with it). Long sleeved shirts and trousers are helpful if you are very sensitive to gnats, otherwise shorts and tees are fine. We provide insect repellant as mosquitoes are more abundant this time of year. Avoid wearing colognes and hairspray as these scents can attract mosquitoes and deter away wildlife. We also advise that you bring a wide brimmed hat and sunglasses that block UVA and UVB rays, but don’t wear a hat on the airboat because it will fly right off your head! Finally, don’t forget to use suncreen protect exposed skin from the sun’s UVA and UVB rays or your skin might start to look like alligator skin! Everyone can get sunburned. Even those with darker skin. Keep these tips in mind and your Everglades Adventure will be fun and memorable!

History of Airboats in the Florida Everglades

Posted July 17, 2014 by Cristina

Ever wondered where airboats came from?

Airboats, also known as fanboats, were invented by Alexander Graham Bell in 1905 in his Nova Scotia labs. The first airboat dubbed the “The Ugly Duckling” was built as means of testing various engines and prop configurations. Fifteen years later, the boat was introduced to the Everglades by pilot and engineer of early American aircraft, Glenn Curtiss, to navigate the marshy areas of the Everglades. Check out more history on his contributions at www.curtissway.com. The modern version is made from aluminum and fiberglass and its design hasn’t changed much from the past. With speeds of up to 50 MPH, airboats are now used in fishing, hunting and transportation. Of course, the locals can make them much faster for racing! At Everglades Adventure’s you can take a thrilling airboat ride as part of our tour in the Everglades. Also included in the tour is a 40-minute nature cruise through the Estero Bay Preserve, narrated van transportation to the Everglades and a sit down lunch in Everglades City. After lunch, you will enjoy a 40-minute swamp buggy ride through the Everglades, an interactive reptile and exotic bird exhibit where you can handle wildlife and a drive through the Everglades to view large alligators and birds. To book an Everglades Adventure call (239) 405-2060 or book online.

1920 Curtiss “Scooter” curtissway.com

Florida Everglades Tours

Posted August 16, 2013 by Cristina

Who loves Manatees???? We do, We do!!!! We have been seeing them on our Everglades tours lately and our tour guide,Anne, has been incorporating a stop on the tour just to see them as long as they stick around the area. She took this pic of a mom with calf and friend while on a recent tour. Anne said there was actually about a dozen there at the time. Now we don’t see this every trip and certainly not all year so this has been very special for us to see for the past couple of weeks. The other pic is of a young man having fun during the Interactive reptile exhibit. Now most folks in his position would be nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rockin’ chairs! But he looks well at ease with this beautiful boa. Hope to see y’all out on an Everglades Adventure tour with us real soon!

Rick Discovers Mama Gator with a Nest of Eggs

Posted July 19, 2013 by Cristina

Just had to share this with y’all. Rick thought this gator was a male, but recently found him on a nest of eggs! She is a proud mama and really protective.

Wild Florida Panther Sighting on Recent Everglades Tours

Posted June 18, 2013 by Cristina

Adventurers! Get yourselves on an Everglades tour and come see us. We’ve been having excitements galore lately, and I can’t wait to tell you about ‘em.

First, after four years of searching and a-hopin’ and prayin, the Everglades Adventure team FINALLY saw some wild Florida panthers—a mama and her kitten—on the Turner River Road. That makes three total in four years, which ain’t too shabby! There wasn’t time to capture the moment on camera, but here’s a picture of the folks who were on the tour who got to see them! Look how happy they are! What an amazing day in the glades.

Folks have also been seeing gators wallowing in the small pools by the Turner River, splashing around and having a good ol’time, and believe it or not, yesterday the group saw a North American CROCODILE in the big pond by Wooten’s. With all the rain we’ve been getting lately, it was hard to believe our toothy cousin would come this far in the fresh water, but us crocodilians sure know how to adapt and survive and we can just about lay up anywhere there’s some water. You might want to get down here quick before he decides to go back south.

I mean to tell you, it’s been exciting!

Til next time! See you then, gator friend.

Welcome Maureen “Mo Gator” to our Crew!

Posted May 20, 2013 by Cristina

Howdy Adventurers!

Boy, do I owe y’all an apology! Ol’Gator Gil got caught up in courtship season, if you know what I mean, and I haven’t even thought one bit about my little news blog here until Greta the Great Blue Heron flapped by to tell me that the Good Times Charter and Everglades Adventure crew is welcoming a brand new member! So, welcome to the family, Maureen “Mo Gator” Goranson! We snapped this picture of her picking up two new Everglades-style friends last week!

We’re at the end of the dry season here, folks, and our spring don’t last but about twenty minutes, so it’s gotten hot and humid, just like we like it. What that means is you need to remember to drink plenty of water when you come out with us so you don’t get all woozy and cranky with a headache. Folks have been seeing lots of cool wildlife lately—including a few teenage gators crossing the road, white tail deer, and guess what? Panther tracks! A few lucky groups even got to see the soft-shelled turtle out of the water to lay eggs. That’s pretty spectacular considering our softies are real shy folks and spend most of their life in the water.

Greta GBH also tells me folks are having a ball down at the Skunk Ape Research Headquarters with the interactive animal exhibit holding the pythons and anaconda and little gator—who, honestly, ain’t so little anymore. They’re ‘bout to have to change his name from Little Grunt to just Grunt.

Adventurers, I promise I will try to do better about keeping you up to date now that my sanity has returned and I’m not fighting every neighbor, cousin, uncle, and outsider from the Miami side for the love of Sally Jo, the fairest gator I ever seen. Anyway, y’all come see us!

Til then, gator friend!

Alligator Mating Season Begins in the Florida Everglades

Posted April 3, 2013 by Cristina

Hey there, Adventurers!
You know, every time of year is a great time of year to visit the Everglades…well, on second thought, in summer you’d best love skeeters, too. A lot. But right now is one of the BEST times to visit ’cause it’s the start of our alligator mating season, and we’ve had a right good number of folks see our big bull gators a-bellowin’ and sending that glades water to dancin’ up in the air. Our adventurers have been mighty impressed–but not as impressed as the female alligators!!

Last week we all just about fell out laughing when Ana, the green anaconda at the interactive animal exhibit, decided to get real curious about a certain opening she found. Well, to our delight–and to the animal keeper Rick’s dismay–that opening happened to be the bottom of his shorts!! I was bustin’ a gut so hard I thought I was going to cry right there on the floor, but I did manage to snap a photo of Ana on her big adventure through Rick’s pants! That poor boy couldn’t do nothing but wait until she was done because you know an anaconda can’t be rushed. Now, he’s threatened to turn me into a pair of shoes for showing y’all this picture, but I just couldn’t help myself.Come see us!

50 lb Burmese Pythons and Florida Panthers

Posted March 5, 2013 by Cristina

Hey there, Adventurers!

Man, have we been having a blast out here in the Everglades. I mean, a blast! Our people on the day tours have been seeing and doing all kinds of glades-style fun things like holding 50 lb Burmese pythons at the interactive animal exhibit and seeing the big bull alligators strutting their stuff on the banks of the Turner River.

In the picture, you can see Fat Neck, an old friend of mine, who’s come down to Ochopee to let the ladies know he’s back in the neighborhood. He’s a right fine catch for mating season, which is just around the corner. Things get real exciting down here then, what with the bull gators showing out all the time and the pretty little females acting too good for ‘em. It’s a great time to be down in the glades for wildlife lookin’!

A few days ago, one of the tour groups showed up for their swamp buggy ride and had been told that an endangered Florida panther had just killed a deer on the path that very morning! It was a thrill to know that old boy might have still been hiding in the sawgrass as they puttered by on that contraption down the buggy path. But that means the panthers are out here, and wouldn’t that be something else if you got to see one!

Y’all take good care, gator friends! See you soon!

Posted January 30, 2013 by Cristina

Hey, there! We’ve been having a heck of a good time out here as always, and I wanted to show you a picture of what happiness looks like, just in case you ain’t never seen it before! Everybody in the world ought to have a moment like our good friend Dodo the Cockatoo had last week when a wonderful woman from Michigan came out to see him on the Everglades Tour.

Well, wouldn’t you know that ol’ Dodo gets his fair share of children and regular adults, but he hardly ever gets to be cuddled up by a woman as sweet as Miss Hilda here. She came out to the Everglades at 89 years old, and she had a blast! But it wasn’t until she put Dodo in her arms that she realized how much she loved cockatoos!

And you can see from the picture that Dodo happens to love sweet old ladies from Michigan, too! These two were inseparable for the little bit of time they got to spend together, and it just goes to show that you never know what you might discover about yourself when you come to the glades—no matter what age you are!

Hope to see you soon, gator friends.

Everglades Tours

Posted January 21, 2013 by Cristina

Howdy there, Adventurers!

Hope you guys are having a spectacular day—we sure are out here in the Everglades although it did get kinda cool last week, and when that happens, boy we alligators sure move slow. Slower than frozen syrup, my mama used to say. Now that’s slow.

You know, when we’re all laid up on the banks out there in the glades, we can hear and see you, which I didn’t realize you didn’t know! I heard a woman say the other day that we eat all the time, and, well, that just ain’t so. I’m a gator, and that means when I do eat, I store 60% of that energy up in my tail so I can have reserves when it gets cool. I need warmth to digest my meals, so these winter months, well, I just don’t eat a whole lot. By your standards, I’ll only eat a few pounds a week ‘cause I’m nine feet long and getting bigger every year. It varies from gator to gator, though—my Uncle Bo Gator is twelve feet, and he don’t eat but about three times all winter. It’s hard to believe, but some gators, the ones who have lots of energy stored up, can go a year without eating at all! Now, isn’t that something?

I’m not one to brag, but we’re pretty amazing animals. Most folks who come out here and meet us seem to think so, too, as you can see from the picture! Hope to see you soon.

Til then, gator friend!

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