The full Everglades experience
Nine hours, two national park units and six stops — an airboat ride, a wildlife drive through Big Cypress, a cypress walk, lunch in Everglades City, a 1906 trading post and a mangrove cruise in Everglades National Park. We collect you from your Fort Lauderdale hotel and bring you back.
This is the tour that has been running since 1991, and it is still the only way to see the Everglades from Fort Lauderdale that includes an airboat, a national park boat cruise, a wildlife drive and a naturalist guide in one day. You cover ground that most visitors never reach: sawgrass prairie, old-growth cypress, the Tamiami Trail through Big Cypress, the mangrove islands of the Ten Thousand Islands and the old stone crab town of Everglades City.
An airboat ride is 45 minutes of one habitat. The Everglades is a mosaic — freshwater slough, cypress swamp, pine rockland, mangrove coast — and the animals move between them. Spending a day with a biologist who reads that landscape is the difference between seeing an alligator and understanding why it is there. Around 40 companies run airboat tours in Florida; very few of them also put you on a skiff inside Everglades National Park and walk you through Big Cypress on the same day.
We are the only Florida SEE Gold Certified ecotour operator running a safari, and the only van tour permitted inside Big Cypress National Preserve. We never feed or harass wildlife, and our guides live here.
Not included: gratuities, and anything you buy at the museum gift shop or along the way.
Times are approximate — your guide will tell you the plan for the day at pickup and adjust it to the water, the weather and the wildlife.
Your naturalist collects you in the tour van. Sit back — the drive south is the first part of the tour, with commentary on what you are passing.
Out onto the sawgrass prairies and pond apple sloughs with wood storks, great egrets and great blue herons working the shallows.
Slow miles through Big Cypress National Preserve, a 720,000-acre swamp forest. We stop where the wildlife is.
A guided walk among old-growth bald cypress, with stops at the Oasis Visitor Center or the Clyde Butcher Gallery when the day allows.
A sit-down lunch in the old stone crab capital of Florida, with a drink and a menu that covers seafood, burgers and vegetarian dishes.
The 1906 trading post on the Barron River, listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Admission is included.
A quiet six-passenger Carolina Skiff into the Ten Thousand Islands in Everglades National Park — dolphins, manatees and shorebirds if they are willing.
We drop you at the door we collected you from.
Pickup is part of the tour and is required — we do not run self-drive tours from the east coast. Your naturalist collects you, drives the day and brings you back to the same door.
Travellers who want the whole Everglades in one day, with someone else doing the driving. Best for ages six and up, for couples, and for families whose children can manage an easy mile on foot.
★★★★★
“We planned to just venture through the park on our own but decided to book a tour instead. So happy we did. Pete, our guide, was a wealth of knowledge and so passionate about this unique habitat. It was also very convenient and professional. Rather than just ‘look’ at the Everglades, I felt like we got to ‘experience’ the Everglades. Book with confidence.”
Danya J., Lenexa, Kansas · Yelp
★★★★★
“Outstanding day with Ben! He was loaded with knowledge for the entire day. Alligators, birds, ecosystems — Ben even had a bird checklist of 70 different varieties. We found 28 of those on the list.”
Rhicksjr83 · TripAdvisor
Before you book
Plan on about nine hours from pickup to drop-off, roughly 7:45 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. from Fort Lauderdale and 8:15 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. from Miami, including transport. From Fort Myers the day runs 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.; from Naples and Estero, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Yes. Lunch in Everglades City and a drink are included, with seafood, burgers, sandwiches and vegetarian dishes on the menu. Tell us about allergies when you book — all food is prepared in one kitchen.
About one mile at an easy pace from Fort Lauderdale, and 1.6 miles from Fort Myers and Naples, with plenty of stops. You can walk as far as you like, as fast as you like.
Closed-toe shoes, a hat, sunglasses, sunscreen, a refillable water bottle, a light layer and a camera. We carry ponchos and insect repellent.
Free cancellation when you call at least 48 hours before your pickup time. Inside 48 hours we charge $25 per person. No-shows are not refunded.
Yes — wild alligator sightings are guaranteed on the airboat. Dolphins, turtles and wading birds are common; manatees and panthers are rare and never promised.
Other tours
Free cancellation up to 48 hours before pickup. Reservations close at 5 p.m. the day before the tour.
