No Name Harbor and Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park

No Name Harbor is the first harbor south of Hurricane Harbor on Key Biscayne. The channel to the entrance is well marked and you can see the walking trails of the park to starboard as you come down the channel. Cape Florida Lighthouse can be seen towering above the palm trees in the distance. The ambience of the Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park welcomes the seafarers and land lubbers alike. There is an extensive bulkhead where boaters can pump out there holding tanks for free, and also tie up for the day, making easy shore excursions, especially if you intend to ride your bikes on the lovely bike trails. The cost to moor your boat to the seawall is $2.00 for the day and boats cannot stay there overnight. The anchorage fee in No Name Harbor is $20.00. There are pay stations along the seawall and payment is by the honor system. Keeping your receipt allows access back into the park, if you choose to go outside the park for nearby shopping.

There is no fuel or water available to boaters in No Name Harbor.  There is a restaurant beside the anchorage and another restaurant in the park near the beach. There is a free outdoor “cold” shower at the restroom and laundry facility. Gary and I used the shower, wearing our swimsuits. The view from the shower of Biscayne Bay was phenomenal. Gary said, “Where else can you have this kind of view while taking a shower?” While we were leaving the shower, another couple came to use it and asked us if the water was still hot. We told them we guaranteed it was as hot as it was when we came. The laundry has one washer and one dryer, not always operational, according to the cruising guide.

We rode our bikes around the whole park. The walking trails were along the shoreline and the bike trails were further inside. No matter where we are, we prefer to be close to the water, so we used the walking trail instead of the bike trail, seeing bike tracks in the sand on the trail indicating others had done so as well. The first point of interest we came to on the trail was an informational sign regarding Stiltsville. The remaining seven houses, now owned by the park, can be seen in the distance on Biscayne Bay. These homes built on stilts, hover over the water miles away from the shore. It’s a strange sight to see. Hurricanes have wiped out many of the structures of Stiltsville. My comment to Gary was, “Why would they think hurricanes WOULDN’T wipe them out?” Yet, seven have somehow managed to stay erect since the years of Stiltsville’s conception in the 1930’s. When you look at the picture, the small dots in the distance are the houses.

Further on the trail, we found the piece de resistance of the park, the Cape Florida Lighthouse, circa 1825. The lighthouse suffered from disrepair until the State of Florida purchased it in 1966 and has since refurbished it to it’s original grandeur. There are a plethora of beautiful sights in the Bill Baggs Cape Florida Park , one of which we found coming from the beach side entrance to the lighthouse area. Delighting us beyond measure, we saw a stunning palm tree lined promenade, directing one’s captured attention to the lighthouse.

　

The trail from the lighthouse led us to the beach, where Gary enjoyed a swim before we had our picnic lunch. While we were eating, we noticed a couple taking pictures while holding a huge starfish. We joined them and took our turn at taking pictures of the pristine specimen. In all our scuba diving, we have never seen such a perfect starfish, or one as big as this one.

What a special experience!

Making a complete loop around the park, we ended up back at No Name Harbor and went to the restaurant there to have a drink before unloading our picnic/beach items at White Swan. From there, we rode our bikes out of the park and 1 ½ miles to the Winn Dixie grocery store. (From the park entrance, it is three lights down, on the left, second floor.) As it turned out, it was the same Winn Dixie we had gone to when we moored at Crandon Park Marina last April. We were pleased to find out the trip is much shorter from No Name Harbor than it is from Crandon Park Marina. From now on, we will tie up at the seawall of No Name Harbor and go to the grocery store from there, instead of Crandon Park Marina. If you are a boater with no bicycle, there is a bus stop just outside the park entrance that can be used if you don’t want to walk the mile and a half. There also is a bus stop near the grocery store.