Snorkeling

Most Florida springs drop off fast into a deep boil. Alexander is the exception: the basin shelves gradually across a sandy bottom, so toddlers can wade a long way out while older kids swim to the vent. That single feature makes it the spring to pick with a mixed-age group. It is also one of the few springs where snorkelling is genuinely rewarding at shallow depth, and canoe rentals run the Alexander Springs Creek downstream through palm hammock. Being inside the national forest, it is quieter than the state parks nearer Orlando.

Most of the Keys have very little actual beach; Bahia Honda is the exception and it is why the park fills early. Sandspur Beach shelves so gently that children can walk out a long way in warm, clear water, and Calusa Beach on the other side is even calmer. The ruined Flagler railroad bridge arcs overhead, half of it removed, which makes the whole place look like a film set. Snorkelling is decent close in around the rocks though not reef-quality. It is a two-hour drive from Key Largo, so this works best as part of a Keys trip rather than a day out from Miami.

Escambrón is an unlikely thing: a small reef-sheltered beach with real snorkelling inside the city, a few minutes from Old San Juan. The reef breaks the Atlantic swell so the cove stays calm, and there is enough structure underwater - coral heads, some submerged ruins - to hold sergeant majors, parrotfish, wrasse and often a turtle. Being a public balneario it has lifeguards, restrooms, showers and shade, which makes it far more practical with children than the open beaches along Condado. Skip it after heavy rain or on a big north swell, when visibility collapses.

Bathtub Reef is exactly what the name says. A sabellariid worm reef runs parallel to the shore a short way out, and at low tide it breaks the surface and encloses a shallow lagoon where the water is flat, warm and clear. Children can stand up throughout while snorkelling over sergeant majors, small parrotfish and the occasional ray. It is genuinely the best introduction to snorkelling for a nervous or young child anywhere on this coast, because there is no depth and no current inside the reef. Timing is everything - come within two hours of low tide, and skip it entirely when the surf is up. The lot is small and free, and fills fast.

Biscayne is almost entirely water, which means the visitor centre is a starting point rather than a destination - the park proper needs a boat. Concession-run snorkel trips go out to patch reef in the bay where the water is warm and generally calmer than the outer reef off Key Largo, and there are glass-bottom and island cruises for families not swimming. From shore you get a short boardwalk, a jetty and a good view across the bay, which is worth an hour but is not the park. Trips are weather-dependent and cancel often, so build slack into the plan.

Buck Island was one of the first marine areas in the world given national monument protection, and access is strictly through licensed concession boats out of Christiansted - you cannot simply turn up. The underwater trail runs through a barrier reef of elkhorn coral in a lagoon, with signs on the seabed, and the fish density inside the reef is far beyond anything reachable from a beach. Most trips also stop at Turtle Beach on the island’s west end, a stretch of empty white sand. The crossing takes about half an hour and can be bumpy. Full-day trips include lunch and more swimming time.

Cane Bay is famous among divers for the wall - a reef edge a short swim from the beach where the seabed simply stops and falls away into deep blue water. Snorkellers can reach the top of it and look over, which is a genuinely startling thing to float above and a strong experience for a confident older child. Closer in there is shallow reef with normal fish life and easy sand entry. Dive shops sit directly across the road for gear. The beach is narrow with limited shade and can get surge on a north swell, when it becomes a poor choice for children.

Cinnamon Bay is a long stretch of sand inside the national park with more room to spread out than Trunk or Maho, and enough wave action to be fun for children without being rough. A small cay sits offshore within easy snorkelling range for stronger swimmers. Behind the beach a short self-guided trail loops through the ruins of a Danish sugar plantation, with the mill and estate house walls standing in the bush - a genuinely interesting half hour that puts the island’s colonial history somewhere children will actually encounter it. Watersports rentals and a campground operate on site.

Coki is a small beach with an outsized reputation underwater. Rocky points at both ends hold coral and the fish life is dense and close in - blue tang, sergeant majors, parrotfish, squirrelfish - starting only a few metres from the sand in water shallow enough for a child to stand. That combination of easy access and real reef is uncommon. It is compact and gets crowded on cruise days, and there is persistent, insistent vending on the beach that some visitors find wearing. Feeding fish is discouraged. Coral World Ocean Park is immediately next door.

Crash Boat takes its name from the rescue boats once stationed here for the airbase. The pier has largely collapsed, and the pilings left standing under the water have grown coral and sponge and now hold dense fish life - sergeant majors, snapper, wrasse - in water shallow enough to free-dive. That structure is why it snorkels better than the plain sand beaches nearby. The beach itself is colourful with fishing boats and busy with local families at weekends, and there are food kiosks. Conditions matter: winter north swells make the west coast rough and murky.

Devil’s Den is an underground spring inside a dry cave, reached by walking down a wooden staircase into the earth. Light comes through one hole in the roof and falls in a shaft across water that stays at 72 degrees, which on a cold morning makes the whole opening steam - hence the name. Snorkelling here is unlike anything else in Florida: you are floating in a rock room, not a river. It is privately run, reservations are required, and there is a hard minimum age with no swimming for small children. Book well ahead in season.

Getting to the Dry Tortugas is most of the experience - two and a quarter hours by ferry across open water, or a seaplane if the budget allows. What you arrive at is Fort Jefferson, an enormous unfinished nineteenth-century fort covering almost an entire small island, surrounded by water clear enough to see the coral heads from the walls. Snorkelling straight off the beach is the best in the state because there is no run-off and almost no boat traffic. Bring everything you need; there is no shop, and the ferry leaves on schedule with or without you. Rough seas make the crossing genuinely unpleasant, so watch the forecast.

Flamenco earns the superlatives. A mile-long horseshoe of white sand enclosing water that grades from clear to turquoise to deep blue, with a reef at the eastern end for snorkelling and surf gentle enough for children through most of the bay. The odd landmark is a rusting US Navy tank left on the sand from when Culebra was a bombing range, now covered in graffiti and universally photographed. Facilities exist - kiosks, restrooms, showers, camping - which is unusual for a beach this good. Getting there means the Culebra ferry from Ceiba or a small plane, and the ferry is the constraint.

The Overseas Highway is 113 miles of two-lane road hopping 44 islands, and the standard family mistake is treating it as a drive to Key West. It isn’t. Key West is the least kid-friendly thing in the Keys, and the best parts are the stops you pass at 55mph on your way to it. So this runs the other way round: three days, never more than about 40 miles between beds, and Key West as an afternoon rather than a destination. Mile markers count down as you go south, which is how everything here is addressed. ...

Key West is short on good beaches and this is the one locals use. The water drops off quickly compared to Bahia Honda, which makes it less suited to toddlers but much better for snorkelling - the rocky edges hold parrotfish, sergeant majors and the occasional small barracuda within a short swim of the sand. Behind the beach sits the Civil War fort itself, with the largest collection of seacoast cannon in the country and cool brick casemates that make a good hour out of the sun. Water shoes matter here; the entry is rocky.

The Frederiksted pier is one of the most celebrated shore snorkels in the Caribbean, and what makes it special is not reef but structure: concrete pilings running down into sand, colonised by orange and purple sponge, with the strange creatures that come with that habitat - seahorses, juvenile drums, frogfish, octopus at dusk. The water is calm and clear on this leeward coast and mostly under twenty-five feet. It suits a child who is a strong swimmer and patient enough to look closely, more than a beginner. Access is from the beach beside the pier; cruise ship days close the water near it.

Gilchrist Blue only became a state park in 2017, and it still feels less discovered than the springs nearer Orlando. The main boil is deep and blue, but the run leading from it to the Santa Fe is knee-to-waist deep over white sand - the ideal place to put a mask on a child for the first time, because they can stand up whenever they want to. Smaller satellite springs sit along the boardwalk. Capacity is limited and the gate closes when the lot fills, which on a hot Saturday can be before eleven.

Cayo Aurora - universally called Gilligan’s Island - is a small mangrove key reached by a ferry that runs every hour or so from the Guánica shore. What makes it work with children is the geography: channels between the mangroves are shallow, clear, protected and warm, so they function as a set of natural pools with fish and starfish in them. There are picnic tables, boardwalks and restrooms and nothing else, so bring food and water. It closes on Mondays. Weekends bring a lively Puerto Rican family crowd with music and coolers, which is either the appeal or the reason to come midweek.

Ginnie is privately owned, which means it charges more than the state parks and allows things they do not - most obviously camping right on the riverbank and tubing without a shuttle. The springs themselves are exceptional: Ginnie Spring proper is a large basin whose clarity is genuinely startling, and Devil’s Eye and Devil’s Ear are the entrances to a cave system that draws technical divers from around the world. For families the draw is the swimming and the drift down the Santa Fe on a tube, with a shuttle back from the take-out. Two things to know before you commit. It is expensive - day admission runs about $40 a head, so a family of four is $160 through the gate before tube hire. And it has historically been a loud drinking scene at summer weekends; an alcohol and open-container policy introduced in 2026 was aimed at that, so check the current rules rather than either assumption. Midweek is quieter regardless.

Hawksnest is the first national park beach on the north shore road and the easiest to reach, with parking essentially on the sand rather than down a trail. Three patches of elkhorn coral sit close inshore, near enough that a child who can swim thirty metres is over reef, and the bay is usually calm. It is smaller and narrower than Trunk Bay and has fewer facilities - restrooms and grills, no snorkel rental - but it is free where Trunk is ticketed, and far less affected by cruise ship days. Sea grape trees give reasonable shade along the back of the beach.