The Sunshine Republic

Biking Shark Valley off Tamiami Trail - During the Day & During a Full Moon!

March 02, 2023 Jim Season 1 Episode 7
The Sunshine Republic
Biking Shark Valley off Tamiami Trail - During the Day & During a Full Moon!
Show Notes Transcript

Learn about the geography and history of Shark Valley off of the Tamiami Trail in Miami-Dade County, including biking this very unique trail during a full moon.

Welcome to another episode of the Sunshine Republic. Today we'll be examining a another tremendous bike ride a well known one in fact, and that is the Shark Valley paved path off of Route 41. In down south in the Everglades. First let me describe a little bit about Shark Valley. It is a depression in in the Everglades at the head of the Shark River. Slope in Far West Miami Dade County. It is part of Everglades National Park, and it empties out into the Shark River and the 10,000 islands of Monroe County, east of Goodland. It is a sawgrass prairie not a lot of trees it does flood during the rainy season. And hence you get the name from Marjory Stoneman Douglas the River of Grass or pay-per-ho-kee is from the native languages of the original settlers of Florida. For such marshes in the Everglades.

 It does have a visitor center, some underwater cameras and informational brochures but certainly the highlight is the paved path. In the past, a well known episode in the second Seminole War occurred in a keener, perhaps near Shark Valley in the late 1830s. Groups of Spanish Indians rated a guarded trading post of the Caloosahatchee River in 1839. And then committed the well known massacre on Indian key down in the Keys near Robbie's Marina and at 40. Parenthetically, that's also a great place to kayak over to and see the foundations and even snorkeling on the south side. But the Spanish Indians who was resided primarily in southwest Florida, were a mix of creek refugees, other Native Americans and Spanish and even perhaps Calusa Indians, and on in December of 1840, responding to attacks by the Indians nine V men, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Harney target and one of their key leaders chuquicamata. The men found him caught him and actually hung in a tree island in the Everglades - that Island is believed to be the present day island at the beginning of Shark Valley.

So how do you get to Shark Valley? Well, Shark Valley is located on Highway 41 Tamiami Trail for the Tamiami Miami trail. Southwest Eighth Street or “Calle Ocho” , 25 miles west of the Florida Turnpike, and its exit 25 A from the north and 25 from the south. Of course you may be coming from Naples and it's take us 70 miles east to Shark Valley. Then once you get there, the highlight really is the 15 almost 16 mile loop trail. It's very easy, it's very flat. It's popular not only for biking but for hiking and running and road biking. So you will typically on weekends encounter quite a few people. The trail is open year round, and really is beautiful to visit any time of the year except perhaps in the summer when it's really hot and really buggy. It is important to remember that animals are not allowed so keep your dogs and your and your cat's at home. You also might want to check it does often flood so you want to check the water conditions. Before you go there might be an interesting anecdote to learn how this whole Shark Valley development was created. And actually bet back in the 1940s, the late 1940s The humble oil company, now part of Mobil or Exxon Mobil found oil in the Everglades and if you ride in other places in the Everglades, you will see some legacy oil derricks particularly in the north Northwestern corner near Immokalee but to get to this particular oil rig, the oil company built a seven mile race path out of the ground with fiil from a trench alongside, Tthe oil turned out to be non commercial grade oil and the project was abandoned. Like many other water features around the world in dry areas, this canal in Shark Valley provides water in the dry season and thus attracts are truly an incredible amount of wildlife from alligators, to incredible amounts of birds. In that race path is now paved very smoothly and nicely and it's just great for riding your bike. 

It is important to remember there are no sharks in Shark Valley. It's just called that because the water runs south into the Shark River, which isn't named that because of bull sharks that were cited years ago. But it is a valley if only because it's only a several feet lower than the surrounding ground formed by the prairies to the right to the west and the ridge to the east. Where Miami is built. There are wild alligators a ton of them. You will see them likely on the road particularly when it's colder in the winter. They are cold blooded so they love laying on the black asphalt and warming up on many occasions they block one of the highlights to the to the tour which is a stunning observation tower with a spiral walkway that brings you to 70 feet above the Everglades where you can see at least 20 miles during the day and even farther at night. Shark Valley is while the main gates closed for vehicles. Later in the day, you want to check the times but it's the five or six or seven o'clock at night. They do allow entrance 24 hours a day. So one of the most interesting adventures is to ride Shark Valley on a full moon. In particular, it suggested to get to get the Shark Valley and enter the gates near sunset and timing out so that you're getting sunset. When you're at the midpoint of your ride at the observation tower. There's nothing more stunning than seeing the sunset over the Everglades at 70 feet up with no other civilization in sight. Then if you take a little siesta. Let the sun go down a little bit on your ride back. It's amazing how bright a full moon can make the path and very likely you'll decide that you don't need a headlight on your bicycle. Of course, just because it's nighttime doesn't mean the alligators are not active, so keep your eyes open. on many occasion, we're on a numerous number of occasions. Personally I've almost run over or into an alligator basking on the path even at night. It really is a great it's a great very adventurous bike ride.

 In particular at night it's amazing to see the lights of certainly the light the glow of Miami to the east and lights of Naples to the west. The stars you see are certainly more visible there. But if you do want to even see stars in an even more brilliant fashion. You're encouraged to we'll go drive west on 41 and up 29 near Immokalee and you could look for the International Dark Sky Association sites which are among the darkest in Florida so you can see the Milky Way and really be impressed by it - by the heavens. But Shark Valley is quite dark and you will see an awful lot of astronomical sites, planets and stars. 

Well that concludes our brief overview of taking a ride to Shark Valley. Thank you again for joining us today and we look forward to having you on another edition of the Sunshine Republic podcast. Thank you very much for joining us today.