Driving from mainland Florida, visitors to the Florida Keys enter the 125-mile-long subtropical island chain at Key Largo, the longest island in the Keys. Key Largo is bordered on the west by Florida Bay and the Everglades National Park backcountry, and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, home to the clear waters of the Gulf Stream. Visitors can enjoy Key Largo�s ties to the sea including scuba diving, snorkeling, an underwater hotel, sportfishing, eco-tours, beaches and dolphin encounter programs. The island also offers numerous shoreside activities including nature trails and a rehabilitation center for wild birds. Key Largo is best known for John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park, mile marker (MM) 102.5, the first underwater park in the United States. Combined with the adjacent Key Largo National Marine Sanctuary, the two parks comprise an area of 178 square nautical miles featuring 55 varieties of coral and 600 species of fish. Their fragile living reefs are acclaimed as some of the most fascinating scuba diving sites in the world. The two parks are contained within the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, which encompasses 2,800 square nautical miles of coastal waters of the entire Keys chain. Back on land, environmental trails at Pennekamp Park wind through tropical hammocks of gumbo limbo, strangler fig, tamarind, wild coffee and mahogany trees. The Key Largo Hammock Botanical State Park, Route 905 at MM 106 bayside, offers opportunities to view rare tree snails, Schaus swallowtail butterflies, white crowned pigeons, mangrove cuckoos, lignumvitae trees, butterfly orchids and wild cotton.

Key Largo also gained notoriety when the 1947 movie classic �Key Largo,� featuring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, hit the silver screen. A local bar, the Caribbean Club, provided the locale for some of the movie�s scenes.

Bogie�s presence still can be seen today in Key Largo. The steam-powered vessel of another American movie epic � �The African Queen� � is on view at the Holiday Inn Key Largo Marina.

The island is about an hour�s drive from Miami International Airport. For more information, write the Key Largo Chamber of Commerce at 106000 Overseas Highway, Key Largo FL, 33037; call 1-800-822-1088 or 305-451-1414; or stop by the Florida Keys Visitor Center at MM 106 bayside.

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