Flagler's railroad that went to sea
Henry Flagler spent his last fortune running a railroad across the ocean to Key West in 1912; the 1935 Labor Day hurricane, the strongest landfall ever recorded in the US, tore it apart and killed hundreds of veteran workers. The state paved the surviving bridges, and the result is the only road trip in America measured in mile markers to zero. Take Card Sound Road in, walk the old Seven Mile Bridge, and mind the tiny deer.
📍 Mile markers are the route's own numbering system; the Islamorada hurricane monument is the one that matters.
Out of the city, through the mangrove causeway or the Card Sound alternate, into the dive capital of the upper Keys.
An open-air conch shack on the old smugglers' road, serving conch fritters to bikers and boaters since the 1950s. The correct way to enter the Keys.
The actual 1912 steam launch from the Bogart-Hepburn film, rescued and running canal cruises. Bogie never came to Key Largo for the movie; the boat did, eventually.
Islamorada's fishing fleet and hurricane monument, tarpon at Robbie's, and the turtle hospital at Marathon.
A WPA crypt holding victims of the Labor Day storm, the most intense US landfall on record. It killed hundreds of WWI veteran bonus-army workers and finished Flagler's railroad for good.
A working sea-turtle hospital in a converted motel, running rescue, surgery and release since 1986. Book the tour; you will meet the patients.
The Seven Mile Bridge, Bahia Honda's broken span, Key deer at dusk, and Mile Marker 0 at the end of the map.
The railroad workers' island village sits under the original Seven Mile Bridge; the restored old span is now a two-mile walk over open ocean. Golden hour here beats any postcard.
The Keys' best natural beach beside the dramatic broken arch of Flagler's Bahia Honda bridge. Swim where the ocean and the Gulf trade water.
A dollar-bill-papered pub hiding down a back road since the 1930s, in the middle of the National Key Deer Refuge. The knee-high deer own the right of way at dusk.
The end of US 1 at Whitehead and Fleming. The sign gets stolen constantly, the photo line never shortens, and the atlas officially runs out of South here.
More in the Florida Peninsula: A1A: Flagler's Coast · The Space & Treasure Coast · Old Dixie: Cassadaga to Kissimmee · Cross Creek & the Springs · The Nature Coast · The Florida Cracker Trail · The Big Water · The Tamiami Trail