Navigation
Support Us
Search

Best Place to Camp

Markham Park

Now that South Florida is perilously close to maximum density, places to pitch a tent are hard to come by. Developers who map out suburban hells like Weston simply don't pay much attention to camping. But we'll always have Markham Park. In this 666-acre county idyll, you'll find mountain bike trails, tennis courts, a personal-watercraft lake, boating, a swimming pool, an observatory, and 96 campsites. Most of the sites are of the drive-up variety; however, a handful of "primitive" spots are nestled in a patch of thick Australian pines. It ain't exactly the Alps, but it's pure South Florida. Markham is a popular place, especially on weekends, so call first to check availability.

Best Place to Mountain Bike

Camp Murphy Off-Road Bicycle Trails

"If rattlesnakes, cottonmouths, alligators, scorpions, wasps, mosquitoes, chiggers, horseflies, spiders, palmetto stumps, swamp, sugar sand, sawgrass, briers, wild pigs, or World War II ordnance bother you, go back to Yahoo! The rest of you, listen up!" Welcome to the opening lines of the Website of Club Scrub, a group that has spent nearly every Sunday morning for the last year clearing a single-track, mountain bike path through the dense pineland of the 11,500-acre Jonathan Dickinson State Park. Hard-core stump-jumpers have been coming to the former Camp Murphy army base, just north of the Palm Beach line in Martin County, since the early 1990s. But it wasn't until Mark Nelson was named park manager later that decade that work began on the long-awaited trail. As former top dog of the Oleta River State Recreation Area, a mecca for mountain bikers in northeastern Miami-Dade County, Nelson had experience with the lunacy of the off-road set. So far, with Nelson's support, Club Scrub members have cleared more than five miles of trail. They hope to have an additional ten opened before year's end. Because the trail is a work in progress, each visit brings a new surprise. In late February, for instance, bikers could take a roughly ten-foot-high jump off a concrete pad that was left behind when the army camp closed in 1944. Marked with a red sign warning, "Experts Only," the jump proved to be too extreme, says Club Scrub president Steve Bucina. "No one can do it," he adds. "We'll probably put a ramp down the back side." But even without such practical adjustments, the trail offers far more than your average trek through Florida wilderness. It winds around the remains of barracks and other buildings once occupied by servicemen who were sent to the outpost for jungle warfare and radar training. Some hills are actually old bunkers. As you pedal through the place, ponder this question: Which is worse, training in South Florida heat or fighting a war?

Best Place to Nail Balls

C.B. Smith Park

Everybody knows that one of the best stress relievers in the world is to go out and whack balls. (We're talking golf balls here, gutter head.) The sprawling park has a new golf center that includes a pro shop, greens for putting and pitching, and a two-tiered driving range that offers both artificial and natural tees. While you're hacking away, the kids can play putt-putt on a well-kept and challenging little course. Don't feel like practicing your golf swing? Then go next door to the state-of-the-art batting cages and try your luck with some fastballs. Once you get your timing down, it's a blast (literally). And if that's not enough, ten freshly painted tennis courts lie nearby (954-437-2674), where you can practice your stroke. Whacking, swinging, stroking... By the time you finish at this park, you'll need a cigarette.

Best Place to Ride a Bike

Jupiter Island

Sure, well-heeled folk would like to keep this little slice of paradise to themselves, but the 17-mile-long island is so peaceful and so doggone pretty that it demands a two-wheel tour. With speed limits of 25 miles per hour on most stretches -- and as low as 15 mph in places where golf carts need a fighting chance -- combative motorists are kept at bay. Only two bridges connect the isle to the mainland, so it's mildly remote. If you're feeling particularly energetic, start at Jupiter Lighthouse Park near the southern bridge. Then take Beach Road over the Intracoastal Waterway and head north on the island's only north-south public road. Coral Cove Park is a chance to pull over, rest, and get a good view of the ocean. As you pedal through Blowing Rock Preserve, homes disappear, and you'll have the chance to imagine what the island looked like a hundred years ago. But don't worry, the flora remains lush even as the preserve ends and the palatial homes begin.

Best Place to Rollerblade

The Lakes section of Hollywood

Say you are the kind of skater who doesn't go for the fancy stuff -- trick skates, snazzy wheels, too many pads. You want an ocean breeze but don't have the perfect thighs and svelte tummy required to traverse popular stretches such as Fort Lauderdale beach. You just like a good workout where the chance of death is low and the view gives you that skater's high. Well, this tree-lined residential neighborhood fits the bill. Warm up at Joe DiMaggio Park on Harbor Islands, where a pleasant, paved trail circles two pretty saltwater ponds, then head east on Washington Street, curve north onto South Lake Drive, and proceed around the lake to South Seventh Avenue, then head north under the bridge, past the tot playground to North Lake, and continue to the turnaround at the northeast corner. Reverse direction and head back to your car, where, if you're smart, you will have stashed a few cold ones.

Best Place to Spearfish

Reef off Lauderdale-by-the-Sea

Walk to the end of the Lauderdale-by-the-Sea pier to discover some of the best hunting in all South Florida. But you're going to have to get wet. And you have to be a certified scuba diver even to have a shot, because the quarry, found between 30 and 60 feet down, is fish. Delicacies such as hogfish and mutton snapper are the reward for the skilled spearfisher; people who live for this exotic and skill-testing sport say the hunting has never been better. "Spearfishing in Broward and Palm Beach is as good as it gets," says Stephen Picardi, president of the South Florida Spearfishing Club. You can also find big fish around artificial reefs all up and down the coast, but you'll need a boat to reach most of them.

Best Pool Hall

Hollywood Billiards

There's just something comfortable about this place. Maybe it's the olive-green carpet, which is worn but not ragged. Or perhaps it's the paneling or the mounted deer heads on the wall. Whatever the reason, Hollywood Billiards feels like the kind of joint where you can play a game or two even if you stink. Nobody laughs as you blow shot after shot. And if you're Minnesota Fats good, 18 tables allow you to show off. If you just like to sit around and drink beer, happy hour runs from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day. So take a cue from us and head over.

Best Pro Athlete

Luis Castillo

They say hitting a Major League pitcher is the most difficult feat in sports. We sometimes wonder about that -- tackling, say, Earl Campbell head-on in his prime sounds pretty hard, too. But still, hitting breaking stuff from the Big Unit or El Duque must be damnably difficult, despite how easy Castillo makes it look. And he does it in so many ways: drag bunt singles, slap shots to no man's land, twisting line drives that tax the outfielders' knowledge of physics, and even the occasional home run. (OK, he had two last year anyway.) But as well as Luis puts the bat on the ball (.344 last year), hitting is only part of the remarkable package. What makes Castillo truly special are his speed (he had a Major League-leading 62 steals last year) and his play at second base. He credits his fielding ability in part to growing up poor in the Dominican Republic, where he fashioned gloves out of whatever he could find. (Legend has it he was partial to milk cartons.) All the hard work has paid off in incredible snags of hard-hit ground balls often followed by wheeling, acrobatic throws to first that belong in the ESPN highlight canon. Long live Luis.

Best Public Swimming Pool

Fort Lauderdale High School Swimming Pool

White lights flicker on at dusk, like moons setting on the horizon. The stench of chlorine is oddly comforting. You'll have no parking problem here, encounter few spectators, and will have to do without even the comfort of a locker room. Rinse off under the trickle of the outdoor shower instead. Once in a while, the pool will close because of rain or a team meet, but otherwise, on weeknights from 5 to 8 p.m., it's yours for the swimming. On rare days the 25-yard lanes become crowded with lean and disciplined master swimmers in their fifties. You probably won't notice them, though. This blue-green world is blessedly quiet. We swim, as we dream, alone.

Best Seats in the House

Section 106 at Pro Player Stadium when the Marlins play the Atlanta Braves

You love this part of the park for many reasons: lots of foul balls, great sight lines, and best of all you're within point-blank heckling range of the enemy bullpen. And when those stinkin' Braves are in town, the fireballing, immigrant-bashing, racist homophobe nincompoop every baseball fan loves to hate is sitting right in front of you. His thick, red neck is just waiting for you to heap invective upon it. Problem is, he's been heckled so darn much the past year or so, your barb will have to be really cutting to penetrate his callused hide -- to say nothing of that dense, bony skull and walnut-size brain. What to say, what to say....

Hello, what's this piece of paper that just fell at your feet from two rows up? Why, it's a photo of the reviled reliever himself (in which his mouth is agape, as always). You search your pockets for a writing implement, debating whether to go with (a) devil's horns, (b) Hitler mustache, (c) hayseed between the teeth, or (d) all of the above.

"Excuse me, did my picture fall down there?" You look over your shoulder at a mousy, bespectacled woman in a Braves T-shirt. Silently you hand her the snapshot, and watch in bemusement as the woman strides down the steps, leans over the bullpen wall, then returns with her hero's autograph.

Another spectator asks her why she's such a fan of the big fella. "Because he's honest and he speaks his mind," she declares in a slight drawl.

You look back down into the 'pen, where the paragon of homespun, folksy wisdom is about to sit back down. It's now or never. You take your best shot:

"Hey Rocker, you suck!"

Ooh. Stung him with that one. Definitely.

Best Of Broward-Palm Beach®

Best Of

Use of this website constitutes acceptance of our terms of use and our privacy policy The New Times Broward-Palm Beach may earn a portion of sales from products & services purchased through links on our site from our affiliate partners. ©2024 New Times BPB, LLC. All rights reserved.
Do Not Sell or Share My Information
Powered By Foundation