Flamingo Campground

Somewhat disappointing! Almost no trails, paths, or things to do. Water is almost impossible to get to and the place is crawling with bugs. This is a wild place. If you have kids or a spouse that is going to complain about bugs, this is a place to pass on. An amazing assortment of things that can bite but that gets old really fast when the Deep Woods Off acts an attractant. Had it not been for coming upon the three massive American Crocodiles (yes Crocs, not Gators) in the fresh water side of the marina and the playful Manatees that inhabit the bay side, this would have been a bust for wildlife. I expected more birds. The Crocodiles were 12 foot plus and one was beached on the boat ramp with its mouth wide open. My wife thought it was artificial when she first saw it. Found the Midway or Big Cypress Midway Campground to be as welcoming less of a trip into nowhere. The trip along the Tamiami Trail to be well worth the side trip. The massive number of Alligators along the way will amaze you (Monument Lake, Midway, the park off the North side of 41). Monsters from another age.

I hate to be a Debbie Downer, but I had to legally change my name to just that after staying here.

So first, the positives. You can see crocodiles here. You won't see them anywhere else in Florida, really. So that's neat. We didn't see any, blame the motor boat enthusiasts, but it's possible. What we did see was a manatee. Well, his nose. And I caught a late night ranger program about nature, and I like nature, so that was great. Big spots, no shade, but large.

The thing is, we were here in "low mosquito season", and if you're the type of tough guy who says, "Mosquitos never bother me, I don't care," or if you praise DEET for its ability to combat the little biting suckers, you will leave here humbled.

They found every which way into our Airstream. Into our van. Into every opening in my clothes. I am that guy, mosquitos literally never bite me. They like my Lady, her mom, and my middle child. Boy, did they get worked out. Our 3 year old woke up looking like he'd gone ten years of consecutive chicken pox attacks. I was luckier, but it was still too much to handle. I had to ride my bike all night until I was tired enough to pass out and ignore them.

So that's unfortunate.

Otherwise, the Everglades themselves are a miraculous testament to mankind. In a world like Florida, where real estate is prime and there's little left of the southern portion that hasn't been turned into a concrete wasteland, the Everglades show how much even the most conservative populations can value a natural ecosystem. There are no big geological features like in western state parks, Everglades celebrates the necessity of our environment working perfectly within itself to support a ridiculous array of flora and fauna. You will never see as many birds anywhere in the US as you do here, and not just swallows and boring things like that, wild birds, strange ones, creatures in the air, land and sea like you've never experienced.

I'd simply recommend doing the park and heading north for nighty night.

We visited the park about two years ago. There are two campgrounds in Everglades National Park. Flamingo is at the southern tip, 38 miles from the entrance. RV sites are electric only and can be reserved in advance. The other campground, Long Pine Campground, is 7 miles from the entrance, and offers dry camping on a first-come first-served basis.

RV sites in Flamingo have nice spacing between them and very little shade. There are restrooms, showers and sinks throughout the campground. At the time we visited, water in only some of the showers was heated by solar.

There is a visitor center that offers various programs in winter, some free, some charging a nominal fee i.e. for canoe rental. We participated in three of their programs and thoroughly enjoyed all three.

The only time to come to the Everglades is winter, as it's the only time that mosquitoes are tolerable. In our case, we lucked out, as there were very few. But depending on weather, they can be bad in winter as well - come prepared.

Make sure to fill your gas tank and stock up on provisions, the drive to to town is about 48 miles one way. There is a shop at the marina but they didn't even have milk there, mostly sodas and snack foods.

There are lots of trails throughout the park, as well as canoeing, and kayaking. Motorboats are restricted to only certain waterways and canoes, kayaks and slow speed skiffs are available for rent.

Birdlife is spectacular, and this is the only place in the U.S. where you can see crocodiles as well as alligators. The Everglades are beautiful in a subtle way that not everyone may appreciate.

Flamingo allows people to spend quality time in the southern areas of the park. For those that have never visited, a combination of some days in Flamingo and some days at Lone Pine Campground would provide the best access to all areas of the park.

We were really disappointed to get here and find NO Verizon signal at all. Occasionally we could get spotty T-Mobile LTE on our phones, but it didn't translate into anything useful. We tried all the tricks with directional antennas and booster with no luck.

That said, we made the most of it! We rented a canoe from the marina and had it transported up to 9 mile pond for a 2 hour paddle. It was absolutely beautiful!!

The Visitor Center and the campground are very old and slightly run down. Clean bathrooms though.

I just don't know that I'd ever visit this section of the park again.

There's really only one reason to camp here and that's to immerse yourself in the deep nature of Everglades National Park. This is an older campground with paved sites and 3 big campground loops A, B and T plus a tent walk-in area. A & B loops are for smaller rigs and trailers while T loop is for larger rigs (motorhomes over 35 ft). All sites are dry-camping ($20/night) except for 41 of the T Loop sites which have 50A electric ($30/night). We stayed in the latter and it was plenty spacious with easy access for any-sized rig. Sites have lots of good separation and large grassy "sitting area", but not many trees so not much in the way of privacy. Location for visiting this southern section of Everglades National Park was awesome. You're right on Florida Bay, 1 mile bike/hike from the visitor center and within easy access of hiking, birding, kayaking you-name-it. Biggest issue were the mosquitoes...holy moly were they bad! Usually winter is a good time to visit, but this was a hot winter and park Rangers said this was the worst mosquito season they'd seen in 20 years. We loved the nature, but the skeeters were so bad we could only handle 3 nights before we had to leave. I'd say definitely come, but check the skeeter situation before you do.

No (zip, nada, none) Verizon signal, but ATT was blazing fast.
Also the campground is 38 miles from southern entrance so come pre-stocked with food/gas as there's really not much down here. There is a dump station and water on site

Great open field camping, with pretty views to wake up to if you get one of the outer ring spots. Great wildlife hikes minutes away. Really enjoyed my time here!

This campground is huge, it is located in the Everglades National Park so you have to pay the park entrance fee. There is over 300 sites and I doubt they would ever fill up. It is easy access to get there on nice paved road. The campground consists of some large loops in big open field areas. There are shade trees scattered throughout.

There are plugin sites available for $30 I believe but we chose the cheaper site cause we don't need to plug in. There are also tent campsites right by the water. The ocean is right there, but not much of a beach or good swim area. There is real good catfishing here.

This area may have been more fun if the mosquitoes weren't so bad. We tried to go for a hike but gave up after a few hundred yards due to the little blood suckers. At night they were so bad we could not stand to be outside for more than a few minutes. There is still the ocean to go paddle on or a few canoe paddle trails that seemed nice. A bike is a good way to get around this large campground.

We were happy to camp here since there was cellular service and the possibility of having non-electrical (20$) and electrical (30$) campsites. It is a the very end of the park road.

We chose the non-electrical since we do not absolutely need it. There's a few trees but it is mainly an open area with good spacing between each site. It may get pretty hot during the summer. It was very quiet.

There was only 1 loop open since there has been hurricane damage, but there was plenty of spots when we came at around 10am. It is a self check-in booth.

Be aware of mosquitoes! Even though it was winter season, there are very active at night. During the day, we had no problem.

Be sure to visit the Flamingo visitor center and sign up for an accompanied ranger canoe trip on the Nine Mile Pond, it is free and a MUST do. At the marina, we can usually see Manatees and even a Crocodile if you are lucky.

Overall, this campground was one of the worst campgrounds we have been on considering we paid $20. The shower was full of spiders, ants, and dirt. There were no fireplaces and only a few benches to sit on. We are used to bad conditions on free campgrounds but that was disappointing.

We made reservations for this campground because we were afraid that it would be all booked in mid-December. There was no need to do this.

The biggest issue was the price at $16/night with our access pass. We assumed we would get a 50% discount as we had in other parks but were wrong. This is probably because of the hot water and dump station they provide but we didn’t really need these and would have preferred cheaper camping.

The spots are a decent distance apart but there is little privacy and the noise from others travels. The second night some people had clearly come out to party.

Finally, you are not allowed to hang hammocks from the trees so we were roasting in our tent.

The good part is that you are near the bay and flamingo visitor center which has manatees and crocodiles.

Overall I was surprised to find such a developed campsite in a national park. If you stay here, bring a lot of bug spray. We were told most of the mosquitoes died in the hurricane but we were still covered in bug bites.