From ghost towns to river crossings, these are the strange, sacred, and sunbaked corners of Florida you won’t find on a postcard.
The road to Pensacola crawled that morning. Dusty and I had already conquered every cup of coffee the truck could carry before we finally reached the causeway that led into Gulf Islands National Seashore. Traffic melted away as white dunes swallowed the skyline, and the Gulf turned the color of polished glass. Somewhere under a … Read more
Some places don’t announce themselves — they just sit quietly in the woods, waiting for someone curious enough to look twice. Jeep Cave is one of those places. A small limestone hideout tucked deep in the Withlacoochee Forest, it feels less like a destination and more like a secret you stumble into on a wandering … Read more
They didn’t just steal the papers.No—Florida’s never been one for subtle crimes. In 1891, under a moonless sky, a gang of Inverness men rolled into Mannfield, Florida, and stole the entire courthouse—records, furniture, clerk, and all. By sunrise, the county seat was gone, and Mannfield’s heart went with it. Today, little remains of this ambitious … Read more
They say some stories don’t find you until you’re ready to hear them.For me, that story began under the canopy of Withlacoochee pines—where time, moss, and memory have buried a town called Oriole. It took three separate hikes to find it.The first, I wandered alone through the brush, chasing rumors of old chimneys and whispers … Read more
Brooksville, Florida They say three-year-old Jessie Mae still cries for her mother inside this house—more than 160 years after she died. Visitors swear they hear her at the top of the stairs, a small, aching voice calling “Mama…” into the dark. It’s a haunting thought, isn’t it? A child’s sorrow suspended in time, echoing through … Read more
Where Legends Live… and Sometimes Look Back There’s a quiet corner of St. Augustine where the past doesn’t just linger —it stares right at you.Unblinking.Perfectly still. Or so they say. Tucked into the old village is Potter’s Wax Museum, the first wax museum in the United States. From the outside, it looks harmless enough — … Read more
Where Pastel Walls Can’t Hide the Dark There’s a strange kind of beauty standing on San Marco Avenue — a two-story Romanesque Revival building shaded by palms and painted the softest bubblegum pink. From a distance, you could mistake it for an Old Florida inn, the kind of place with rocking chairs and lemonade on … Read more
The sawmill that ate a forest — and the traces it left behind. They say the swamp keeps its own counsel. Walk quietly and the ground will tell you where streets once ran, where rails once sang, where men and machines turned cypress into lumber and melt into money. Centralia rose fast and fell faster … Read more
Some places whisper their stories. These caves?They echo them. Deep in the Withlacoochee Forest, two sinkholes carved into Florida’s limestone belly — Dames Cave and Peace Cave — wait like open mouths in the earth. Their edges are framed in ferns, roots dangle like veins, and the ground drops away without warning. These are some … Read more
Haunted History in the Heart of Kissimmee They still talk about the morning of January 19, 1912. The air was crisp, the crowd pressed against the picket fence, and the rope swung gently in the dawn light. When the trap gave way, a man dropped—and legend says the rope never stopped swaying. Today, workers in … Read more