Many travelers take a half or full day to see the Everglades, about a half-hour from Marco Island. Several companies offer airboat rides through the saw grass and around the mangroves near Everglades City. Some go out into the Everglades. Guides, many longtime locals, stop on the rides to identify birds and point out alligators, trees and air plants. Airboats look like aluminum flats boats rigged with huge, noisy motors that roar tourists through water and saw grass at top speed.
Passengers wear headphones to muffle the sound.
But, sadly, the roar scares the wildlife. A number of companies in and around Everglades City give airboat tours. In the early 1960s, before condominiums were built on its beaches, and long before the bays were dredged for fill on which to build houses, Marco Island had wide, sweeping beaches, acres of undeveloped land and towering Australian pines. But a coalition of environmental groups fought the development and urged government regulators to stop it. In the end, they were responsible for halting dredging, filling and construction of subdivisions in Marco Island and saving dozens of acres for nature preserves.