Alcohol is forbidden at Cape Florida, because the beach and surrounding land are a state recreation area. We like this to be a family beach. Parents and kids come here to swim, to have barbecues - we have 18 barbecue pavilions. Motorboats are outlawed on the Atlantic side where people swim but are allowed in the bay. We never go to South Beach.
South Beach is quicker than here.
Too many people there. Too much noise. Volunteer Paul Cloues spends Saturdays taking tourists up the 118 steps of Cape Florida Lighthouse. The foundation was laid in 1825, four years after Florida became a U.S. territory, he tells them. Ships were wrecking into coral rock reefs offshore, so Washington lawmakers decided the spit at the end of Key Biscayne was the perfect place for a lighthouse.