CHART 21
Big Bend
Cruising Florida's BIG BEND
The name "Big Bend" is geographically accurate in describing the Gulf Coast as it curves up the peninsula from Tarpon Springs to St. Marks and the Panhandle, but the new name of "Nature Coast" does a better job, and is fast gaining in acceptance and usage.
We'll stick to the shoreline route rather than heading across the Gulf to Carrabelle where the ICW picks up again. There's a good buoyage system in place along the coast so the mariner can go from one marker to the next and they're quite evenly spaced at about ten miles a "hop."
If you have made time, though, you'll want to stop and enjoy the wildlife and the beautiful little towns (or more properly, perhaps, "settlements") spaced along the coast ... many at the mouths of rivers with strange-sounding names ... and one that's very well known - the Suwannee.
St. Marks, another historic place with its beautiful old white lighthouse, marks the end of our Big Bend cruise and the beginning of the Florida Panhandle.