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#first-magnitude-spring

3 posts tagged.

Aerial view of circular blue spring bowl with limestone walls and clear water
Hidden Spots

Madison Blue Spring — The Panhandle's Hidden First-Magnitude Cathedral

Two hours west of Gainesville, a perfectly circular 90ft limestone bowl pumps 64 million gallons a day of 70°F gin-clear water into the Withlacoochee. No cap, no crowd, no cell signal. The least-known first-magnitude spring in Florida.
Boardwalk over clear blue spring water with manatees visible below at Manatee Springs State Park
Wildlife

Manatee Springs — The Quiet Alternative to Crystal River

Levy County's first-magnitude spring on the Suwannee, named by William Bartram in 1774. Ten to forty manatees on a January dawn — not five hundred — and almost no one watching with you. The quiet alternative to Crystal River.
Clear blue spring bowl at Wekiwa Springs with swimmers and tubes in the background
Hidden Spots

Wekiwa Springs — Orlando's Front-Yard Wilderness

Twenty minutes from Disney, the parking lot ends and a 7,800-acre wild spring begins. Wekiwa is Orlando's front-yard wilderness — a first-magnitude spring, a 13-mile blackwater paddle, alligators, black bears, and a 72°F bowl most tourists never find.