The Florida Trail
 In the early 1960s, Jim Kern, a Miami resident, visited the Appalachian Trail for a backpacking trip and came back to Florida with a burning desire to create a long-distance hiking trail in his own backyard. Founding the Florida Trail Association to pursue that goal, Kern rounded up like-minded Floridians and set to work. The Florida Trail’s first blaze was painted in the Ocala National Forest near Clearwater Lake in October 1966.
Today, Kern’s original dream of a 500-mile long distance hiking trail has grown to a federally designated National Scenic Trail more than 1,400 miles across the state of Florida, with volunteers from all over Florida seeing to its maintenance, expansion, protection, and promotion. Our goal is to establish a continuous wilderness corridor in which our footpath enables hikers to enjoy Florida’s natural habitats. After 40 years, nearly 1,000 miles of “Florida’s Footpath Forever” lies within a protected corridor, connected by orange blazes along back roads where we have not yet been able to protect the corridor.
If you love Florida’s outdoors as we do, please join us in making this goal a reality!
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Florida's Own National Scenic Trail
 Our 27-minute documentary, The Florida Trail: Florida's Own National Scenic Trail debuted on PBS affiliate WMFE-TV in Orlando on May 27 and can be seen on their cable channels on an ongoing basis. It is also airing on SGTV, Seminole County Government Television.
Produced by Seidler Productions under the direction of the Florida Trail Association and the USDA Forest Service, this program is available to public and community television outlets for broadcast. Please contact us for details. A retail version will be available by mid-October.
PREVIEW a SEGMENT on YouTube!
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