There really IS a Christmas in Florida, and its zip code is 32709.
Many people stop at its post office just to send mail with a Christmas postmark. But for visitors from South Florida, there’s much more.
Christmas is a living history lesson, with a real fort, “soldiers” and their “wives,” and a flurry of daily life as it was lived in older times.
Busy days are filled with chores such as broom making, tending animals, cane grinding, cooking over campfires and minding the cow camp.
It began Dec. 25, 1837, when 2,000 American soldiers marched with their muskets into the wilderness and built a base they named Fort Christmas. The Seminole wars of that era died away, but the settlement remains to this day.
Located between Orlando and Titusville, Christmas includes a unique county park to see in a weekend or to add to a vacation at one of Orlando’s theme parks or the Space Coast.
The Fort Christmas Historical Park is open all year. Its many lively events include militia re-enactments each spring and fall. Descendants of early homesteaders come for a reunion every January, and the area’s agriculture is honored with an AgFest, with a barbecue and bake-off, in October.
A Cracker Christmas, a festival held Dec. 3-4, features Santa Claus and demonstrations of pioneer skills. Community groups sell hot dogs, sweet pickles, gator bites and home-baked goodies. Post office personnel will be there, too, in a special booth where they’ll hand-stamp your holiday letters with a Christmas postmark.
In the park, visitors step into a time machine and enter the Florida Cracker era of the 1860s to the 1930s. Start by viewing a short film on the Seminole war era; it plays every half hour. The fort replica is full size, built about a mile from the original site. Its seven homes once belonged to settlers who raised citrus, cut timber, made turpentine, farmed or ran cattle. The structures were moved to the park, renovated and furnished in authentic period pieces.
See Union School, built in 1906, and the school Lunch Room, added in the 1930s. With an indoor place to eat, students were served a hot lunch prepared by a hired man whose meals are still remembered fondly.
The park’s cow camps show how these shelters and corrals evolved from the 1860s, a time when scrub cattle were an important food source for soldiers, into the 1930s.
Bring a picnic lunch or reserve one of the park’s pavilions for a larger group. The playground has swings, a slide, a jungle gym resembling a fort, a special area for small children, plus a basketball court, tennis court and baseball field.
The massive St. Johns Wildlife Refuge nearby is closed to the public at this time but its wildlife population ranges far beyond its borders.
Orlando Wetlands Park nearby is open year-round and is home to river otters, raccoons, white-tailed deer and bobcats. The park has an education center, restrooms, picnic tables and more than 20 miles of hiking trails. Tram tours run on most weekends.
The waters of this region’s lakes and marshes are a winter home for many waterfowl, including blue-winged and green-winged teal, common moorhens and American coots.
If You Go
Christmas is 25 minutes from Titusville, one hour east of Walt Disney World, and 40 minutes from Port Canaveral.
Fort Christmas Historical Park is on County Road 420, off State Road 50. Admission is free. The site is open daily except Mondays and holidays. The fort and pioneer homes close at 4 p.m., but the park is open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. in summer and until 6 p.m. in winter. 407-254-9312, nbbd.com/godo/FortChristmas/ or orangecountyfl.net/CultureParks/Parks.aspx?m=dtlvw&d=15
Orlando Wetlands Park, 407-568-1706 or cityoforlando.net/wetlands/
Where to stay
Many popular chain motels are located in the Titusville area and along I-95. The Christmas RV Park has campsites. 407-568-5207, christmasrvpark.com.
Janet Groene is a Florida travelwriter who holds a Gold Award for travel writing from Parenting Publications of America.
