Big Pine Fishing Lodge & Campground

Big Pine Key RV Resort sits at mile marker 33, on the island where the Key deer live and four miles down the road from Bahia Honda. It is a fishing camp grown up into a resort, and the mix of places to sleep reflects that: full hookup RV sites on the canal and the water, restored Airstreams and luxury travel trailers if you did not bring your own, two-bedroom cottages that sleep up to six, and rustic tent sites for people who want the stars and nothing between them.

The centerpiece is a 25,000 gallon rooftop pool, which is a genuinely odd and wonderful thing to find at an RV park. Down at water level there is a boat ramp and boat slips, available to guests and to approved local charter captains, with trailer parking and ramp use included in the slip. The camp store opens at 7:00 am and stays open until 7:00, selling ice, snacks, frozen bait and firewood, and it is open to the public as well as to guests. Wi-Fi reaches the sites.

What you came for is outside the gate. The National Key Deer Refuge is on this island, and the deer wander the neighborhoods at dusk looking unbothered. Bahia Honda State Park and its beach are a short drive east. The backcountry flats and the reef are both reachable from the ramp, and in July the lobster mini-season brings a particular kind of visitor, for which you will need a recreational saltwater fishing licence and a lobster permit.

Practical notes. Check in for RV sites runs from 2:00 to 7:00 pm, and check out is 11:00 am. Pets are welcome at RV sites, leashed and well behaved, but not in the trailer rentals, the cottages or the rustic sites. And measure your rig: the main entry gate has a 13.2 foot clearance, so anything taller needs to come in through the alternate gate. Call ahead and they will walk you through it.