The exhibits at Cedar Point include a tactile map of the area.
NPS Photo
Along your journey in the Cedar Point area, you might encounter wayside exhibit signs that may describe:
Where you are
Wildlife information
Historic and cultural information
Safety messages
Local information
Several of these wayside exhibits have been audio described and added to our website as audio files, so you may enjoy them as you travel. Please download these audio files before you begin your trip, since cell phone service and internet access can be limited in many locations.
Sifting through the Past
An audio description of the exhibit titled Sifting through the Past.
What can you learn from broken pottery, brass ornaments, and strings of beads made from shell and bone? At Cedar Point, archeological finds like these tell us that people have been here at least 4,000 years.
When Europeans arrived in the 1500s, people living here spoke a dialect of the Timucua language. They fished, hunted, and gathered oysters to sustain village life
In 1684, Spanish priests and about 300 Christian converts from Timucua-speaking tribes relocated their mission village from a nearby island to Cedar Point. Caught between England and Spain for control of the Atlantic coast, the mission at Cedar Point lasted only 12 years before relocating again.
Fun Times at Fish Camp
Audio description of the exhibit Fun Times at Fish Camp located at the end of the parking lot near the water.
Let’s go fishing! Today you can bring fishing equipment and launch your own boat at the boat ramp nearby. Whatever you catch, you’ll have to gut, clean, and cook yourself.
Way back when, Buddy’s Fish Camp would do all this for you. Buddy’s would rent you the boat, sell you slimy live bait, clean your fish, and then fry it up just right. Relaxed and well-fed, you could spend the night in a rustic cabin, then get up the next morning and do it all over again.
Buddy’s Fish Camp lasted from the 1920s to the 1990s, but “fish camp culture” lives on. People still flood Florida’s coastlines to fish. Favorite catches include flounder, sheephead, black drum, croaker, and redfish. Help protect the fun of fish camp for future generations.
Labels: redfish, croaker, black drum, flounder, sheephear
A Day at Cedar Point
Audio description for the A Day at Cedar Point panel located at the boat ramp and restrooms.
Cedar Point offers both modern recreational opportunities and compelling glimpses of the past. Trails lead from sunny pinelands through maritime forests to saltwater marshes. Each is rich with its own natural bounty. Look for hawks, turtles, and other wildlife as you venture out on our trails.
Archeological research on ancient shell middens here confirms that this lush world has supported people—and shellfish—for thousands of years. Ruins of an 1800s plantation reveal commercial exploitation, while also evoking the courage of ordinary lives and the painful legacy of human bondage. Today, fishing, boating, hiking, photography, and more await you in this protected environment.
Protect YourSelf and the Park
Use insect repellent, wear sunscreen, and be cautious when walking along trails and near wetlands.
Carry drinking water. Take along a cell phone if available. In case of emergency call 911 or park staff at 904-251-3537. Please report any unsafe conditions.
Pets must be on a leash at all times. Stay on marked trails.
Do not remove any cultural artifacts, plants, or animals. All are protected by Federal law.
Items left in vehicles should be out of sight and/or locked in a vehicle trunk.
Hello Maritime, Goodbye Pines
Audio description for the exhibit Hello Maritime, Goodbye Pines located along the trails in Cedar Point.
Something about the forest starts to change here—can you see the difference? Look to your left: pine trees. To your right: water oaks and cypresses. At this point on the trail, you are crossing between a sunny, open pine upland forest and a shady, moss-draped maritime hammock forest. As you near the water, another change will be very clear: you walk out of the maritime forest into the salt marsh
Pine uplands cover about half of all the land in Florida. Loblolly, slash, longleaf, and other pine trees tower above low-growing plants such as wax myrtle and saw palmetto. Gopher tortoises burrow into the sandy soil.
Maritime hammock forests are a dense tangle of water oaks, magnolias, and cabbage palms. These tall, broad-leaved hardwood trees and palms create a thick canopy above a green undergrowth of ferns, yaupon holly, and palmetto. Brilliantly colored indigo buntings feed on beauty berry and other shrubs.
Salt marshes are coastal wetlands where salt and fresh water mix. Grasses, rushes, and sedges grow in wet soils that get flooded twice a day with the tides. Hundreds of animal species, from tiny fiddler crabs to large water birds, depend on the salt marsh for food and shelter.
Where will you go Today?
Audio description of the exhibit panel titled Where will you go Today? located at the end of the road parking lot trail head at Cedar Point.
The Cedar Point trail system offers a rare chance to explore native Florida ecosystems in a natural, undeveloped landscape only minutes from a major metropolitan area. As you hike, listen and watch for signs of wildlife all around you. These woods and marshes harbor high-flying ospreys and eagles, reclusive bobcats and white-tailed deer, noisy cricket frogs and treefrogs, and insects by the millions.
The Cedar Point Loop Trail takes you through maritime hammock with views of the salt marsh, as well as the ruins of an 1800s plantation.
The Pinelands Trail takes you through pine uplands to the marsh alongside Cedar Point/Pumpkin Hill Creek.
Beyond the Preserve’s western boundary is Pumpkin Hill Creek Preserve State Park, with trails connecting to the City of Jacksonville’s Cedar Point Preserve, Betz-Tiger Point Preserve, and other trails in the Timucuan Trail system.
Protect Yourself and the Park
Use insect repellent, wear sunscreen, and be cautious when walking along trails and near wetlands.
Carry drinking water. Take along a cell phone if available. In case of emergency call 911 or park staff at 904-251-3537. Please report any unsafe conditions.
Pets must be on a leash at all times. Stay on marked trails.
Do not remove any cultural artifacts, plants, or animals. All are protected by Federal law.
Items left in vehicles should be out of sight and/or locked in a vehicle trunk.
Lives Etched in Salt and Oyster Shells
Audio description of the exhibit at the Cedar Point plantation ruins.
The ruined walls before you once anchored a plantation whose owners supplied salt to the Confederacy in the Civil War. Enslaved people farmed and hunted the land, tended the household, and boiled tons of salt from seawater.
Though it seems remote today, this land was heavily farmed as early as 1783, when the King of Spain granted it to the Samuel Mills family. The Fitzpatrick family acquired it in 1795 and started salt operations, followed by the Browards around 1848. The land’s heritage of sustaining coastal people goes back thousands of years.
Archeologists have found artifacts that evoke the daily lives of enslaved people who toiled on coastal plantations.
Skilled workers held as slaves constructed the plantation’s main house, kitchen house, and outbuildings of “tabby”—a concrete-like mixture made of oyster shells.
Tools and Toys Who shaped and sharpened this fishhook? Who cleaned and cooked the fish? What enslaved child played with this cornhusk doll when her chores were done?
Tabby to Touch Please touch this reproduction tabby slab. Please do not touch the ruins, which are very fragile.
Partners in Preservation
Audio description for the exhibit Partners in Preservation located at the bridge crossing from the National Park property across to the City of Jacksonville Cedar Point Preserve.
You can explore more undeveloped, native Florida habitat just across the water from here. Although the landscape ahead of you is outside the Timucuan Preserve, it is protected by a partnership of supporters: City of Jacksonville, Florida State Parks, National Park Service, and Timucuan Parks Foundation.
Since 1999, these supporters have worked together to set aside and connect more than 80,000 acres of protected habitat along the Nassau and St. Johns rivers. This ambitious partnership supports miles of multi-use trails connecting federal, state, and municipal public lands across the region.
For hikers and other recreational visitors, these collaborative efforts improve quality-of-life and outdoor experiences. For wildlife, such long-term collaboration is, quite literally, a lifesaver: larger, less fragmented habitats help many wild Florida natives survive.
Protect Yourself and the Park
Use insect repellent, wear sunscreen, and be cautious when walking along trails and near wetlands.
Carry drinking water. Take along a cell phone if available. In case of emergency call 911 or park staff at 904-251-3537. Please report any unsafe conditions.
Pets must be on a leash at all times. Stay on marked trails.
Do not remove any cultural artifacts, plants, or animals. All are protected by Federal law.
Items left in vehicles should be out of sight and/or locked in a vehicle trunk.
