Charlotte Harbor Environmental Center - Punta Gorda, Florida

carlos garcia

Uno de los mejores parques que eh visitado.

Tamara Chik

Such an excellent place to hike and view wildlife. Many well maintained trails. An amazing alligator lookout and educational building. Clean bathrooms on site. Leashed dogs are welcome. An amazing butterfly garden to see and a native nursery. This place is the real Florida. Just bring bug spray and water and a camera for the amazing trails !

Wendy Carlson

Except for being super muddy due to lots of rain, what we did hike was nice. Waiting for dry season and heading back. Butterfly house was nice, volunteers were very informative. And found out there is an eaglett!! Met Charlotte

karen Gleeson

Very cool place. I would recommend bringing bug spray as the mosquitoes and Nats can be bad out on the trails by the water. The trails are very well marked and the scenery is beautiful. There are bathrooms and a screened picnic area for you to us. This is an educational preserve so there is alot of information available about the plants trees and animals that live here. It's also an alligator preserve so be mindful of your surroundings and follow the signs. It's so peaceful and relaxing to just walk along the trails and take in the beauty mother nature has to offer. It does get hot so bring water for yourself and your dog. Oh and good walking shoes are definitely the way to go . Put this place on your list ...I don't think you will be disappointed.

***I wanted to add that you should also bring your camera and sunglasses. Just a little reminder from the great staff of this natural wonderland.

Brad Loncar

Very primitive and very cool. If you get easily creeped out by rustling in the bushes while you walk around, then this is not the place for you. Everyone else will love it. I only had time to do the Eagle Point (red) Trail and it took about 30 min. They were doing work on a bridge to Three Lakes and Pine Flatwood and I don’t think it was possible to get to those trail heads, but this should be a temporary issue that others won’t face. Other bridges and areas were roped off in spots due to hurricane damage, but nothing bad. I’ll be back to do those trails and two others as well. They key here is they have fantastic signage on the trails with informative signs and many white posts with QR codes explaining the trees and plants (though I didn’t have great cell service inside with T-Mobile). And they have a good map and info page you can carry with you. Overall, fantastic educational facility.

Vince Cosentino

My lovely wife and I stopped in to walk one of the trails. We had previously took a very short walk only to the visitor center and vowed to return for a longer visit. Well the place is a nice walk on relatively easy trails. We took the yellow trail or the three lakes trail. First of all don't wear sandals, bad choice of footwear, ( there are mucky parts )and use a fair amount of bug spray. Long pants are recommended. As for the trails themselves, they are winding and relaxing which is nice because they are poorly marked and you will most likely end up wandering for longer than you expected. The map supplied is more or less worthless due to the lack of clear landmarks or points of references. I'm not putting the place down but for a small nature walk it can be a bit confusing... We will return but this time with our GPS trail guide.

Balloon Elevations

Nice, quiet walking trails not far from the Punta Gorda airport. While we only saw 1 turtle swimming in the distance it was still enjoyable and, we did see raccoon & bob cat prints on the trail. As others have stated it was muddy so be prepared.

Richard Maas

A local who had never been to this park found a pleasant surprise. I won't repeat other reviewers comments about wildlife, muddy trails, etc..it's all there. Repeat. Muddy. Entire trail system, contains trail markers and informational signage.Covers several miles and should satisfy most seeking a close up view of this type of ecosystem and habitat. Informational centers were closed during the weekend in January 2020.