Arriving a day or more ahead of your cruise embarking from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida? A great place to get acclimatized is Dania Beach. Just a short distance from the Ft. Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, the Port Everglades cruise port and many hotels, Dania Beach gives cruisers a little bit of pre-tropical sun worship.
Dania Beach is located south of Ft. Lauderdale and north of Miami. Currently, the population is around 30,000. The fast growing community was just 20,000 strong in 2000. The area was originally settled in the 1880’s as the town of Modello and incorporated in 1904 (Broward County’s oldest city).
Along the way, Modello became Dania and in 1999 the name was changed to Dania Beach.
The fishing pier at Dania Beach is a popular spot for anglers. The pier is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Fishermen need to pay $3 per day to enter while those just doing some sightseeing need to pay $1 per day.
Go to the bottom of this article to watch a short HD Video of Dania Beach Pier.
At the base of the Dania Beach pier is a seafood restaurant. The current version of the pier was built in 1994.
Being from southern Ontario in Canada, we always get a chuckle out of foreign visitors taking pictures of common squirrels while one of the greatest natural spectacles in the world goes almost unnoticed just a few hundred feet away. Florida locals must get the same chuckle when us tourists gawk at Pelicans, taking picture after picture.
The pier at times has a higher population of these big birds than humans. You’ve got to admit, they are an exceptionally photogenic creature!
This innocent looking Pelican was actually harrassing an oriental lady to no end. She was trying to clean some tiny fish that she caught and the Pelican felt the he should have it.
A little long exposure photography of the pier. My variable range neutral density filter left some odd shadows on this image. I was a little concerned there would be blurring. I was getting sandblasted by the wind, sitting nearly beneath the pier. However, the tripod held up.
Another long exposure shot looking down the beach towards the pier. The portion of the pier to the far left is the restaurant.
Dania Beach is just a short distance from the Ft. Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport (FLL). This Allegiant Air MD-80 is just one of many aircraft that either take off or land over the Atlantic Ocean each day.
Looking north from the pier, the beach gets a little more naturalized and a lot less habitable for beach goers. In the background is a large cruise ship at Port Everglades.
Directly north of the pier is the cargo shipping port at Port Everglades.
Just a few of the several cargo ships just off shore.
