1,650 Acres of Quiet Retreat on Florida’s Hontoon Island

To reach this island, visitors need to paddle across the river or board a private boat.

Hontoon Island State Park sits right on the St. Johns River in Volusia County in Florida on Jan. 31, 2024. Patrick Connolly/Orlando Sentinel/TNS

By Patrick Connolly From Orlando Sentinel

ORLANDO, Fla.—If Hontoon Island’s tall pines and broad oaks could speak, they would have stories to tell of homesteaders and explorers who ventured to the island and made their homes along the St. Johns River centuries ago.