Highway A1A: Florida at the Edge

The story of Highway A1A--running north to south along 500 miles of famous Florida coastline--and its crucial role in the historic settlement and the future of a state adapting to 21st century demands. Highway A1A: Florida at the Edge is more than an insightful guide to the cities and towns along Florida's Atlantic coast. It is also the dramatic story of how tourism begat development, how development begat sprawl, and how this coastal corridor, almost out of the blue, created Florida's original year-round residential downtowns with the power to transform how Floridians live and how the world vacations in the Sunshine State. Highway A1A is anecdotal, authoritative, humorous, and wide-ranging. Passionately Floridian travel writer and tourism analyst Herbert Hiller offers a fuller and more balanced story about Florida's Atlantic coast than any other guidebook. Exploring towns from Callahan to Key West, Hiller covers Florida's 13 Atlantic counties, providing maps, historical and present-day photographs, and recommendations for places to visit, lodge, eat, and shop that are truly local in character. Whether you're a tourist or a roving Floridian looking for some diversion not far from home, Highway A1A will put you in touch with what makes the Atlantic coast special--its dynamic sites and sights.

Herbert Hiller has written for Atlantic Monthly, National Geographic Traveler, and Land and People. He is the author of Guide to the Small and Historic Lodgings of Florida, winner of a Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Award as best travel guidebook in America, and coauthor of Season of Innocence. He lives in Putnam County, Florida, and is at work on a new book about Florida downtowns, small towns, and the trails that connect them.