Cooley's Landing

We decided to ride close to home and enjoy some of our neighborhoods. Sailboat Bend is the only neighborhood designated as a historic district in Fort Lauderdale. It has charming old homes that have been restored and a lovely little port called Cooley’s Landing. We'll write and show more of Sailboat Bend in another post.

Part of Ft. Lauderdale city marinas, Cooley's Landing is a Historic site named for one of Fort Lauderdale's founding fathers and located on the New River with boat ramps and docks. It’s beautiful lush park-like setting attracts people who want to enjoy being outdoors and benefit from a beautiful day as well as the live-aboard boat community and visiting boaters. Many of the boat owners were just lounging on their boats with a book or the paper enjoying the sun.

There is a Memorial in remembrance of Cooley’s Massacre. This monument marks the site of the William Cooley plantation. Cooley arrived here in 1824 and soon became the leader of the small settlement that grew along the New River.

On January 6, 1836, local Indians attacked Cooley’s homestead, killing his family and children’s tutor. This marked the beginning of the Second Seminole War in South Florida and led to the founding of the military post, Fort Lauderdale, in 1838.


Here are some interesting links.
The architect of Cooley’s Landing has a page here, (didn’t know it was a million dollar project) http://cpzarchitects.com/gv_Project-04.php
The boat Calypso docks in Cooley’s Landing and writes about it: http://www.sailcalypso.com/ftlauderdale.html
A boating couple write in their blog: http://favorsgreatlooptrip.blogspot.com/2006/02/fort-lauderdale-216-2006.html


Near the picnic pavilion is a palm tree with the largest trunk that we have seen anywhere. This tree has to be many years old. It would take two people to reach around it. We thought about asking a couple of people to do it, but we didn't want to take them away from their peaceful time.