Southeast Florida—the magic tip of the Florida peninsula. Charles Feil offers it to you from a bird’s-eye view, or rather, the view from his little gyroplane, Rooty Kazooty, as he buzzes over the beach, the cities, the Everglades, and the ever-shimmering waters of the Atlantic and its bays and inlets.

The tour begins in—where else—Miami, and includes Miami Beach, Coral Gables, Coconut Grove, Vizcaya, Biscayne Bay, and all the wonders of this unique region. On we go, south to Florida City and Homestead and the farmlands to their west. Then we swoop over the mostly uninhabited Everglades, that huge slow-moving river of grass that extends all the way to the west coast. Here we see fires, and airboats, and sunsets, and the homes and villages of the Seminoles and Miccosukees.

We fly north to Broward County with its main city, Ft. Lauderdale. We gaze at huge ships navigating the Hillsborough Inlet and then zip over to the beach where “spring break” originated and soar all along the coast of Broward and Palm Beach Counties. We encounter the contrasts of plush Palm Beach and more urban West Palm Beach and the Mediterranean sophistication of Boca Raton.

All along the way, thanks to Kevin McCarthy’s succinct text, you’ll learn fascinating facts about what you are seeing.

So hop aboard Rooty Kazooty and let’s zoom over southeast Florida.

Even from above, southeast Florida—with its mixture of beaches, resorts, farmland, wildlife preserves, and urban enclaves—offers its own unique rhythm, part slow old Florida, part trendy new Florida, all with a background saucy Latin beat.