Seaplane from Miami to Pompano Beach

About eleven minutes in the air. Pompano Beach lies roughly 33 statute miles up the coast from downtown Miami, just under 29 nautical. The whole of that is flown over water.

The exact block time depends on the aircraft and on which departure point you leave from, so it is confirmed with the boarding time before you book. What sets the length of the day is not the flight. It is how long the aircraft waits for you at the far end.

Often, yes. The Hillsboro Inlet joins the Atlantic to the Intracoastal at the north end of this stretch and the charter fleet keeps its berths here. Send the coordinates with the enquiry and the pilots decide whether they can put down there. Full names go in when you book, because a float aircraft is payload limited and the operator runs people, bags and fuel through a single calculation.

On protected water agreed with the operator, or at the airpark on floats with wheels. The coast here has the Hillsboro Inlet at its north end joining the Atlantic to the Intracoastal Waterway, so there is sheltered water behind the beach.

The inlet itself is narrowed by rock on both sides and the ebb runs hard through the cut, which is why the set-down point is fixed in your itinerary rather than left to the morning. You are told where you are landing before anything is due.

Yes, on an amphibious aircraft. Pompano Beach Airpark has three paved runways, the longest 4,918 feet by 150, so a wheels arrival is a real option rather than a compromise. Wind and sea state decide which of the two makes sense on your morning and the call belongs to the operator. If the honest answer for your date is the runway, you hear it when the quote comes back, not at the slip.

Yes and it is the most common way parties do it. Eleven minutes up, the afternoon on the beach or in the water, home before dark, with the aircraft waiting rather than turning around. The only fixed edge on the day is daylight. That makes it one of the easiest days we fly to arrange at short notice.

A seaplane needs daylight on the water. Landings run from 30 minutes after sunrise to 30 minutes before sunset, so the day has a hard end rather than an open one. Nothing closes before the light does. The window moves through the year, which is why the latest departure for your date comes with the quote. A return arriving after dark lands on a lit runway instead of on water.

Up to nine. The aircraft is chartered whole rather than sold by the seat, so your party travels together on one booking and comes home on the same aircraft. How many seats are usable on your date depends on the payload once baggage is aboard, so it is confirmed with the quote rather than promised in advance. Send the headcount and say whether children are travelling.

Dive kit, rods and hard cases all travel regularly, within the payload for the aircraft on the day. The limit is a weight rather than a bag count, which is why bulky equipment is declared when you book rather than weighed at the dock: it comes out of the same payload the passengers do.

On a hop this short that is usually the only real constraint on the day, so it is worth being exact about it.

Water operations depend on wind and sea state as well as visibility, so a departure can move on a day that looks clear from the beach. Summer afternoons move return legs more often than mornings do.

On this route there is a second answer that an island crossing does not have: an amphibious aircraft can use the airpark runway when the water will not take it. The call belongs to the operator and you are told before you book how a moved departure is handled.

It depends entirely on the road. The drive is 36 miles and about 48 minutes with a clear run. That is the number the map gives you rather than the one the afternoon gives you. The flight is roughly eleven minutes over water with no traffic on it at all. Parties book it when the arrival time is the point: a boat sailing, a table held, a dive boat leaving the inlet.

Three miles of public beach, a reef about 400 feet offshore in around ten feet of water with a built snorkel trail on it. The Fisher Family Pier runs 896 feet out with the restaurants and shops of the Fishing Village at its foot.

North of that the Hillsboro Inlet carries the sportfishing fleet and the 1907 lighthouse above it. Say which of those the day is about and the ground arrangements come back with the quote.

Yes, if the day is planned around the boat rather than the flight. The Lady Luck is a 324 foot tanker sunk in July 2016 about a mile southeast of the Hillsboro Inlet, with the hull in around 120 feet of water and the top of her stack roughly 50 feet down.

That is a certified dive rather than a snorkel, so the shallow reef trail closer in is the version that works for a mixed party. Boats leave from inside the inlet, minutes from where you land.

A charter is priced as a whole aircraft, not per seat, so the number moves with three things: which aircraft flies your date, how many of you there are once bags are aboard and how long the aircraft waits for you. Tell us those and you get one all-in number, with the departure point, the boarding time and the hours at the far end it is based on, before anything is due.

Yes, pets travel in the cabin with you. The one thing we ask is that you tell us at the enquiry, with the type of animal and its weight, so the seating and the load plan are right from the start.