My earliest car trips to the Florida Keys were with my grandparents. Nearly every summer we drove down the warm, bright road that begins in Key Largo and winds up, a hundred and some miles and thirty-seven bridges later, in Key West. The Overseas Highway was a tacky stretch of tarmac even in those days. That's why we liked it. My grandfather, a sucker for roadside attractions, needed little urging to pull over the car and wonder at this or that small miracle. Tame barracuda. Turtle-shell treasure maps. Pirate booty.

Chain stores and condos have joined the scene since I was a girl. But the road through the Keys is still lined with gaudy attractions: mom-and-pop dive shops with pet pelicans named Hubert; gypsy wagons advertising palm-thatched tiki bars; souvenir stands selling canned sunshine and seashell ballerinas. There's plenty of raffish charm and wild beauty remaining in the Keys, if you go looking for it. But search you must, even if you've been there as often as I have. I've learned to go with a specific itinerary and also to leave room for aimless exploration--for turning down intriguing side streets. I love the Keys, partly for the sense that there will always be another layer to peel away.

During her most recent spring vacation, I took my 11-year-old daughter, Kate, on her first car trip to Key West. The Keys, I explained as we started, are a chain of 34 subtropical islands strung along the Overseas Highway like so many charms on a bracelet. In places, the land bracelet is barely wide enough to accommodate the road, and the natural beauty is overwhelming. Near the beginning, soon after the highway leaves the mainland, there's a stretch where the radiant expanse of sea and sky surrounds our car. To one side of the road, we see the indigo reach of the open Atlantic; to the other, the Gulf of Mexico gleams like polished turquoise.

In planning our trip, I have taken into account both the girl I used to be and the girl my daughter is now. On my behalf, we'll search out tacky roadside remnants of the old Florida Keys. For Kate's benefit, we'll investigate the fascinating world of marine creatures. We have in hand a precise list of places I expect to stop, annotated with the numbers of mile markers. (These small, green navigational signs begin at MM 126, just south of the mainland, and count down to MM 0, in Key West.) When we reach Key West, we'll meet up with friends from Massachusetts, then drive back to Miami, hitting whatever places we missed on the way down.

Ann Banks is the author of THE CHILDREN'S TRAVEL JOURNALwhich is published by The Little Book Room in New York, New York.

Please keep in mind that phone numbers, addresses, and prices are subject to change. Updated August 2005.