2 Best Sights in The Florida Keys, Florida

When Key West was designated a U.S. port of entry in the early 1820s, a customhouse was established. Salvaged cargoes from ships wrecked on the reefs were brought here, setting the stage for Key West to become—for a time—the richest city in Florida. The imposing redbrick-and-terra-cotta Richardsonian Romanesque–style building became a museum and art gallery in 1999. Smaller galleries have long-term and changing exhibits about the history of Key West, including a Hemingway room and a permanent Henry Flagler exhibit that commemorates the arrival of Flagler's railroad in Key West in 1912.

This redbrick Civil War fort never saw a lick of action during the war. Today it serves as a museum, operated by the Key West Art & Historical Society, with exhibits about the 19th and 20th centuries, including relics from the USS Maine, cigar factory and shipwrecking displays, and a collection of Stanley Papio's "junk art" sculptures and Cuban folk artist Mario Sanchez's chiseled and painted wooden carvings of historic Key West street scenes. You can climb to the top of the citadel tower.