Matanzas River

Unlike most rivers, the Matanzas does not flow in just one direction. It is a tidally influenced waterbody that connects two ocean inlets- one at the port city of St. Augustine, and the other fourteen miles south (as the crow flies) at Fort Matanzas National Monument. Depending on if the tide is outgoing or incoming, the river may be full to its banks and flowing inland, or exposing lots of shoreline and streaming towards the sea.

All told the river is nearly 23 miles long, and on its course between the inlets it forms the western boundary of Anastasia Island, a classic east coast barrier island. The Matanzas technically runs for another seven miles or so south of the southern inlet until it melds with the Halifax River at about the Volusia County line.