
Florida embraces a total area of 58,577 square miles, of which 54,153 are land and 4,424 are water, including over 166 rivers and more than 30,000 lakes. It is situated between the 31st and 24th parallels north and between the 79th and 87th meridians west. The highest sections are from Orlando south to Sebring, where elevations vary from less than 40 feet above sea level to 325 feet at the summit of Iron Mountain near Lake Wales and in the area near DeFuniak Springs in the northwest where elevations reach 345 feet at Lakewood. The northern part is approximately 385 miles wide from the Atlantic Ocean on the east, west to the Perdido River. From Jacksonville to Key West, the distance is 507 miles, and from Pensacola to Key West, 832 miles. Tidal shoreline totals 2,276 miles.
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The southernmost point in Florida lies some 600 miles south of California's southern border. The southern tip is 1,700 miles from the equator, closer than any other part of the continental United States. Jacksonville is 837 miles west of the northeastern shore of Maine and nearly due south of Cleveland, Ohio. A line drawn south from Miami almost bisects the Panama Canal, and virtually all of South America lies east of that line. The state is in the Eastern Standard Time Zone except the area west of the Apalachicola River which is in the Central Standard Time Zone.
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