Weeki Wachee used to be a city. Not a big one — for most of its life, it was one of the smallest incorporated cities in the entire country, and its mayor was a working mermaid.
The city was chartered in 1966 for one purpose: getting the name onto maps and street signs to help pull visitors toward the springs attraction. It worked as a piece of marketing, technically, for over fifty years. By the 2020 census it had all of 16 residents, and its general manager — Robyn Anderson, who managed the mermaid attraction itself — also held the office of mayor. With finances and services stretched thin for a population that size, State Rep. Blaise Ingoglia sponsored the bill that dissolved it, and Governor Ron DeSantis signed it into law in June 2020. It’s an unincorporated community again now, same as everywhere else in the county.
None of that changed what’s actually here, which is still the reason people drive out.
The park the town was built around
Weeki Wachee Springs State Park is still running the same underwater mermaid show it started in 1947, nearly eight decades on. It’s the single reason a town of sixteen people once had its own mayor.
The water park half of the property, Buccaneer Bay, has been mid-renovation on its kiddie area — trading it for a full-size slide and an enclosed flume. The rest of the park has stayed open through the work.
Six miles of clear water
The Weeki Wachee River runs six spring-fed miles from the springs out to the Gulf, clear enough to see the bottom the whole way. Weeki Fresh Water Adventures is the only outfitter actually on the river at the springs, handling put-ins for kayaks and paddleboards.
Good to know
Weeki Wachee sits on Hernando County’s Gulf Coast side, south of Spring Hill along US-19. It is no longer an incorporated city — there’s no city hall or mayor’s office to visit, just the state park, the river, and the unincorporated community around them.
For the county seat a short drive northeast, there’s the Brooksville guide, and for what’s on this weekend, the full county guide.