Hi guys,
Making vacation plans, have narrowed it down to the Emerald Coast area of FLA, or more specifically, somewhere between Pensacola and St Joe’s Peninsula.
What do you think of the area?
It’s just me and my wife and we’re looking for a quiet-ish locale with a couple nice restaurants and maybe a little recreation.
I see St. Joe supposedly has one of the country’s best beaches, but is it worth it to stay there?
If you can get on Tyndall AFB you can have 20 miles of perfect beaches pretty much to yourself. If not, avoid Panama City Beach if you want quiet, because it isn’t. Between the Air Force Base and St.Joe is pretty quiet if I remember correctly.
Hi seriousart. Me again.
Lessee. That area’s actually pretty nice, there’s tons of Touristy things and tons of just plain beaches. For example, between Destin and PCB is some golf courses, condos, and such, but it’s mostly nice beaches (or was the last time I was there). Destin is a pretty touristy town, but has some great beaches (Most of Ft. Walton does). Panama City Beach is usually full of college kids, but has some cool waterpark-type stuff to do.
The beaches are fantastic… but (I live in Florida) personally I find the entire Panhandle horrible, in terms of people/restaurants/bars etc…
We went there on vacation two years ago, and LOVED it. We stayed outside of Pensacola. However, our priorities were different than yours, we had a lot of little kids with us (it was a family reunion type thing) and it worked out so well for our group because there were so many family-friendly activities.
I found most places were crowded, but not overly so, but again, we were seeking out things that were kid-friendly so we probably hit more crowds than if we had been looking for adult things to do as a couple.
The beaches were fantastic. Another thing we really liked was a canoe/inner tube float down the local river, which doesn’t sound at all thrilling but it was relaxing to beat the band.
We started picking restaurants based on how SMALL their advertising was – the big ads for the big touristy places resulted in terrible restaurants, so our theory was that the little places that didn’t advertise would be more aimed toward locals, and this worked out well for us.
I would highly recommend the Destin / FWB / Navarre area. I lived in Fort Walton Beach for four years, and Okaloosa Island and the surrounding beaches are by far the most beautiful I’ve ever seen.
Okaloosa Island has become a bit more crowded in the intervening years, but it’s still relatively quiet. Also, you may want to venture down to Seaside (where the Truman Show was filmed). It’s a gorgeous little town as well.
Cape San Blas. It most likely has everything you’re looking for except maybe the restaurants. Good food can be found but not much other than of the seafood shack or small town variety.
I’d second the Destin area, Hwy 30-A. Great beaches, not overcrowded just not secluded, and good shopping and restaurants within a reasonable drive. You’d definitely go back.
Cape San Blas is my favorite beach and is the reason I moved to Tallahassee – so I could be closer to my favorite vacation spot. Without divulging my secrets (I don’t want TOO many people to fall in love and move there!), you can find restaurants in Apalachicola, east of CSB, and in Port St. Joe and Mexico Beach to the west. Expect little more than still wriggling fresh seafood. There’s not a lot of ambiance and you’ll probably eat with plastic and paper plates in most places… but I’ve never gotten bad seafood anywhere in the area. It’s all fresh.
Here’s a link for Mexico Beach – great access to the beaches at Tyndall AFB. Not much to do, unless you fish or jetski or love the beach. If this trip is about relaxing and getting away from it all, then this is the place for you. If you want to shop and wine and dine yourself and eat in fancy schmancy restaurants with hoity toity waiters… consider Ft. Walton/Destin. More developed in that part of the panhandle.
Also, I hear Gulf Shores Alabama is pretty nice.
Go over to Santa Rosa at Navarre (my former father-in-law lived right at the bridge) and enjoy. Beautiful beaches with very sparse crowds.