I’m so glad I got to the Florida panhandle when I did—just four months before Hurricane Michael would devastate the coastal towns and beaches I enjoyed so much.

I split my week on the panhandle between two locations: the Apalachicola area and the Pensacola area. First stop was a waterfront site at Presnell’s Bayside Marina & RV Resort in Port St. Joe. From this location I was able to visit some beautiful state park beaches and several lighthouses.

My waterfront site at Presnell’s RV Resort.

Locations of the points of interest I visited from my campground in Port St. Joe, FL.

St. Joseph Point Lighthouse is located right next door to the campground. It’s privately owned so I could only get photos from the street.

St. Joseph Point Lighthouse next to my campground.

St. Joseph Peninsula State Park is rated as one of the best state parks in the U.S. and one of the best beaches, as well. I would rate it as one of the least utilized.

St. Joseph Peninsula State Park.

St. George Island State Park is on the barrier island that creates Apalachicola Bay and boasts 9 miles of pristine beaches.

The access points to the beach are small trails through the dunes.

St. George Island State Park is another under utilized beach.

I brought a nice lunch with me and just I snapped a picture of it…

A couple seagulls swooped down and stole the entire sandwich off my plate—the bastards—and I went hungry.

This Great Blue Heron was much nicer and allowed me to get pretty close.

St. George Lighthouse can be seen as soon as you get across the bridge to the barrier island.

Camp Helen State Park required a very long (3/4 mile) walk on a trail consisting of deep, soft sand. It was quite a workout but the beach was gorgeous although there are no facilities there—you have to carry everything you need and there are no bathrooms. All I brought was my camera.

The 3/4 mile walk from the parking lot to the beach was exhausting.

The deep, soft sand was difficult to walk on, especially in flip flops.

This was, by far, the most beautiful sand I saw at any Florida beach.

The remnants of an old pier is like a dinosaur skeleton on the beach.

St. Andrews State Park was voted “America’s Best Beach” in 1995 but when I visited, there was very little beach to sit on.

The extremely narrow beach at St. Andrews State Park.

Cape San Blas Lighthouse is located in downtown Port St. Joe.

Cape San Blas Lighthouse.

Cape San Blas Lighthouse reflected in the pond.

Crooked River Lighthouse is located in Carrabelle, FL. It was memorable for me because I believe this is where I was bitten by chiggers while walking through the overgrown field in the foreground. Within a couple days, my legs had broken out with about 20 itching sores. At first, I thought they were mosquito bites but they didn’t go away, continued to get worse, and started to ooze.

Crooked River Lighthouse.

Just a few of the chigger bites I suffered. One even had a three inch red area around it.

I knew they weren’t mosquito bites when they started looking like this.

A week later, when I arrived in the back woods of Alabama, I was ready to seek out a walk-in medical clinic but a friend told me to put nail polish on them. It suffocated the chiggers that apparently burrow into your skin (gross!) and dried them up. That helped a lot but it still took a few weeks for them to completely cleared up.

My next stop was Navaree Beach Camping Resort in Navaree, just east of Pensacola. This campground had a mix of campsites and cute little beach bungalows for rent.

Adorable bungalows available at Navaree Beach Camping Resort.

The waterfront area of Navaree Beach Camping Resort.

When I arrived at this campground, I was greeted by a check-in committee. I didn’t need to leave the RV to check-in—something I’ve never experienced anywhere else. I did, however, have to unhitch the car at the entrance because the campground was very tight to maneuver through. The man who was assigned to help me get into my site offered to help me unhitch but I assured him I could handle it myself. Two minutes later, he was impressed and said he hadn’t seen any men do it as efficiently as I had.

Then he insisted on “helping” me get into my site. I followed him to it and backed in with one try. Again, he was impressed and said, “You’ve done this before, haven’t you?” Yeah, a couple times.

I got myself all set up and settled in then looked at my paperwork and noticed it wasn’t my credit card on the receipt. It turned out they had two Reeds checking in that day and they’d given me the wrong site. It was a premium site (read: more expensive) so I had to move…by myself.

I had to vacate this first site I was given by mistake and move to another part of the park.

I spent the next few days exploring Big Lagoon State Park, Perdido Key State Park, and Pensacola.

Locations of the points of interest I visited from my campground in Navaree, FL.

Big Lagoon State Park has a very small beach but is mostly known for bird watching in a 700 acre tidal marsh. There’s a boardwalk to get you across the wetlands to an observation tower. Along the boardwalk, I noticed people throwing raw chicken parts into the water. I can only imagine it was to attract alligators.

View of the boardwalk from the observation tower at Big Lagoon State Park.

People were throwing raw chicken parts into the shallow waters of the marsh, I assume to attract alligators.

At the western-most point in Florida is Perdido Key State Park, on the border with Alabama.

Perdido Key State Park. Just beyond the beachfront condos is the Alabama border.

Pensacola Lighthouse is on the grounds of the Naval Air Station—home of the Blue Angels—and I had to pass through the gate and explain to the very attractive MP (I love a man in uniform…especially a twenty-something in top physical condition…but I digress…) that I just wanted to photograph the lighthouse. They let anyone in but you must go directly to the lighthouse and back.

Unfortunately, he lighthouse is in a very tight location, making it hard to get good photos.

I had to pass through the gate at Pensacola Naval Air Station to get to the lighthouse.

Pensacola Lighthouse at the Naval Air Station.

As I wrapped up my visit to the Florida panhandle, a tropical storm was moving in so I headed away from the coast to Alabama.

My route from Ocala National Forest to Port St. Joe and then to Navaree, FL.

Upcoming post:

Moving inland to Alabama and Tennessee.

My name is Lindsay Reed and I’m a photographer and retired graphic artist with a passion for both lighthouses and road trips. I am living as a full-time solo RVer in my 31 foot Coachmen motorhome and plan to spend the next few years traveling the U.S. and Canada photographing not only lighthouses, but everything else there is to see in this wonderful land. I hope you enjoy my blog and will follow my adventures in the months and years ahead.