Fort De Soto State Park, St. Petersburg, Florida

Fort De Soto Park near St. Petersburg and Clearwater, Florida is a good beach day trip from Orlando. It took us about 2 hours to drive from near Disney until we stepped onto the beach. A good plus to this drive is even though it is a longer drive then it is to the Atlantic Beaches like Cocoa, there were definitely less tolls. We paid a 50 cent toll, a 75 cent toll and then a $5 entrance fee to the park. So fees were cheap. We even brought our own lunch and snacks to save. There was a convenient snack bar as well as beach chair,umbrella,kayak and bike rentals in case you are traveling from further away.


When we pulled in we decided to first head to North Beach. There was a snack bar located here as well as chair and umbrella rentals which was nice. Umbrellas were $12 ,chairs $6, and a combo with an umbrella and two chairs was $19.95. We ate our packed hoagies from wawa at the convenient picnic tables in the shade by the snack bar. Nearby bathrooms and showers was also a great amenity.

As we made our way closer to the beach, there were informational signs about all the wildlife in the area. There was information on whales, sea turtles, dolphins,birds and more! We had been warned about there being stingrays in the area when we arrived, so we made sure to do the 'sting ray shuffle' and shuffled our feet across the sand as we walked in the ocean. We didn't see any, but better safe then sorry.















After we swam in the ocean and took a walk up the beach, we ran into an area where we could not walk any further due to there being trees and roots right on the water. At this point, we turned around and went back to our chairs to relax for a while. After we had enough of the sun, we packed up and headed back to the car to check out the fort. There was another snack bar, a gift shop, and some picnic tables here as well. The Fort did not have much, but did have a great view of the beach and water from the top! By this point in the day the humidity was rising and the sun was getting hotter so we wanted to go swimming again. This time we headed to the east beach. When we pulled up we noticed less cars were at this beach which seemed like a good sign, until we saw the water. On the day we went this beach had rockier shores and a lot of seaweed floating on the water and on the shore. There were bathrooms, grills and shaded picnic tables here as well, so maybe depending on the day check out this spot.

We were still wanting to swim so we headed back to North Beach, this time to another little area on the other side of the trees on the shore we could not walk around. We went straight in the water to cool off, then went for a walk to the end of the beach to look at the boats heading off to the nearby sandbar.

When we were finished with our day, we changed into dry clothes and cleaned off in the nearby showers.