We woke up in Pensacola and hung out with the Topp family while they got ready for their day. The nanny came and we offered to watch the littlest one for a bit, but the nanny had her own schedule and decided to take her. Boo hoo!
We decided to make ourselves feel better by heading to the beach. It was a beautiful day and we started out at one of the Pensacola beaches near a hotel. We stayed for about an hour before deciding to explore further East down Santa Rosa Island.
Away from the hotels, the Gulf Islands National Seashore is a nature reserve with incredible beaches. It would be a great place for road biking since there is a strict 25 mph speed limit for cars. We stopped at Beach 32 and thought it was the most beautiful beach of the trip. The picture below doesn’t do it justice but the water was crystal clear, perfect temperature and the sand was a fine, sugar-like consistency.
After a beach morning, we stopped at the Shark Bite food truck, which had a lot of good Yelp reviews. We were too late for the breakfast menu but the lunch offerings were pretty good. I had the Jerk Pork tacos while SMS had the Shrimp and Chorizo. I would definitely recommend this place- the daily lunch specials also sounded delicious.
After a quick stop at Donut Hole Bakery in Ft. Walton beach where we picked up a slice of key lime pie, we continued on to Grayton Beach.
Grayton Beach was absolutely beautiful. We went down the street from our hotel for an early dinner/late snacks at Chiringo and then we went to the beach to watch the sunset.
After sunset, we headed back to the hotel. We were a little hungry so we went to AJ’s Grayton Beach, which was pretty terrible. The oysters were spoilt and the rest of the food was not great. A definite do-not recommend.