1 week west coast Florida suggestions

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an RV or an interest in RVing!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
See posts with no answers
O

ORPP2

Member
Joined
Apr 7, 2022
Posts
9
Location
UK
Hello everyone.

We are a British couple who have booked an rv through Cruise America from 6-13th March. We are picking up and dropping off the vehicle in Delray Beach and would like to see the west coast of Florida (from Sarasota North).

Our initial thoughts are
Delray to Okeechobee
Okeechobee to Sarasota
Day in Sarasota
Sarasota to Clearwater
Clearwater to Crystal River
Day around Crystal River
Crystal River over to east coast
Return rv

What do you think of the itinerary?
Any campsite recommendations, nothing is booked.

Many thanks in advance for your suggestions and assistance.

Sandra & Chris




, Can anyone please help us out with some suggestions for a route and places to stay.
 
Hi and welcome.

I'm sure some options will be forthcoming. Many members spend time in Florida.

It's snowbird season so that might limit your options a bit.
 
  • Like
Reactions: SMR
If you want to see the “real” Florida and not the tourist area, come visit the Panhandle west of Destin!
Pensacola has the most beautiful beaches that I have ever seen, the people are great, and there are many historical and nature areas just waiting to be enjoyed.
 
  • Like
Reactions: SMR
In Sarasota I would check out Myakka River State Park and the Ringling Museum.
I would get some reservations as soon as you can, Florida is "swamped " with tourists during your dates.

Enjoy your trip
This is a fun video
 
Last edited:
Dan_Frisbie said:
If you want to see the “real” Florida and not the tourist area, come visit the Panhandle west of Destin!
Pensacola has the most beautiful beaches that I have ever seen, the people are great, and there are many historical and nature areas just waiting to be enjoyed.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the suggestion. Might be a bit far for just one week?
 
SMR said:
In Sarasota I would check out Myakka River State Park and the Ringling Museum.
I would get some reservations as soon as you can, Florida is "swamped " with tourists during your dates.

Enjoy your trip
This is a fun video
Click to expand...
Thanks. I have started looking at places to stay. Is there an app or site that you would recommend when searching for availability?
 
Having been born and raised in Daytona Beach (left in 1975) I can say with some authority, stay away from DB. But, just down the road you can find a little place called Spruce Creek. Great place to kayak. I think you can still visit the Kennedy Space Center. Find a mom & pop seafood restaurant. One that looks like it might fall into the water at any minute. Singletons Seafood Shack comes to mind. 4728 Ocean Street, Jacksonville, Fl, 32233.
 
I think you will need to check with individual campgrounds to find reservations, Florida State Parks has its own reservation system and you can check several parks at once.
I would look at RVPARKY to help find campgrounds and plan the route.
If you go to Carabelle, Fl. check out the Ho Hum RV Park. Absolutely nothing to do at the park but relax, enjoy the gulf, sunsets and sunrises.
 
Also be aware mid March is prime spring break season according to google prime spring break weeks are the weeks of March 4th and March 11. This is when college students from across the entire US flock to the beaches of Florida, Texas and elsewhere by the millions.
 
That loop is about 700 miles and you would be doing it in 6-travel days. ~110 miles a day. Granted that's only two hours of highway travel but I wish you'd consider the time it takes to setup, tear down and all the minor delays that would chew up most days pretty completely, perhaps curtailing actually touring some of the locations. My fear is that you won't have enough time to enjoy.

If me, I'd do each stop as a two-nighter or find "the best few" from the list and save the remaining for another year.

No matter my issues, when you come I wish you fun in the sun!
 
Well, I would recommend one side of Tampa or the other. The Naples to Sarasota area, IMHO, some of the best of South Florida.

Crystal River is also beautiful.

Trying to do both areas, and really enjoy them in a week could be a bit taxing. Especially with the trip across the state each way. Traffic can be a bear, especially with Spring Break, going on.
BTW, A lot of families go off to play during Spring Break, too.
 
Thanks everyone. We have been thinking today that maybe we are trying to do too much in one week.

It's late here in the UK so we'll restart our plan tomorrow with fresh heads after a good night's sleep.
 
ORPP2 said:
Thanks everyone. We have been thinking today that maybe we are trying to do too much in one week.

It's late here in the UK so we'll restart our plan tomorrow with fresh heads after a good night's sleep.
Click to expand...
If you tell us your general goals on this trip, what are your interests, ie beaches, wild life, cultural, tourist stuff, etc. we might be able to make some suggestions of how and where to go to make the best use of your time. Also tell us if you are the type that like to move around a lot, or stay in the same place for 2-3 days, either way a week is not a lot of time. Keep in mind that Florida has about half the land area of Germany and is long and thin, with about 2/3 the population density of Germany, or about the size of England and Scotland combined, though much of Florida is relatively new construction as the population of Florida has increased nearly 10 fold since 1950 (2.75 million in 1950 to 21 million today), even though one of the oldest towns in the US (Saint Augustine found 1565) is in the state.
 
Between the spring college breaks and the normal winter "snowbird" influx, expect everything to be crowded and campsites in short supply. And your trip is only a couple weeks away.

You effectively lose two days of your rental week picking up & loading the motorhome and later returning it. Maybe combined with some driving time on those days, but it always takes longer than expected. So figure you have 5 days of fun-time. Try to spend it seeing & doing rather than driving, ala' Larsmac's & Isaac's suggestions.
 
We've re-thought our trip, followed advice and are now only considering 2 destinations. However, I've spent 2 days trying to find suitable accommodation and am waiting to hear back from one enquiry in Sarasota. The only space I could find in Tarpon Springs was very expensive and not in an ideal location to visit the sights

Right now, we are even thinking about cancelling the rv, and renting a car and hotels instead.

We are full-timers in our motorhome over here so are very used to sorting this kind of stuff out but I don't want to spoil our trip before it has even begun stressing out over this.

The reason for renting the rv is that we have our long-stay visas and would like to buy an RV in the USA and travel around and thought it would be useful to rent for a week to get a feel for the rv life there before we committed to purchasing one. However, we are being put off completely by this experience.

Thanks to everyone for your very helpful suggestions and advice. It has been very much appreciated.
 
ORPP2 said:
However, we are being put off completely by this experience.
Click to expand...
The only thing to be "put off" by is going at the peak, super busy time to an area that is usually in high demand until the summer heat arrives, and all done on short notice and for a very short time period. To gain more insight to RVing in the US Jackie and Tony can fill you in quite a bit, but time and distance (among other things) will be a bit unfamiliar to you (both are more than your experience apparently includes).

But welcome for whatever you decide to do.
 
Sorry if we've thrown a wrench into the works, there.
Spring Break is kind of a big thing in Florida. I used to live down there, and I got to where we would take off for northern climes during Spring Break.
Sarasota and points south will still be pretty nice this time of year though. Most of the younger types will be focused on the Party places, like Ft Lauderdale and Daytona, or Panama City.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Members online

Total: 1,278 (members: 24, guests: 1,254)

Forum statistics

Threads
132,008
Posts
1,389,028
Members
137,751
Latest member
Oldlawnman
Back
Top Bottom