Travel: Beach time is all the time at St. George Island, Florida

ST. GEORGE ISLAND, Fla. — “It’s a beachy thing to do,” a beachcomber tells me. She picks up a seashell - a big one with a hole in the middle - and hangs it on a sand fence.

Dozens of seashells dangle from weathered wood fences constructed to help secure shoreline dunes. Looking for seashells, especially the imperfect, holey ones, is a common pastime here on St. George Island.

Shell collecting ranks high with other island-life traditions, like surf fishing and sand castle building. Beach-goers here eagerly anticipate sweet treats from Aunt Ebby’s Ice Cream Shop. Savoring Weber’s Donuts, iced with shell and fish decorations, is also a beachy thing to do.

St. George Island, located about 70 miles southwest of Tallahassee, connects with the Florida Panhandle via the four-mile Bryant Patton Memorial Bridge. The island, one mile across at its widest point, stretches 28 miles long.

The middle of the island holds a colorful collection of small stores, restaurants and houses. The Dr. Julian G. Bruce St. George Island State Park occupies the east portion. A maritime forest spreads across the west portion. Docks and private homes face Apalachicola Bay.

“There aren’t any shopping centers or movie theaters out here,” explains Sam Fortunas, yoga instructor and owner of Island Fit, as she directs her paddleboard effortlessly around an inlet. “You come here to be outdoors. You come out here to kayak, paddleboard, boat, fish and hang out at the beach.”

The No. 1 beach in the United States

The light tan sand beach runs the length of the island. It is more than wide enough for long strolls even at high tide. The Gulf of Mexico takes it easy with the tide. No extreme body surfing here, just the calming sound of light waves lapping the shore. Stroked by soft, balmy air, the island keeps a lazy pace.

At the nearly-2,000-acre state park, families put up their brightly hued sun umbrellas early and stay all day. Fishermen try their luck casting from shore, but the sense is they aren’t that concerned about catching any fish.

“There’s just so many things that capture my imagination there. It’s an idyllic place,” Dr. Stephen Leatherman is quoted as saying about the beach at the state park.

Leatherman, a professor at Florida International University, produces the famed Dr. Beach’s Top 10 Beaches list annually. For 2023-24, he rated the state park’s nine miles of beach as the No. 1 beach in the United States. In discussing his rating, Leatherman talked of the sugary fine sand, crystal clear water and the “get-away-from-it-all” feeling of remoteness the beach provides.

The 72-foot Cape St. George Light presides over the central island area. In a museum next to the lighthouse, visitors learn how the structure has been rebuilt three times, the last construction coming after a tenacious community preservation effort following the collapse of the previous beacon in 2005. More than 22,000 bricks from that structure were used in the new lighthouse. The reward for climbing the 92 wooden steps to the top is a 360-degree view of the island and bridge from the mainland. Visitors will not see any high-rise hotels. The island has a long-standing building code to keep the skyline uncluttered. Far from the big-city lights, the night sky is filled with thousands of stars.

The 1,200-acre St. George Plantation, a gated community, dominates the island’s west end. Leisure Lane, the main thoroughfare, winds through a pine and oak forest edged on the ocean side by five miles of pristine beach. About half of the 500 single-family homes serve as vacation rentals.

Since 1954, St. George Island has ended at the Bob Sikes Cut. A dredged channel split the island into two parts, giving boats quicker access to and from Apalachicola Bay. Fishing boats navigate through the Cut in quest of redfish, sea trout and the like. Enterprises like Fortunas Family Charters and St. George Island Charters offer boating and fishing trips.

The sliced-off western portion of land, now known as Little St. George Island, is uninhabited except for a thriving population of gulls, terns and other shorebirds. Brown pelicans sweep up and down the channel. Ospreys and bald eagles claim trees for nesting. Shell seekers and nature lovers enjoy the natural beauty of this unspoiled place.

Humble beginning

“People like to say we are like Key West and the Outer Banks used to be many decades ago,” says Alice Collins, a leading realtor who has done business on St. George Island for 50 years.

Collins remembers crossing the bay on a ferry that held nine vehicles in 1973 when her family became the 20th family to reside on the island. Through the years, the island retained its simple, Old Florida ways. People built unpretentious beach cottages. They sought a quiet atmosphere where they could relax and have a good time.

“They used to have dune buggy races on the beach,” Collins recalls.

She founded Collins Vacation Rentals, which today operates 270 properties on the island. Luxury homes carry price tags well into the millions. Rental prices can range as high as $20,000 a week and require booking a year in advance. Celebrities like Kid Rock, Faith Hill and Hank Williams Jr. come to visit, some flying into the small island airport.

“You may walk into the bar and be next to the CEO of a billion-dollar company,” she says, “but you’d never know it.”

All about the oysters

Apalachicola Bay, which separates St. George Island from the mainland, was once considered the world capital of oyster fishing. Oysters keep a high place on the menu of the half-dozen seafood restaurants here. Mango Mike’s has at least nine varieties of oysters on the half shell, including a smoked barbecue-with-bacon version. Paddy’s Raw Bar offers an oyster specialty called the Kitchen Sink that features red and green peppers, bacon, onions, jalapenos and parmesan cheese. The Blue Parrot Oceanfront Cafe, which started out as a hot dog place on the beach in the 1980s, has an extensive seafood menu that includes fried oysters. Even the Beach Pit, focused mainly on delicious barbecue, has at least four versions of oysters on the half shell.

The restaurants here are casual with outdoor and indoor seating. Flip flops, shorts and tee shirts are suitable attire. After all, it’s a beachy thing to do.

Linda Lange and Steve Ahillen are travel writers living in Knoxville, Tenn.