Do beaches around Central FL have “seasons”?

[drive carephilly]

Even though we're technically subtropical we still have a pronounced tropical/monsoon weather pattern with a wet season that runs from May through October (roughly lining up with hurricane season). It's hot and humid and the high temps are typically in the upper 80s to mid 90s with heat indices from 90 to 115.

Then we have a dry season that runs from November through April where we get a lot less rain, heat indices are low to non-existent, and temps are much more variable. We can see high temps from the low to mid-80s in mid-November to the mid-50s in January.

This can vary by a few weeks from year-to-year in part because it's heavily influenced by the El Nino/La Nina cycle but that's more or less the gist of it.

[Lillie767]

Originally Posted by tonyp22

I’m asking specifically about the restaurants, shops, and such. In beach towns going further North in the country, come the end of September (or earlier depending how far up the coast you go) a lot of the shore shops and restaurants close up until the start of the next beach season. I haven’t yet gotten out to New Smyrna or Daytona, but is there anything equivalent to that here? I can see some folks just loving the heat and water temps right in the middle of the summer, and the snowbirds come down for the winter and spring so just the additional tourism would be enough reason for places to stay open. Seems like there’d never really be on “off season”. Am I off base on this?

Nothing closes in the Tampa Bay area. It's year round "fun".

[kyle19125]

Originally Posted by Lillie767

Nothing closes in the Tampa Bay area. It's year round "fun".

In some areas, restaurants go to limited days/hours. Indian Rocks Beach I know as one example.

[StephanieAnne]

We live near Orlando & go to the beaches on the east & west coast year round. I have never noticed that the businesses close to the degree of impacting our visit. In fact, winter is probably the busiest time for St. Augustine area because the the festival of lights. I highly recommend staying in a nice B&B in the historic district & take a boat cruise to see the lights from the water. The shops & restaurants stay open late. New Smyrna & Cocoa Beaches have a lot of fall & winter festivals, art shows, wine walks etc. Clearwater/St. Pete area seems busy any time of year but the hotel prices in all of these locations tend to dip a bit in the fall when kids are in school. I think places like Sarasota and Naples have a distinct "season" where hotel rates are high from Feb.-early May due to the influx of snow birds. We just went to Naples a couple of weeks ago during "low" season. Some of the restaurants closed early but there were PLENTY of restaurants & stores that were open late.

The temperatures can vary widely in the winter. Sometimes it's warm enough to swim on Christmas Day & sometimes it's in the 40's. It's kind of like California temperatures in the winter here. Cool water and chilly evenings, warm days. IMO, October is the best month for the beach!

New Smyrna Beach festivals: https://visitnsbfl.com/events

Cocoa festivals: https://www.visitspacecoast.com/events

Clearwater/St. Pete beach festivals: https://www.visitstpeteclearwater.co...~~Featured~1~~

St. Augustine festivals: https://www.visitstaugustine.com/events/festivals

If you come down in the winter, be sure to check out some things that are uniquely Florida. For example, the manatees normally migrate to the springs (which remain about 72 during the winter) and you can kayak or paddleboard or even see them from the shore. Blue Springs park is about 30 mins from New Smyrna and they go there or Crystal River/Homosassa on the west coast. In the Cocoa Beach area you can join a kayaking tour to see the comb jellies that light up at night. Scroll down to see the comb jelly tour:

https://www.adayawaykayaktours.com/w...xoCMwcQAvD_BwE

New Smyrna beach is pretty tiny if you are trying to keep kids occupied but charming in a small town way. During the winter, we usually like to stay at the Hammock Beach resort in Palm Coast (not far from Marine Land & St. Augustine) or a historic B&B in downtown St. Augustine. We also enjoy the Hilton or Wyndham or Marriott hotels in Clearwater, the Sirata or Tradewinds in St. Pete, Amelia Island or Sawgrass Marriott (Marriott not on beach but has a beach shuttle) in the Jacksonville area. In New Smyrna there are mainly condos but there's a Springhill suites right on the beach and main street. There's also a big Hilton on the beach in Daytona that's in the middle of everything (not a big fan of Daytona). I hope this helps.

[tonyp22]

StephanieAnne, thanks so much for all the great insights!

[MOforthewin]

Originally Posted by HeartofFlorida

Certain businesses shut down in the Panama City in the colder months, especially restaurants that rely heavily on tourist dollars. It was like being in the twilight zone, LOL. I didn't think there was such a thing as "seasonal" in Florida until I experienced it for myself.

Yep. Makes sense. The winter it's too cold on many days to even walk the beach up there.

Even here in Southwest Florida there are a few days with highs in the upper 50s when you can't do much at the beach.

I hardly see anyone in the water in the winter here in SWFL unless it's during the spell where water temps are way above normal.

FL Panhandle it's too cold on a number of days to do outdoors stuff without wearing a heavy jacket unlike here in Southwest Florida. Hence we get slammed in the winter.

It seems hernando County on over to Orlando is the dividing line. North of that the climate of FL is colder.

Even late March and early April I see hardly anyone in the water at the beach down here.

Not until the last couple weeks of April do I see a lot of people in the water here in Charlotte COunty.

It varies each year though due to the temperatures but beach season where I would swim would be the last two weeks of April thru the third week of Oct.