Nestled between Gulf Islands National Seashore and Navarre Beach Country Park, Navarre Beach, Florida is named among the best in the US, year after year. Its 20 km of pristine white shoreline is perfect for strolls, swimming, or enjoying scenic outdoor activities. We book in a cool condo for a week!
Good Morning, Navarre Beach!The first light leads us to the beach pier, and with $1 entry fee we’re in the game!The Navarre Beach pier’s claim to fame is being the longest fishing pier in Florida, stretching almost 500 m long and towering 9 m above the water.From up there it is easy to spot schools of fish, as these stingray out on a fishing trip.These guys also want those fish, but are not even remotely close to what the stingray seem to catch.The location draws not only fish. Anglers and photographers and wild life curious enough to be interested in us humans, like sea gulls, doves and mosquitos.Pelicans flying by in slow motion. These are h.u.g.eBeach from above.And here are the stingrays once more, they’re swimming past just underneath, how lucky.The deeper the water, the darker, they’re gliding in just 1 meter deep shore area.Wave patterns.More beach waves.Closed beach bar.Great blue heron sitting on a pole right above the walking path.And its footprints really are big o.OWave spitting up at a sandbank.Tracing someones footsteps.Building a sand castle (the ticks on the bucket list fly).The pier from afar.Pelican starting out of the water.Slipping over the dunes on a board walk.Sanderling, looking for lunch. Feeds on a wide variety of small creatures on beach, including sand crabs, amphipods, isopods, insects, marine worms, small mollusks.Resting in the white sand.The remarkable purity of Navarre Beach and the Florida panhandle sand is related to its geologic history. Like most all beaches along the East and Gulf coasts, the panhandle sands came from the wearing down of the Appalachian Mountains, which brought an array of different minerals to the shore. But unlike other coastal areas, the rivers stopped bringing any new sand for tens of thousands of years. During this long period of time, wave action has ground the particles down to size. Quartz, being the most resistant mineral commonly available on the face of the earth, is the only type of sand grain left as the other minerals were ground down to dust. Not being stable on the high energy beach, these fine-grained sediments were transported and deposited offshore. What we find on Navarre Beach and the panhandle beaches today is quartz sand crystal at its terminal size, meaning that all the grains are nearly the same size (well sorted in geologic terms).Looking down at the busy beach at sunset.Navarre sunsets, part 2.Part 3, atmospheric refraction sample.Happy Thanksgiving, peeps!We had a really big chicken stuffed with apples and yummy Austrian Semmelknoedel.
