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Only a few stretches of the Florida coast allow horses, and at most of them you ride with a guide.
Amelia Island State Park in Nassau County is one of the few beaches in the state where you can bring your own horse: call the ranger station first at 904-251-2320, and a Nassau County ordinance requires a manure catch bag on every horse. Guided rides also go out on Amelia Island, including from Peters Point Beachfront Park. In St. Lucie County, the beach at Frederick Douglass Memorial Park on Hutchinson Island at Fort Pierce takes riders who buy a county permit, and guided tours ride there as well. On the Panhandle, guides have been taking riders along the beach at Cape San Blas in Gulf County since 1995, at a walk, with no experience needed. In Flagler County, guided rides follow Flagler Beach at low tide.
Nassau County. There is almost nothing built here, which is the point of it. The park sits on State Road A1A about eight miles south of Fernandina Beach and seven miles north of Little Talbot Island, and the beach runs down to the inlet with no buildings behind it.
Open the guide →Nassau County. The southern tip of the island - over 200 acres of undeveloped sea island with nothing built behind the dune. One of the few beaches in Florida where you can ride your own horse on the sand; the ranger station handles the arrangements and Nassau County requires manure catch bags.
Open the guide →Nassau County. 4600 Peters Point Road, off South Fletcher Avenue. A large parking area, restrooms, indoor and outdoor showers, picnic tables and barbecues, and fishing is allowed. Four lifeguard towers are staffed from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
Open the guide →St. Lucie County. At 3600 South Ocean Drive, open dawn until dusk, and named after Frederick Douglass, the abolitionist, editor and author. Horseback riding is allowed on the beach here with a county permit.
Open the guide →Gulf County. A narrow peninsula about twenty minutes from Port St. Joe that runs out and then curves back around St. Joseph Bay, one of the least populated and richest coastal ecosystems in the state.
Open the guide →Flagler County. Six miles of beach through a town of 5,182 people. Lifeguards cover the stretch from North 9th Street to South 9th Street, 9:00am to 6:00pm, on weekends from October to May and every day between Memorial Day and Labor Day.
Open the guide →The white sand is on the northwest Gulf coast, in Walton, Okaloosa, Bay, Santa Rosa, Escambia and Gulf counties.
Siesta Beach on Siesta Key in Sarasota County is the one people name.
Two different answers, and the second one surprises people. On the coast, the clearest water is the Gulf off the Panhandle in calm summer weather, and the Keys - Bahia Honda, John Pennekamp and Dry Tortugas, where the water sits over sand and reef rather than river mud.
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