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Anclote Key Preserve State Park

Photo: User:Trougnouf (Benoit Brummer) / CC BY 4.0 · source

🏖️ Beaches

Anclote Key Preserve State Park

Tarpon Springs, FL · Tampa Bay

About

A barrier island three miles off the Tarpon Springs sponge docks, reachable only by boat or ferry, with no road, no high-rise, and no provisions waiting on the other side. Miles of white sand run unraked along the Gulf, heaped with shells and backed by ten-foot dunes and an 1887 lighthouse on the southern tip; bald eagles and oystercatchers work the shallows while you do your own packing in and out. Bring water, claim a primitive campsite, and let the surf be the only thing you hear after the last ferry leaves.

Highlights

Getting there

Anclote Key, off Tarpon Springs (boat/ferry access only)

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Wild Florida Gulf Coast Beaches9 places

Wild Florida Gulf Coast Beaches

Florida's wildest Gulf beaches make you work for them: some you reach only by boat, others by a long walk past the last paved road. These are the undeveloped barrier islands and protected state-park shores with no resort strip and no high-rise wall, just sugar sand, dunes, shelling, and the kind of quiet you earn. Pack your own water and shade.