Plenty of sand, and paths to it
Posted on August 31st, 2010
For a trio of Palmetto High bodyboarders, the path to the Gulf’s waves is through a 3-foot-wide access on Anna Maria Island. Crowded by vegetation, the path looks like it must be private because it squeezes between two houses. But it is actually the narrowest public access point in Southwest Florida.
After taking several runs at the water, Greg Hillabrand, a Palmetto senior, notes, “Today, the waves aren’t much.”
Still, he and his friends, who say they have been using this path their whole lives, have this secluded part of the beach practically to themselves, sharing it only with a fisherman from Lakeland.
Between the north tip of Anna Maria Island and the mouth of Charlotte Harbor there are 121 spots where the public can legally cross the land between the beachfront road and the water, according to Stephen Holland, a University of Florida professor who spent much of the last year mapping accesses from the Panhandle to Southwest Florida.
That is up from the 94 that Holland found when he conducted a similar study 15 years ago and mapped all of the state’s access points.
Choose a data set to see beach access points in a county…
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