Fort Walton Beach

The weather forecasts suggested the wind would pick up overnight and swing around to the north. I therefore started looking for a stop on the south shore of an island or the canal.

A free dock at Fort Walton Beach appeared to be a reasonable distance for a day cruise and was sheltered from a north wind. There were no current reviews on ActiveCaptain or Navionics. It was apparently damaged in 2020 by hurricane Sally and was shutdown. However, I was sure I had seen a post from someone who had been there recently. They said the docks were repaired and open but only the T-head and first slip were deep enough for a vessel our size.

So Plan A was to check out the free dock. Plan B was to anchor to the east of the free dock in the no-wake zone and dinghy the dogs to the park on shore. Plan C was to tie up at one of the two nearby marinas with transient space.

We did not need the secondary plans. The dock was empty. We nosed in slowly as it was quite shallow. We had about three feet under our stern at low tide and less at the bow. There were numerous signs that say no overnight mooring but John had read the local police department might grant permission. John called, provided names, boat name and our hull registration number and we were good to stay.

The park on shore is obviously well used during the day judging from the full garbage cans. It has mature trees, a bandstand, play structure, dog park and handicapped accessible side walks. It is also a camping spot for a few homeless people. We wondered if the need to register with the police was because of issues with locals or to keep boaters from becoming “locals”. A one day stay must be registered with the police. More than a day requires permission from the city manager so we suspected the later. There were three sailboats anchored within a 200 feet of the dock that had obviously been there for some time.

In any case, we had no problems. Enjoyed a short walk to a number of restaurants and grocery store.