Clear Kayak Tour and Fort Desoto

We have never done a clear kayak tour until now! We started our day at Fort Desoto, which is south of Saint Petersburg. After spending the day running around Mullet key, we grabbed dinner at Billy’s Stone Crab. Then we did a clear kayak tour at night see-thru glow kayaks – they had multi-color LED’s that lit up the water – Come join the adventure! The clear kayak tour at sunset is highly recommended also. And Fort Desoto Camping is a must-do if you are in the area!

 

 

Fort Desoto

We started our day at Fort Desoto – not a bad drive from Bay Bayou RV Resort. After paying a couple tolls to get onto the key ($1.75 in total), we then had to pay $5 to enter the park, which is actually a long key with a nice road that gets you from end to end:

Fort Desoto Map

The Fort was built to protect the entrance of Tampa Bay Harbor during the Spanish-American war, but I don’t think it ever had to fire it’s guns in anger, which consisted of eight 12 inch mortars and two 6 inch Armstrong guns. The main area of the fort that houses the mortar batteries is still well-preserved, and a few of the other buildings still stand. Of special note is the museum, which has a ton of interesting artifacts from the era. This brochure has a bunch of facts if you are planning to visit.

 

Fort Desoto Fishing Pier

We also made it to the Fort Desoto fishing pier – a very large t-shape pier perfect for doing some bay fishing. It is very long and wide, and when we were there the crowds weren’t bad at all. Off to the right is even a beach area that you can hang out in.

 

Fort Desoto Beaches

Fort Desoto is rightly known for insanely beautiful beaches – the sand goes for miles and the beach is one of the widest we have seen. Kayaks and SUP’s are definitely the way to go to explore the area if you have one (or rent one). The sand is clean and smooth and the breeze coming off the gulf is perfect.
Fort Desoto Beach

Camping at Fort Desoto

The county maintains a pretty large RV camping area, with 236 sites. Full water and hookup are available. The cost is pretty reasonable (for Florida) and can accommodate large rigs. They allow you to stay up to 14 days in any 30 day period. We would highly recommend staying in this area if you can, especially if you like the beach!

Billy’s Stone Crab

We had dinner over at Shell Key, at a place called Billy’s Stone Crab – and the food was great! We think we met Billy himself, and had a great time. The restaurant is kind of funky – one side is more outdoorsy, and the other has the main dining room. On top of the main dining room is an open long bar with seating facing the water. They had live music up there and that was fun. The only challenge was the late-day sun coming in off the gulf – tough problems to have!

Clear Kayak Tour

Christy found us a tour to take – a night clear kayak tour! This tour group has see-through kayaks with LED lights mounted in them, so they light up the underneath area of the boat. Get up and Go Kayaking is the company, and they have tours set up all over Florida. The kayaks were fun, but seemed a little less stable than the standard 2-man kayaks we have used in the past.

clear kayak tour

The tour guide was great and we got to see a horseshoe crab up close! Our only complaint was the tour was only 90 minutes, but advertised as 2 hours. She must have had a date, because she hauled ass back to the launch area – we were kayaking full-speed for the last half of the tour. That wasn’t cool!