Category: Beaches

We went to the beach for a few hours and I got to visit Ponce Inlet and look for shells. Since my son likes to fish from the beach, he drops me off by the jetty (picture down the page) and drives back down the beach. He’ll park about a mile away so I can travel the inlet beach and then walk to where he is fishing.

This gives me some time alone to beach-comb and then get exercise walking back to the truck. I like to fish, but not at the ocean.

The Dog Beach

The Ponce Inlet beach is also a dog beach. It was not crowded at all, but a few people had their dogs on leashes and were having a nice stroll. You can see the dog and people prints in the sand here. The tide was coming in, but there was still a lot of open beach to explore. I didn’t find many great shells, but did collect a few new scallops, which I love to find.

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The Inlet is a wonderful place for photos. Any photographer would get some nice shots here. A few years ago I took a bunch of photos at low tide when the beach was full of ripples and tide pools. They are still some of my favorite pictures.

Rocky Jetty and Surfer’s Beach – Shark Bite Capital

As I left the inlet side of the beach I passed the rocky jetty. To the right of this jetty is the surfing area which is also known as the “shark bite capital of the world”. Surfers can be bitten by the black tip sharks that patrol these waters, but usually it’s a quick bite and they are gone. People rarely, if ever, die but they probably have memorable scars!

I was going to link to a video here, but the NatGeo video is so awful, I didn’t. Many of the images are NOT even from New Smyrna – just something they threw in! Boo on them.

Surfers are the ones that get bitten most often because they look like food to the sharks. Don’t swim where surfing takes place – you shouldn’t do that anyway. There is plenty of beach, so stay further south. Rip currents are a worst threat, so swim near lifeguards.

The high number of shark bites also correlates to the high number of people who visit this area and swim in the ocean.

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The waves were quite large and as I passed by the surfing area, I could see many surfers way out catching waves. My phone camera is not great, but there are a couple of surfers in some of these photos. I think they all fell just as I took the photo… LOL.

Some Things To Know About the Beach

• If you plan to drive onto the beach, check the tides. At high tide you won’t be allowed on because the beach will be underwater. Plan to either park in one of the lots (that do cost money), or hit the beach at low tide.
• It’s best to have a 4-wheel drive vehicle or you may – yes it’s likely – get stuck in the soft sand when you park. BUT… it’s easy to get help from fellow beachgoers and they will help push you out.
• Swim near lifeguards, as there can be rip currents that are unseen.
• If a thunderstorm is nearby you will probably be asked to get out of the water and leave the beach – by the beach patrol. Florida’s lightning can be deadly. Don’t travel to the beach on a stormy day, and that means go early in the day during the summer when storms will build all day long and become a problem in the afternoons.

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The water temperature was in the high 80’s and this is in October. A few weeks later it had dropped by about ten degrees because the nights (and days) had thankfully cooled off.

A Visit to Flagler Ave and New Smyrna Beach Video

I managed to find a video by a young couple (and their adorable baby) who visited New Smyrna Beach via Flagler Ave., which is where they parked and walked onto the beach. A lot of the video includes their baby, Apollo – almost like a home movie – but the baby is so cute and the couple is very likable. They travel the world and have bunches of videos from their trips. If you are interested, view Chase for Adventure – Visiting the Shark Bite Capital of the World.