Panhandle beaches beckon

Daily vehicle entrance fees for the parks: $4-$8. For more information on individual parks, visit floridastateparks.org or call 850-245-2157.

To see the full list of current and past winners of Dr. Beach's annual survey, visit drbeach.org.

AIRPORTS

Coastal Panhandle airports with regular commercial service from Atlanta:

Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport. 6300 West Bay Parkway, Panama City. 850-763-6751, iflybeaches.com.

Fort Walton Beach Airport. 1701 Florida 85, Eglin Air Force Base. 850-651-7160, flyvps.com.

Pensacola International Airport. 2430 Airport Blvd., Pensacola. 850-436-5000, flypensacola.com.

With Memorial Day weekend fast approaching, many travelers are looking forward to kicking off summer with a beach trip.

The blinding white sands and emerald waters of the Gulf of Mexico beaches in the Florida Panhandle are longtime favorites with Southerners. A few Panhandle beaches have even been declared “America’s best beach” in a popular annual survey.

Every year since 1991 Florida International University environmental coastal sciences professor Stephen P. Leatherman has rated America’s beaches.

Better known by his nickname of “Dr. Beach,” Leatherman is the director of the Laboratory for Coastal Research at FIU. Once he crowns a beach “America’s best” in a given year, it can’t win the title again, but it must retain the qualities that landed it in the top spot so it doesn’t lose its ranking.

All of Dr. Beach’s Panhandle selections are inside Florida state parks, good options for Memorial Day weekend — or any time during peak season — because the crowds are minimal compared with the beach towns. For those doing some last-minute planning, consider a visit to one of the parks in these Panhandle resort areas.

Cape San Blas

Looking at a map of the Florida Panhandle, you’ll notice a distinctive westward-facing narrow arm of land that crooks into the Gulf. This is St. Joseph Peninsula, more commonly referred to as Cape San Blas. The first half of the peninsula is scattered with beach homes, an occasional low-rise condo development, a couple of convenience stores and that’s about it. The second half is home to St. Joseph Peninsula State Park, which landed at the top of Dr. Beach’s list in 2002.

One of the most striking aspects of this beach is the high dune field. The ever-changing dunes here are among the tallest on the Gulf Coast. Aside from a couple of access areas with dune crossovers, the beach is pristine and wild, stretching for 10 miles to the tip of the peninsula. Many have made the mistake of trying to walk to the tip unprepared for the long, rigorous walk. Better to take a boat or prepare for a true backcountry experience rather than taking a whimsical beach hike in your flip-flops in this undeveloped section of the park.

If everything on the cape is booked, the nearby town of Port St. Joe on the bay has a handful of mom-and-pop inns and its own salty charm.

St. George Island

St. George Island State Park at the eastern end of 28-mile-long St. George Island hasn’t landed at the top spot of Leatherman’s survey yet, but it’s worth mentioning because it’s often been a runner-up. The island, accessed via a 5-mile-long bridge from the mainland, is a favorite with families with young children. You won’t find mini-golf and amusement parks here, just a flat, wide beach filled with lots of sea shells and sand dollars, perhaps more than any other Panhandle beach. Shelling is a popular activity on low-key St. George.

The state park contains a campground, but no cabins. The rest of the island is lined with vacation rental homes on the beach and Apalachicola Bay, famous for its oysters. On the mainland, the historic town of Apalachicola beckons with plentiful shopping and dining options when you need a break from the beach.

Panama City Beach

The capital of spring break madness for college kids is also home to the more subdued sands and natural wonders of St. Andrews State Park, Dr. Beach’s 1995 pick. Located on the channel where the Gulf meets St. Andrews Bay, east of the strip, the park is perfectly situated for escaping the beer-guzzling throngs and immersing yourself in nature. The main section of the park is a peninsula with access to an undisturbed beach, the bay and the channel.

Across the channel, uninhabited Shell Island is also part of the park. The island, accessible via a short ferry ride from inside the park, is a haven for snorkelers, who fin their way around a clear, pristine lagoon, exploring the small marine life through their goggles. The ferry service rents snorkel gear and sells concessions, a nice perk when you realize you’re on an undeveloped island without any services whatsoever. Birders also frequent Shell Island, and dolphin sightings are common both in the channel and from the beach.

South Walton

New urbanism was pioneered in the late 1970s with the construction of Seaside along a stretch of coastline now known as South Walton (after Walton County) between Destin and Panama City Beach. Unlike the two mammoth beach resort towns that sandwich the 26-mile-long coast, South Walton is a string of smallish communities, most of which follow Seaside’s sustainable development model. County Highway 30A is the thread that ties the 16 beach communities of South Walton together, complete with a paved bike path running alongside it.

Also found along 30A: Grayton Beach State Park, Dr. Beach’s top pick in 1994, and the lesser-known but much larger Topsail Hill Preserve State Park. Both parks have silky sands that squeak beneath your bare feet and wide dune fields. What they also have that the others don’t are coastal dune lakes — bodies of water that cut through the beach to the ocean at intermittent times to create a unique freshwater-saltwater ecosystem. The lakes are as pretty as they are rare, ringed by sand dunes on one side and pine forest on the other, all within hearing distance of waves crashing on the beach.