Thanks!

As for fishing, the father in law booked it so I am not 100% sure but i will let y'all know once it's over hopefully with some good pics.

Thanks for the suggestion! Wife and I are going to have a date night one night and she definitely wants to do Seaside so we will consider.

Wife is currently driving and we are near Lafayette.

We are at Santa Rosa beach right now (a few miles east of Destin), water is clean and blue!

How was the drive? How long?

We are thinking about going here next summer, but will have a 6 and 4 year old... and that is a long way to drive. Has anybody flown? I guess the closest airport is Destin/Fort Walton beach (VPS)? I saw there are non-stops from Austin to VPS on Allegiant Air... anyboby flown them before?

jpb1999 said:

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How was the drive? How long?

We are thinking about going here next summer, but will have a 6 and 4 year old... and that is a long way to drive. Has anybody flown? I guess the closest airport is Destin/Fort Walton beach (VPS)? I saw there are non-stops from Austin to VPS on Allegiant Air... anyboby flown them before?

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Never flown Allegiant, so I am of no help there. We flew into Panama City (ECP) this past year, and we are going in there next summer also. We like ECP a little better than VPS facility-wise. ECP is up on the northwest side Panama City, so you never even have to go into town coming from the west. From the 293/98 junction in Destin, it's only about an hour to ECP (vs. 30 min to VPS).

We are probably a little crazy...we pulled out of our house at 2AM and pulled into our destination at 245PM. We had an unplanned early stop about 1.5 hours in and then we stopped for breakfast around 830am and one last quick gas station break about 2 hours out. Wife drives first before breakfast and I drive the last half.

The kids did not go to sleep as they have done in past but honestly they did fine and I am glad we drove vs fly due to money savings and I feel like we are able to pack more.

Thanks for info. How old are your kids?

We would be driving from Temple/Belton area, and Google Maps is saying 12 to 13 hours depending on where you are going.

Are there non-stops from AUS to ECP? It says there are non-stops on the ECP site, but when I search for flights I am not finding anything. Are they just seasonal?

They are about to be 5 and 3 (bdays in October).

jpb1999 said:

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Are there non-stops from AUS to ECP? It says there are non-stops on the ECP site, but when I search for flights I am not finding anything. Are they just seasonal?

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I would doubt it, although I am not sure. We live in Lincoln, NE, so we generally fly out of either Lincoln or Omaha (sometimes Kansas City). We most always connect in Atlanta because we usually fly down on rewards tickets using Delta's miles program. I'm not sure there is anything direct into ECP other than from the major hubs (DFW, ATL, Chicago, etc). Not sure if Southwest flies into ECP or not......

jpb1999 said:

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How was the drive? How long?

We are thinking about going here next summer, but will have a 6 and 4 year old... and that is a long way to drive. Has anybody flown? I guess the closest airport is Destin/Fort Walton beach (VPS)? I saw there are non-stops from Austin to VPS on Allegiant Air... anyboby flown them before?

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We flew this exact flight this week going and coming back. Got the $32 each way deal for it. Flight time was an hour and half each way... and takes another 40 minutes to drive from airport to Destin area... it's a no brainer. Allegiant is a no frill airline... but be aware... but boy... how to you pass up 1.5 hour flight for 12+ hour drive? And with that price, how do you pass that up?

and by the way, we flew with a 3yo and a 11mo.

Wow, just looked out of curiosity, and I'd give Allegiant a shot for that kind of a deal. I looked in Nov. when I'll be going back for work and they had round trip, non-stop from AUS to VPS for $101! Crazy cheap, wish they flew out of DFW/DAL.

Southwest flies into ECP and PNS, but they they stop in DAL and HOU, respectively. Depending on where you're staying they're both roughly an hour from Destin (ECP closer to east side/Sandestin/30a and PNS closer to west side/Ft. Walton/Okaloosa Island).

We've made the trip to/from DFW about twice every year for 10+ years. When we lived there, we had my wife's folks in DFW to visit, and now we're in DFW and have my folks to visit in the Destin area (Niceville). Our kids are 10, 4, and 2 now, but they've all made the trip all their lives and they all do great. Of course, we suspend some rules to keep them happy, so unlimited screen time and an abundance of junk food certainly helps. Usually 12 hours is a pretty good estimate.

I don't go quite as early as planoaggie, but we try to get on the road by 4-430. Definitely helps if you can boogie the first few hours whith minimal traffic/stops.

Do you rent a car when you get there or just take a shuttle to hotel/house? Is it easy enough to get around by taxi/shuttles once there or would it be better with your own car or a car rental?

Thanks for all of the info!!

bigboykin said:

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Wow, just looked out of curiosity, and I'd give Allegiant a shot for that kind of a deal. I looked in Nov. when I'll be going back for work and they had round trip, non-stop from AUS to VPS for $101! Crazy cheap, wish they flew out of DFW/DAL.

Southwest flies into ECP and PNS, but they they stop in DAL and HOU, respectively. Depending on where you're staying they're both roughly an hour from Destin (ECP closer to east side/Sandestin/30a and PNS closer to west side/Ft. Walton/Okaloosa Island).

We've made the trip to/from DFW about twice every year for 10+ years. When we lived there, we had my wife's folks in DFW to visit, and now we're in DFW and have my folks to visit in the Destin area (Niceville). Our kids are 10, 4, and 2 now, but they've all made the trip all their lives and they all do great. Of course, we suspend some rules to keep them happy, so unlimited screen time and an abundance of junk food certainly helps. Usually 12 hours is a pretty good estimate.

I don't go quite as early as planoaggie, but we try to get on the road by 4-430. Definitely helps if you can boogie the first few hours whith minimal traffic/stops.

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I've flown into both VPS and PNS. VPS is way more convenient as usually a family member will pick me up since at least one person in our group drives in. Frontier flies directly to pns and since it was over $200 cheaper i tried it this year. I felt really bad for my brother who picked me up as it was in the evening and traffic was terrible. It wasn't too bad as it was on the way out for my parents driving back to dfw when i left. Worth it if it's significantly cheaper, but VPS is definitely easiest for where we stay.

jpb1999 said:

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Do you rent a car when you get there or just take a shuttle to hotel/house? Is it easy enough to get around by taxi/shuttles once there or would it be better with your own car or a car rental?

Thanks for all of the info!!

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Yep we rented a car once we got there because we like being able to drive around on our own at our own schedule. No comment on taxi/shuttles since we didn't use any.

Agree 100%. We'd often have people visiting try to save a few bucks by flying to PNS or ECP (we lived 10-15 minutes from VPS). "Oh it's only an hour away, and it saves like $40! Do you mind?" If it was my friends/family, I'd tell them to pony up or I'd offer to pay the difference. None of them let me, of course. If it was wife's friends/family, one of us usually had to suck it up and take at least a good 2.5 hrs out of our day (round trip with time for parking/loading at airport, traffic, etc.) and spend money on gas.

Frankly, it's an ass-beating of epic proportions for minimal savings 98% of the time. If somebody can swing by on their way or something, that's a case where it might make sense, but my advice is not to be cheap at the expense of your family and friends' time, money, and effort.

bigboykin said:

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Agree 100%. We'd often have people visiting try to save a few bucks by flying to PNS or ECP (we lived 10-15 minutes from VPS). "Oh it's only an hour away, and it saves like $40! Do you mind?" If it was my friends/family, I'd tell them to pony up or I'd offer to pay the difference. None of them let me, of course. If it was wife's friends/family, one of us usually had to suck it up and take at least a good 2.5 hrs out of our day (round trip with time for parking/loading at airport, traffic, etc.) and spend money on gas.

Frankly, it's an ass-beating of epic proportions for minimal savings 98% of the time. If somebody can swing by on their way or something, that's a case where it might make sense, but my advice is not to be cheap at the expense of your family and friends' time, money, and effort.

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I hear ya... it was really painful to drive on any non-Interstate highways in this area. Speed limits are quite low on most roads (as compared to Texas highways), plus very little freeways, so there's no way to get from one place to another fast.

Yeah, there really aren't too many big thoroughfares. Hwy 98 is essentially the only major east-west corridor south of I-10, and it has multiple stoplights, neighborhoods, 30-45 mph zones, and a ton of traffic.

Btw, on re-read, I may have come across harsh. Certainly wasn't directed at anybody here who might be looking to save money by flying into ECP/PNS. I don't watch the fares closely, and in some cases or for a larger group it may be pretty significant savings. Just a little bit of a sore subject from years of people asking what I felt was a huge favor from me for what I thought were usually trivial savings.

Few updates:

1) went to Baytown warf and ate at Hammerheads. The food was good and thought the whole area was pretty neat. I think we will go back before we leave.

2) Played golf at Regatta Bay. Tough course for bad players such as myself. No room for error. Had fun but would probably find another if we play again.

3) will update but tomorrow is fishing with "captain kelly".

4) kids are having an absolute blast. Beach is great. Love the area.

Had a little 4 hour charter. Did pretty well. First time for me. Next year 100% will be an 8 or 10 hour.

We are back from vacation. Had a great time.

We did make it down to Seaside / Watercolor on our last day and had a drink at Southern Cafe while walking around.

Based on this one year while having stayed in Sandestin and also visited Destin and Seaside...I think my preference will be to continue to go back to Sandestin. Personally, Seaside/watercolor seemed too fake to me. I can see the attraction for some but didn't do anything for me. Sandestin has plenty of amenities that are easy to get to and is a nice, central location between several other communities.

Our condo made it EXTREMELY easy to go from room to beach to pool and back to room.

Already looking forward to my trip out there again next year.

So how will the hurricane effect this area by next summer? How much damage has it done? Will it also effect beach and water clarity?

Never been to the area but was starting to think about planning a trip next summer with the family. The main draw would have been for the 4 and 6 year olds seeing the clear blue water and white sands as opposed to the Texas coast...

Based off the reports I have read, Destin actually fared pretty well, with very little damage. Should be no issues to your plans next year.

Was there this past weekend. Destin and Miramar Beach are both perfect.

Here now! Been here for 10 days and Destin is fine. Other than all the workers that are here to help bring back Panama City, kids on fall break and the work on 98...all is AOK. The Red Tide is gone for now, the beach was as perfect as ever yesterday. Unfortunately, the leftover rain from TX arrived....but this weekend is supposed to be beautiful. Prettiest beach in USA!!

bumping this thread to see if anybody has recommendations for dive shops in Destin.

will be out there in a few weeks and was thinking of catching a dive