We just got back from a week on 30A in Seagrove Beach Florida and it was such an amazing family getaway!
We’d never been to 30A, (I hadn’t even heard of it until we moved to Franklin). People here kept asking if we’d been, and it’s the way many people here visit the beach without getting on a flight. It’s about a seven hour drive, and if you leave early enough in the morning you’re there by the afternoon, so it’s doable with kids. We left later than we wanted to and and stopped more times than originally planned, we ended up getting in by 10pm, but we eventually made it!
The area is named after Scenic Highway 30A and the communities are strung along it one after another, Seaside, WaterColor, Grayton Beach, Rosemary Beach, Alys Beach, and Seagrove, which is where we stayed. Each one has its own feel, some planned out and some older and more lived in. There’s a paved bike path running the whole length of it so people get around on bikes and golf carts, and the water is so clear and turquoise it almost looks like the Caribbean.
We were looking in Seagrove specifically. It's right in the middle of everything, Seaside a few minutes one way and Rosemary Beach a few minutes the other. It's one of the older parts of 30A too, it grew on its own instead of being planned out all at once, so it's live oaks and magnolias and beach cottages mixed in with the bigger houses. I loved the trees and nature along the houses, I kept forgetting the beach was so close.
Top | Pants | Headscarf | Earrings
The house we stayed at is called 10 Palms 30A and it has ten bedrooms! That sounded like way too much house when we were first looking at it and then we counted our six, plus everyone who wanted to come, and it ended up being perfect. There was enough space to have the kids nap in a quiet area while everyone was being loud in another part of the house. And traveling as a family of 6 now means we'd most likely need two hotel rooms, especially as the kids get bigger. So finding a house that felt like a hotel resort but we had our own private pool and space felt so nice! People usually book it for bigger groups too, company retreats, bachelorette parties, a few families going in together, etc.
My friend Jenna met us there with her husband Kevin and their two little girls who are five and one. Jenna and I met at cheer tryouts in high school in 2001 at Glendora High School in CA and we've been close friends ever since. She's in Colorado now and we would typically see each other when she'd visit CA, her family has a beach house in Newport Beach. But we hadn't seen each other since we moved to TN and had been trying to figure out if we would go out to her or she would fly to us, and they had been wanting to check out 30A too and had never been. So we thought this would be the perfect spot to go and for both of us to have a beach vacation. Our friend Jeff came from Miami, which would be a nine hour drive for him, so he flew. We originally met him in 2016 when he was shooting street style photos in New York, and he and Anthony connected at our first Coachella and have been friends ever since (10 years!) And Anthony's family drove down from Tennessee for the last half of the trip. None of us had been before so we weren't sure what to expect. It was also the last trip we did before Jadyn went back to college, so having all of us together was what I was really looking forward to.
We booked through 360 Blue and Natural Retreats. It felt like staying at a hotel but with the ability to make food and do laundry, that was key, I packed so much lighter knowing I could wash clothes there. There was concierge service the whole week, so if we needed anything I could just text them and they’d handle it, they were so great!
The beach access with the house was private. It was a three minute walk, you go down the path off 30A to a gate, and there's an attendant who walks you over to your set up, chairs and umbrellas already out for all of us, every morning. It's right next to the public beach and so much less crowded. The water was so clear, and my kids would not stop talking about how soft the sand was, it was really powdery and white!
(I’ve had this swimsuit for two years and it’s one of my favorites! It’s sold out in red but linked the black one)
It was Clive’s first time at the beach. The water was so warm I could let him splash in it for a bit, and he sat there chewing on his hand, happy, the water coming up over his feet.
Our days were spent with beach for the first part of the day, back to the house to swim in the pool once everyone was hot and hungry, then the walk back down for golden hour, which was SO pretty. At night we’d put a movie on out by the pool and the kids would swim while it played (we did ISR swim lessons earlier in the summer and this trip was even better knowing my kids could swim!). It reminded me of our Disney Cruise in a way, because we would go to the beach off the boat and come back later and swim while they played a movie on the deck, Anthony said the same thing too.
There was a coffee shop called Prema Organic around the corner and we walked over each morning and got their Balance Latte.
The house had a golf cart so we took it around and explored, and we ended up at Coastal Rancher for eggs and snacks, they had grass-fed beef, pastured eggs and raw milk too, which is not what I expected to find on a beach trip. And we got donuts delivered from Heirloom, which fries theirs in beef tallow.
We cooked together every night in the kitchen. With a large fridge we shopped for groceries when we got there and I brought supplies to bake and that made it convenient to eat as a large group, going out to eat would have been a bit tricky with more than 10 people. Anthony made his burgers, which are my favorite because I love how they’re seasoned:
Anthony’s Burgers
2 lb ground beef
1.5 tbsp salt
1.5 tbsp pepper
1.5 tbsp onion powder
1.5 tbsp garlic powder
Mix, roll into balls, smash down into patties.
Poppy turned five while we were there. The kids swam most of that day while I worked on her cake and made sourdough for dinner, and then we walked over to see golden hour at the beach and came back and she opened her presents.
On her actual birthday we did a 5 year old pancake which is a yearly tradition, and she wanted the chai tea from Prema around the corner, so we walked with me to get it that morning and she felt special, she told me she “felt like she was 5 now!” So cute!! Also how has it been 5 years since she was born??
Towards the end of the trip we took a pontoon boat out to Crab Island, set up by 360 Blue with Destin Party Pontoon (you can set up excursions through them too). It was one of our favorite moments of the trip! Clive, Poppy and Elliott had their life vests on for the ride over (I was dying with how squishy Clive looked in his!), and once we docked the kids took theirs off to swim out to the raft with us.
My linen button-up (size Large)
The water there is so shallow that people are standing around in it playing and swimming, and it’s so clear it felt like swimming in a pool, everyone hanging out on their boats and so many kids out there. Clive was on the raft with us for a while and then slept on the boat for his nap, and Anthony’s mom was there so she kept wanting to snuggle him while the rest of us swam. Poppy and Elliott were jumping off the rafts the whole time. There was a fresh fruit boat going around taking orders that we were able to have coconuts delivered too.
As for the house, there was so many different areas to explore There was always something going on back at the house; ping pong, shuffleboard, the views from the fourth floor deck, the kids never ran out of things to do. It felt relaxing because we didn’t have an itinerary.
We’d end up around the couch or the table talking too late and the kids would be off playing together in the house. We originally thought we’d go out and explore the downtown areas more but we were all content hanging at the house and being together.
On the way home we stopped at Salty Bottle, which is a popular spot Jadyn saw on Tiktok and wanted to try it, and it was so good, there’s something fun about trying out cute new coffee shops.
There’s so much of 30A we didn’t see, and we already know we’re going back, everyone was saying it in the car. Next time we’ll explore more of it!
xx Brittany