I made reservations for Fort De Soto camping

• Mar 2, 2017

• #1

3ringer

Senior Member

Fort De Soto is in St Petersburg Florida. It looks to be a beautiful park. It is very unique. It has a separate campground for pet owners. It also has a separate beach for off leash dogs. We will be taking our GSP's with us. The park is so popular, you have to make reservations months in advance. They are booked until June. Some sites are waterfront. Looking forward to this trip in June.

 

• Mar 2, 2017

• #2

Artfuldodger

Senior Member

It looks really nice. I've never been to that for down the Gulf Coast.
I wonder how the bugs are?

 

• Mar 2, 2017

• #3

3ringer

Senior Member

Artfuldodger said:

It looks really nice. I've never been to that for down the Gulf Coast.
I wonder how the bugs are?

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As with most coastal campgrounds, the skeeters and noseeums can be bad sometimes. I have had good luck with the Off Lanters. I also plan on taking a screen house too just in case. The reviews are outstanding and I really didn't see many people talking about the bugs. They did say that the raccoons were really bad.

 

• Mar 2, 2017

• #4

Greene728

Senior Member

With this extremely mild winter, I'd look for bugs to be bad everywhere. And yes, they are terrible at the coastal areas like this. SGI is one of my favorite places on earth. However, we went last year mid July and I'll never do that again. Between the mosquitoes, no see ums, and yellow flies I was ready to set the whole island on fire for the betterment of all man kind.

 

• Mar 3, 2017

• #5

Dr. Strangelove

Senior Member

The bugs are BAAAD. I used to live very near there (Bradenton, FL) and recreated all over the place. It's a beautiful area, though.

 

• Mar 4, 2017

• #6

Artfuldodger

Senior Member

Dr. Strangelove said:

The bugs are BAAAD. I used to live very near there (Bradenton, FL) and recreated all over the place. It's a beautiful area, though.

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What kind of bugs? We had some friends that went camping in the Everglades. My dad asked them if the mosquitoes were bad. The man said "no, the Yeller Flies done et em all up."

We used to camp at Cape San Blas up on the panhandle. Every morning I had to knock down spider webs that had strung webs between the trees, camper, and truck.
We had more trouble with the coons than with insects though.
I'd rather put up with mosquitoes and no-see-ums than biting flies.

 

• Mar 4, 2017

• #7

Greene728

Senior Member

Them yellow flies are the spawn of Satan!

 

• Mar 4, 2017

• #8

3ringer

Senior Member

I will be purchasing a screen for sure. There is one called The Clam that goes up in a minute. It has great reviews. We are looking forward to taking a dogs to the off leash dog beach.

 

• Mar 4, 2017

• #9

Artfuldodger

Senior Member

3ringer said:

I will be purchasing a screen for sure. There is one called The Clam that goes up in a minute. It has great reviews. We are looking forward to taking a dogs to the off leash dog beach.

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I watched a few videos of the campground on You tube. The dogs at that campground sure look like they are having a good time. We take my daughter's dog camping with us. I think he enjoys it as much as we do.

I have noticed that those screen rooms block all of the breeze. You could always put a fan in the screen room.
Fans make a big difference for summer camping. We have battery powered fans if we don't have electricity.

 

• Mar 6, 2017

• #10

ragingbull

Senior Member

Lived closse to there and used to camp there all the time. Dont remember bugs being a really bad problem,but the raccoons are another story. They know haw to open all sorts of tents and zippers are no problem for them. None the less it is really fun place to camp. Love going down there

 

• Mar 12, 2017

• #11

mdgreco191

Senior Member

Going there over memorial day week. Gonna kayak fish in the mornings if anyone wants to join.

 

• Mar 13, 2017

• #12

Jeffriesw

Senior Member

I have lived within 50 miles of Fort Desoto for all of my life (51) and have been camping for 30+ years and have never camped there
I guess I will have to remedy that next year.

However, I have camped at numerous other campgrounds up and down the east coast (Homassassa, Crystal River, etc) and the no see ums are horrible in March and April along the coast.