5 /5 Rob Houser: I was at Daytona Beach on a cool day in March, so there were very few people actually on the beach, which made it a fantastic day to drive up and down the beach because I could drive at max speed (10mph) without having to stop. You should stop and you can stop. Just park your car,get out, and do your beach rituals. It’s a cool way to see a large part of Daytona Beach, and it allows you to go to a part of the beach that’s right for you (crowded or isolated, near a particular building or not).
Here are my main tips:
Download the Volusia Beaches app. It tells you where all of the entrances and exists are for your car and most importantly which ones are open for entry. That changes based on the tides.
Once you have paid ($30 when I did it), you just drive to another entrance, they check your license plate, and wave you through. You will have to get off and back on occasionally based on the tides, if you’re trying to drive as much of the beach as you can.
If you want to drive as much as you can, check your weather app for low tide and try to go close to that time.
If the weather is nice, it’s going to be much more crowded. They will limit the number of cars, so plan to go earlier. It will mean you will have a lot slower driving unless you go super early. Also, be very observant of kids running in front of you. It’s a beach. They’re kids playing. Pay attention.
Some stretches require four wheel drive. Pay attention to that. I tried it before turning on the four wheel drive and it was easy to get stuck in the loose sand. The four wheel drive worked fine. The sand on the other parts of the beach where any car can go is pretty tightly packed.
