I head to Navarre Beach once or twice a year to enjoy a quiet beach town with almost nothing to do except relax on the beach. But can you get some good training in here too? You bet! Navarre is about 15 miles away from Pensacola City Beach, a much more popular tourist spot, and in between the two is nothing but sand dunes. If your family (or you) like the beach, this is a great place to come for everyone to get a little bit of something they want.
Swim
It’s the beach! Of course you can swim here. There’s no reason to find a pool. Since it’s the Gulf of Mexico the surf is usually pretty calm (not always…) so there should be some good opportunities to get some open water swimming in. My trip over this past weekend did include a day with jellyfish in the water but other than one afternoon, the water was great for swimming the whole time I was there.
Bike
Navarre tends to be a pretty quiet town, even during holiday weekends. Every morning, you’re pretty much guaranteed to see scores of cyclists on the road. The section of road that Navarre Beach itself occupies is only 3 or 4 miles. Where you can really get a great ride in is when you leave town and head towards Pensacola City Beach. There’s very little traffic that travels between the two towns, especially in the morning. While the route itself isn’t the most exciting in the world it’s a little different than what most people are riding on a weekly basis. The whole route is surrounded by sand dunes and protected nesting sites. The biggest danger here is given the route is an out and back, there is a risk of a headwind for an entire stretch of the ride with no break. And that’s not fun.
Run
It’s usually pretty easy to get a run in no matter where you go on vacation but Navarre Beach is a great place for it. It is Florida and you’re probably here during the summer so it is going to be HOT! There’s a great running path that goes from one end of town to the other so it’s really easy to get a nice run in. If you want a few extra miles you can even run out of town towards Pensacola. There’s absolutely no shade and if you’re going to run more than a few miles, you’ll want to take some water along since there’s no water fountains anywhere along the way. But it’s really fun to run through a beach town.
Overall, this is a great place for a holiday if you also want to get some good training in. It’s going to be hot but there’s not many places I’ve been where I can get in every type of training just by stepping out the front door of the condo or hotel I’m staying at.