This is Estero Island, a barrier island about seven miles long and never more than half a mile wide, connected to San Carlos Island and the mainland by the Matanzas Pass bridge locals still call the Sky Bridge. Estero Boulevard is the only road, running the length of the island from the shrimp docks at the north end to Big Carlos Pass at the south, where a second bridge crosses over to Lovers Key State Park and Bonita Beach.

In this guide I am walking you through every stretch of this island the way I actually experience it now, not the way it looked before Hurricane Ian. I will cover Times Square and the pier site, the quieter mid-island stretch, the south end near Lovers Key, the shrimp fleet on San Carlos Island, and two places worth knowing about that sit just off the main beach entirely: Bowditch Point Park at the north tip, and Bunche Beach Preserve across the water on the mainland. I will go deep on what the sand and water are actually doing here, score it honestly, and tell you who this beach fits right now, mid-recovery. I close with my own read on what it means to keep coming back to a place while it rebuilds itself around you.

The Vibe & Culture at Fort Myers Beach

Recovering, Not Recovered

I am not going to write around it. This island took three hurricanes in two years, and you will see that history the moment you cross the bridge.

Hurricane Ian came through in September 2022 and took the fishing pier, hundreds of structures, and most of Times Square with it. Two years later, Hurricanes Helene and Milton hit within weeks of each other, dumping storm surge and, in Milton’s case, several feet of sand straight down Estero Boulevard. Locals will tell you they dug out twice. That is not a complaint, it is just the timeline you need to understand this place honestly.

What surprised me on my last visit is how far along the beach itself is. Renourishment work is finished, the shoreline is wide and clean, and in a lot of spots the sand is genuinely in better shape than it was before Ian. The town center is the piece still catching up. Times Square is filling back in with smaller, elevated buildings instead of the dense strip that stood there before, and you will see finished restaurants sitting next to empty lots and food trucks operating where a restaurant used to be. It is not a finished postcard yet, and I think that is worth knowing before you go rather than after.

Seasonally, this island still runs the way SW Florida beaches always have. Winter and early spring bring the snowbirds and the best weather, spring break adds a burst of energy around Times Square, summer is hot and quieter with locals owning the beach on weekday mornings, and fall is when I personally like it best, warm water, thinner crowds, and the island settling into itself before the next season starts.

Fort Myers Beach Areas: Seven Stretches Worth Knowing

Fort Myers Beach is not one experience end to end, and right now, mid-recovery, that is truer than ever. Here is how the island and its immediate neighbors actually break down, and what you will find at each stop.

Times Square & the Pier Site

Island Center · Estero Blvd near Old San Carlos Blvd

This is still the first place your eye goes when you cross the bridge, and it is the clearest snapshot of where this island stands. The Fort Myers Beach Pier was destroyed by Ian in 2022, and as of this writing it is still a field of broken pilings in the water. Lee County has an $11.7 million contract ready to rebuild it longer and wider than before, and construction is expected to begin sometime in 2026 with a target completion in 2027. Until then, the pier’s absence is the one thing every longtime visitor mentions first.

Times Square itself is filling back in slowly and unevenly. You will find a genuine mix here: rebuilt restaurants doing full dinner service right next to a food truck parked on the footprint of a place that has not reopened yet, alongside empty lots waiting on permits. Some of the island’s longtime spots are back, some are operating out of trailers, and a few are gone for good. The beach directly in front of Times Square is wide and freshly renourished, and it is where you will find the heaviest foot traffic on the island, day-trippers, families staying at the beachfront resorts, and a steady stream of people drawn by whatever restaurant or bar is open that week.

I will be honest, this isn’t where I go anymore for a quiet beach walk, and it wasn’t really that kind of stop even before Ian. It’s where I go to see how the rebuild is progressing, grab dinner somewhere that has reopened, and take the pulse of the island. If you only have time for one stop, make it this one, but don’t mistake it for the whole story.

Lynn Hall Memorial Park

950 Estero Blvd · Next to Times Square

Lynn Hall sits right beside Times Square and has always been the easiest, most central place to put a towel down on this island. The sand here is wide and soft, freshly renourished like the rest of the beach, and the water off this stretch is about as calm and gradually sloped as Gulf water gets, no sudden drop-offs, no real undertow on a normal day. As of April 2026 the parking lot here is closed for construction of new elevated restroom facilities, with a target reopening in summer 2027, so you will find portable restrooms and a pedestrian walkway on the west end of the park instead of the lot you might remember.

The crowd here mirrors Times Square next door, families, sunset watchers, and anglers working the surf line. There are no lifeguards anywhere on Fort Myers Beach, a fact that surprises some first-time visitors given how developed this stretch feels, so keep an eye on your own group the way you would at any unguarded beach.

I still park a little farther south and walk in rather than fight for space here, especially now that the main lot is closed. But if you want the classic postcard version of this island’s center, with the sand as good as it has been in years, this is still where people head first.

Mid-Island

Estero Blvd, Roughly Mile Marker 3 to 5

Once you get a mile or two south of Times Square, the whole feel of the island changes. This stretch is lined with lower-rise condos, small resorts, and rental cottages rather than the concentrated commercial strip up north, and the beach itself widens out with noticeably fewer people on it, even in season. The DiamondHead Beach Resort area anchors this stretch and gives it its informal name among locals, Diamondhead, even though it is really just the quieter middle third of Estero Island.

You will find a mix of repeat visitors and part-time residents here, people who know the island well enough to skip the center entirely. It is a good stretch for an early morning walk, and I have had long stretches of firm, flat sand to myself here on weekday mornings even during winter season.

This is genuinely where I would tell a friend to stay if they wanted beach access without the Times Square noise. You are still a short bike ride from restaurants and nightlife when you want it, but you are not sitting in the middle of it all day.

The South End & Big Carlos Pass

Near Lovers Key Bridge · South Estero Blvd

The island narrows and quiets down considerably as you approach the south end, where Estero Boulevard eventually crosses Big Carlos Pass into Bonita Springs. The development thins out, the beach stays wide, and the water on this end benefits from the pass itself, which keeps things moving and generally a little clearer than the more enclosed stretches farther north.

This is a locals’ stretch more than a tourist one. You will see fewer resort guests and more people who live on or near the island, walking dogs, fishing the pass, or just avoiding the crowd up north. It connects naturally to a day that includes Lovers Key State Park just across the bridge, since the two beaches share the same sand and water character even though one is a barrier island town and the other is protected parkland.

I like ending a beach day down here specifically because of that pass. Watching the tide move through Big Carlos Pass at sunset, with Lovers Key visible across the water, is one of the more underrated views on this whole island.

San Carlos Island & the Shrimp Fleet

North of the Matanzas Pass Bridge · Main Street & Shrimp Boat Lane

This isn’t a beach stop, and I’m including it anyway because it explains the island you’re about to visit. Cross onto San Carlos Island before the Sky Bridge and you’re in what’s left of a working shrimp town. Erickson & Jensen Seafood Packers is the last operating dock of what used to be a much larger fleet, family-run since 1964, and you can still walk down and buy Florida pink shrimp straight off the boat.

The Fort Myers Beach Shrimp Festival, run by the local Lions Club since the 1950s, still draws a real crowd every late February or March, with a blessing of the fleet, a parade, and a shrimp boil that fills Times Square for a weekend. It is one of the clearest windows into what this island was before it became a beach destination at all.

I make a point of stopping here before crossing onto the beach proper every time I visit. It reframes the whole island for me, this started as a fishing and shrimping community, and the beach town grew up around that, not the other way around.

Bowditch Point Park

Northern Tip of Estero Island · 50 Estero Blvd

At the very north end of the island, where the developed strip runs out entirely, is a 17-acre county park that I did not properly visit until recently, even after years of coming to this island for the pier and Times Square. Bowditch Point Park sits where the Gulf meets Matanzas Pass, with a narrow, replenished beach on the Gulf side and a completely different, calmer shoreline on the bay side where you can watch dolphins working the pass on almost any morning.

This spot has earned its own full write-up from me, since there is enough here, the trails, the birding, the paddle launch, the two very different shorelines a short walk apart, to cover properly on its own. Read my full Bowditch Point Park guide here. For this overview, know that it is the quietest, most naturally intact stretch left on Estero Island, and it should be on your list even if you only have one extra hour.

Bunche Beach Preserve

Mainland · 18201 John Morris Rd, Fort Myers

I need to be straightforward about this one, since it is not technically part of Fort Myers Beach at all. Bunche Beach Preserve sits on the mainland side of San Carlos Bay, across the water from Bowditch Point, and I only really got to know it on a recent visit when I stayed just over the bridge, overlooking the preserve, in a spot I had never thought of as a beach stay before.

This is a 718-acre tidal flat and mangrove preserve, not a barrier island gulf beach, and the sand here is narrow, dark, and mixed with mud and shell hash rather than the wide quartz shoreline you find on Estero Island. Because of that, I am not including Bunche Beach in my sand rankings for this guide. If I did, it would score low against true gulf sand, and that comparison would miss the entire point of the place. What Bunche Beach does better than almost anywhere else in this area is birds. At low tide the flats fill with plovers, godwits, roseate spoonbills, and dozens of other shorebirds, and it is one of the best birding stops on the Gulf coast without a boat.

I did not expect to fall for a beach that is really a mudflat, but I did. It is the kind of place that rewards patience and a low tide more than it rewards a beach towel, and I would send any birder here before I sent them to the pier.

Fort Myers Beach Rankings: Expert Scores Across 11 Categories

These scores reflect Estero Island’s gulf-facing beach as a whole, mid-recovery. Bunche Beach Preserve is not factored into the sand-related scores below, since it is a mainland tidal preserve rather than a barrier island gulf beach.

Fort Myers Beach Sand & Water: Deep-Dive Analysis

Sand Composition & Texture

The first thing you will notice about Fort Myers Beach sand is that it sits in an interesting middle ground. It is not the deep, sugar-white powder you find up in the Panhandle, and it is not the shell-heavy, coarse sand you find on parts of the Atlantic coast either. It is a genuinely good quartz beach with a real shell presence mixed in, whiter and finer than most people expect from a working, developed island.

Like the rest of Florida’s Gulf coast sand, this is quartz weathered out of the Appalachian Mountains over millions of years and carried down by ancient river systems. What sets it apart locally is the grain shape. A professional sand sculptor who works the island’s annual sculpting championship has pointed out that the quartz grains here are notably angular, a sign of younger sand, and that angularity is exactly what makes it hold together so well for sculpting and for packing a firm walking surface at the waterline. The beach was fully renourished after the string of hurricanes, and on my last visit the width and quality were noticeably improved from what I remembered pre-Ian.

• 🏖
  Sand Color. A warm off-white to light tan, brighter near the dry upper beach and closer to gold right at the waterline where shell fragments concentrate. Not the blinding white of the Panhandle, but genuinely bright in full sun.
• ✋
  Texture. Fine to medium, with real shell fragments mixed through it rather than the shell-free powder you find further north. It packs firm at the waterline and stays comfortable underfoot most of the day, since quartz does not hold heat the way darker sand does.
• 🔬
  Grain Size. Quartz-dominant with a noticeably angular grain shape, a sign of younger sand that has not been worn perfectly round yet. That angularity is part of why this sand is genuinely favored for sand sculpting.
• 🐚
  Shell Content. Moderate to high, especially after storms or an overnight high tide. This is Southwest Florida, and the shelling reputation of this coast shows up here too, cockles, scallops, olives, and the occasional whelk in the wrack line.
• 👣
  Walking Comfort. Very good at the waterline, where the sand packs firm and flat for miles. The dry upper beach near Times Square gets churned from heavy foot traffic, and shell content underfoot increases the farther you get from the freshly renourished stretches.
• ⭐
  Barefoot Rating. 7/10 most of the year. The quartz base keeps the sand from overheating the way darker beaches do, but the shell content means you will want water shoes if you plan to walk the upper beach or explore the flats near Bunche Beach.

Water Conditions at Fort Myers Beach

The water here is defined by how gradually the Gulf floor slopes away from the beach. There are no sudden drop-offs and no real undertow on a normal day, which is part of why this island has always drawn families even through its recovery years. Clarity and color shift with wind, rain, and the periodic red tide blooms that affect this whole stretch of coast, so it is worth checking conditions the same week you plan to swim rather than assuming a calm day.

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  Water Clarity. Fair to good on calm days, dropping noticeably after heavy rain or when a red tide bloom is active in the area. Check the county’s water quality advisories before you plan a swim day.
• 🌊
  Water Color. Green to turquoise close to shore, shifting toward a deeper blue-green farther out. Less consistently emerald than the Panhandle, since this stretch of Gulf carries more sediment and organic matter from the bay systems nearby.
• 〰️
  Wave Action. Generally calm to light. The gentle slope of the Gulf floor here means waves stay small under normal conditions, with slightly more energy at the south end near Big Carlos Pass.
• 🏊
  Swimming Quality. Good under normal conditions, gradual entry, warm water most of the year. There are no lifeguards anywhere on Fort Myers Beach, so this is swim-at-your-own-risk the entire length of the island.
• 🚣
  Water Sports. Kayaking and paddleboarding are excellent through Matanzas Pass and onto the Great Calusa Blueway from Bowditch Point. Parasailing, jet ski rentals, and dolphin cruises run out of several marinas along the island.

Dogs & Pet Accessibility at Fort Myers Beach

Are Dogs Allowed on the Sand? YES.
Dogs are welcome on a leash across nearly all of Fort Myers Beach, with a couple of specific exceptions worth knowing before you go.

Where Dogs Are Allowed

• ✓The full public shoreline of Estero Island, from Times Square down to the south end near Big Carlos Pass, on a leash no longer than six to eight feet.
• ✓Bowditch Point Park at the north tip, same leash rules, with plenty of room to walk on both the Gulf side and the bay side.
• ✓Bonita Beach Dog Park, a short drive south in Bonita Springs, if your dog needs real off-leash time in the water.

Where Dogs Are NOT Allowed

• ✗Any designated swimming area marked off along the beach. Keep your dog out of these roped or signed sections even on a leash.
• ✗Bunche Beach Preserve on the mainland. It’s often paired with a Fort Myers Beach trip, but dogs aren’t permitted there at all, due to nesting shorebirds.
• ✗Off leash, anywhere on Estero Island. There’s no designated off-leash beach on the island itself.

Paws on the Ground Reality

You won’t find dog water stations along this beach, so bring your own, especially if you’re walking any real distance in summer. Shade is limited once you’re out on the open sand, and the parking lots and access roads get hot enough by midday to matter for paw pads, so time your walk for morning or evening if you can.

Enforcement here is real but relaxed. Rangers and beach patrol will ask you to leash up if you’re not, and they take the swimming-area boundaries seriously, but nobody is going to hassle you for a normal leashed walk along the sand. If your dog needs more mileage than a beach stroll gives you, Koreshan State Park in Estero has several miles of shaded, leash-required trails along the Estero River, a nice change of pace from sand and sun.

Crowd Levels and the Overall Feel of Fort Myers Beach

Right now, the crowd on this island splits pretty clearly by location. Times Square and Lynn Hall Park stay busy with day-trippers, resort guests, and anyone drawn in by whichever restaurants have reopened. Mid-island and the south end pull a quieter, more local crowd, and Bowditch Point at the north tip and Bunche Beach across the water attract almost exclusively birders, walkers, and people who already know the island well enough to look past the main strip.

The seasonal pattern here still follows the classic Southwest Florida rhythm, even mid-recovery:

• Winter (December to April): peak season, snowbirds fill the island, best weather, busiest parking and restaurants
• Spring break: a real energy spike around Times Square specifically, more subdued elsewhere on the island
• Summer: hot, humid, and afternoon storms are common, but locals own the beach on weekday mornings and prices drop
• Fall: my favorite window here, warm water lingering, thinner crowds, and the island settling in before the next season

Who Is Fort Myers Beach Really For?

✓ Who Will Love Fort Myers Beach

• Families who want calm, gradually sloped water and a wide, freshly renourished beach without a lot of fuss

• Birders and wildlife watchers, between dolphins in Matanzas Pass, sea turtle nests, and the shorebird flats at Bunche Beach and Bowditch Point

• Shellers chasing the Southwest Florida reputation without the crowds or prices of Sanibel

• Dog owners, since leashed dogs are welcome on most of the beach and a true off-leash dog beach sits just down the road

• Budget-conscious travelers, since prices here still run lower than Sanibel, Naples, or Siesta Key while the island rebuilds

• Anyone genuinely curious to see a barrier island community rebuild itself in real time, treated with the respect that process deserves

✗ Consider Another Beach If…

• You want a fully polished resort beach with no construction or empty lots in view. Head to Naples or wait a couple more years

• You need a lifeguard on duty. There are none anywhere on this island

• You want free or cheap parking. Town lots run $5 an hour and private lots run $10 to $20 a day

• You are chasing solitude during winter season. Times Square and Lynn Hall stay genuinely busy December through April

• You want the deep, powder-fine, nearly shell-free sand of the Panhandle. This is a quartz-and-shell beach, not a sugar-sand one

Things to Do at Fort Myers Beach, Florida

Between the beach itself, the pass, and San Carlos Island next door, there is more here than a towel and an umbrella, even mid-recovery. Here is what actually fills a day on this island.

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  Beach Walking. Seven miles of flat, gently sloped waterline from the south end near Big Carlos Pass up to Bowditch Point. Quietest in the early morning before the day crowd arrives.
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  Dolphin & Manatee Watching. Matanzas Pass and the water around Bowditch Point are reliable spots for dolphins on almost any calm morning, with manatees showing up seasonally in the pass and marina channels.
• 🚣
  Kayaking & Paddleboarding. Launch onto the Great Calusa Blueway from Bowditch Point or Matanzas Pass Preserve. Calm, protected water on the bay side makes this an easy paddle for beginners.
• ⛵
  Key West Express. A jet-powered catamaran runs round-trip cruises from Fort Myers Beach straight to Key West, a full day trip for anyone who wants to island-hop without driving.
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  Shelling. Best at low tide, especially near Bowditch Point at the north end. Bring a mesh bag and only collect shells that are clearly unoccupied.
• 🦐
  Fresh Shrimp & the Shrimp Fleet. Erickson & Jensen on San Carlos Island sells Florida pink shrimp straight off the boat, and the annual Shrimp Festival in late February or March turns Times Square into a real island celebration.
• 🏛
  Mound House. A historic site built atop a 2,000-year-old Calusa shell mound, with exhibits covering the island’s Indigenous, Spanish, and American history.
• 🪂
  American Sand Sculpting Championship. An annual event that draws professional sculptors to the island, and a good reason the local sand gets talked about for its sculpting qualities specifically.
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  Wildlife Watching. Sea turtle nesting runs May through October, and shorebird nesting season runs mid-February through early September, with snowy plovers, American oystercatchers, black skimmers, and least terns all documented on this beach.
• 📷
  Sunset Watching. Reliable most evenings, with Big Carlos Pass at the south end and the bay side of Bowditch Point offering quieter sightlines than the crowd at Times Square.

Local Knowledge and Practical Advice

A few things I have picked up walking this island through its recovery, the kind of details a first-time visitor genuinely benefits from knowing before they go:

• 🅿️
  Parking is not cheap, and the system has changed. Town-managed lots and beach access spaces run $5 an hour with a small transaction fee, enforced 9am to 9pm daily including holidays. Private lots on the north end run $10 to $20 a day.
• 🚧
  The Lynn Hall Memorial Park lot is closed until summer 2027. Portable restrooms and a pedestrian walkway remain open on the west end of the park during construction. Use a different beach access point if you need parking near Times Square.
• 🏖
  There are no lifeguards anywhere on this island. The water is generally calm and gently sloped, but this is swim-at-your-own-risk the entire length of Estero Island.
• 🐾
  Dogs must stay leashed and out of designated swimming areas. A six to eight foot leash is standard, and you will need to head to Bonita Beach Dog Park nearby for a true off-leash option.
• 🚩
  Check red tide advisories before you plan a swim day. This region deals with periodic red tide blooms, and Lee County posts current water quality sampling data online before you head out.
• 🌇
  Sea turtle lighting rules apply island-wide, May through October. Amber LED bulbs, shielded fixtures, and closed curtains after dark are required at every property, beachfront or not, under the town’s sea turtle conservation code.
• 🍽️
  Times Square is a mix of open and closed right now. Some longtime restaurants are back in full, some are running out of food trucks on their old footprint, and a few lots are still empty. Check ahead if you have your heart set on a specific spot.
• 🦐
  Time a visit around the Shrimp Festival if you can. Late February or early March, with a blessing of the fleet, a parade, and a shrimp boil that gives you the island’s real character in one weekend.
• 🐚
  Best shelling is at low tide near Bowditch Point. Check a tide chart before you go and plan to arrive as the water is pulling out, not after it has already turned.
• 🌳
  Bring bug spray for Bowditch Point and Bunche Beach. Both have wooded or mangrove-adjacent sections where mosquitoes and no-see-ums can be a real factor, especially at dawn and dusk.

Where to Stay Near Fort Myers Beach, Florida

Lodging on this island is still catching up to demand in places, since several properties are mid-rebuild, but there is a genuine range from full-service resorts to quieter mid-island rentals and one honest gap worth knowing about.

Gulf-Front Resorts & Condos

Properties near Times Square and Lynn Hall Park put you in walking distance of whatever restaurants and nightlife are currently open. Margaritaville Beach Resort, DiamondHead Beach Resort, Pink Shell Beach Resort & Marina, and GullWing Beach Resort all sit directly on the sand, and several offer private beach chair and umbrella service worth asking about when you book.

Mid-Island Rentals

Condos and cottages between mile marker three and five put you on a quieter stretch of beach while keeping you a short bike ride from Times Square when you want it. This is where I would point most first-time visitors who want to actually relax.

Camping

I want to be straightforward here rather than send you somewhere that no longer exists. The island’s longtime beachfront campground, Red Coconut RV Park, was destroyed by Hurricane Ian and the property was sold in 2023. As of this writing the site sits vacant while redevelopment plans are debated, so there is currently no beachfront camping option on Fort Myers Beach itself. The closest real camping is Koreshan State Park in Estero, about 25 minutes away, with wooded RV and tent sites along the Estero River. The campground there has had periodic closures for maintenance, so confirm current availability before you book.

Fort Myers & Cape Coral, Mainland

For lower rates and a wider range of budget to mid-range hotels, the mainland towns of Fort Myers and Cape Coral sit a short drive across the bridge, a practical option if you want to day-trip to the beach rather than stay directly on the island.

What Makes Fort Myers Beach Different from Nearby Beaches

Fort Myers Beach stands apart right now for reasons that have nothing to do with polish. It is an island that is honest about where it stands, and that honesty is worth something.

A few features make it distinct:

An island rebuilding in plain sight

Most beach towns hide their construction. This one does not have that option, and I have come to respect how openly this community talks about where it is in the process rather than pretending the pier is fine.

Real working shrimp town roots

San Carlos Island and Erickson & Jensen are not a tourist attraction dressed up as history. This is a working fleet that has supplied this coast with pink shrimp for decades, and you can watch it happen.

Two very different neighbors bookending the island

Bowditch Point’s wooded quiet at the north tip and Bunche Beach Preserve’s tidal flats just across the water give you two completely different natural experiences within a few minutes of the busiest stretch on the island.

Gentle, walkable water for miles

The gradual slope of the Gulf floor here makes this one of the easier, calmer beaches on this coast to actually swim in, not just look at.

Fort Myers Beach vs. Other Southwest Florida Beaches

These are the beaches visitors most often weigh against Fort Myers Beach, and the honest read on when you would choose one over the other.

Fort Myers Beach vs. Sanibel Island

Sanibel is the region’s famous shelling destination, quieter, more upscale, and reached by a toll causeway. Fort Myers Beach is livelier, more affordable, and currently rebuilding in ways Sanibel largely finished addressing after its own Ian recovery. Choose Sanibel for a polished, quieter stay. Choose Fort Myers Beach for nightlife, budget, and an island still finding its footing.

Fort Myers Beach vs. Bonita Beach & Lovers Key

Just across Big Carlos Pass, Lovers Key State Park and Bonita Beach offer protected, less developed shoreline with excellent shelling and no real nightlife scene. If solitude matters more than convenience, head there for the day and stay on Fort Myers Beach at night.

Fort Myers Beach vs. Siesta Key

Siesta Key, about ninety minutes north near Sarasota, has a genuine claim to some of the purest quartz sand in the country and draws a bigger, pricier crowd for it. Fort Myers Beach has more shell content and a more relaxed, working-town feel, at a noticeably lower price point.

Fort Myers Beach vs. Naples

Naples is manicured, upscale, and quiet, with a beach town built around polish rather than personality. Fort Myers Beach is louder, more casual, and considerably more affordable, with a story still unfolding rather than a finished one.

Bottom line: Fort Myers Beach right now is not the same island it was before 2022, and it is not pretending to be. The sand and water are genuinely good, the wildlife is excellent, and the prices still reflect a place mid-recovery. Sanibel and Naples give you more polish. Fort Myers Beach gives you more honesty, and for a lot of visitors, more value.

Patti’s Perspective: My Honest Take on Fort Myers Beach