What beach, when should we get there and any other tips. We’re staying in Panama City beach that weekend. Best place to park?

Thanks,

Tony.

Get there very early. See if there is on base parking. These guys are pretty popular.

We’re planning a watching from the beach.

Also, go to whatever beach or venue on Thursday or Friday. About a month ago they were in for the Air Show in Terre Haute, IN. Our Thursday golf group happened to be in Terre Haute.
Tee'd off about 10:00 and they started practicing. They took about a 45 minute break which I assume was to refuel and then started up again. So for all but about 45 minutes of the 5 hour round we had a free air show.
On the 9th another guy was getting ready to hit his 100 yard shot into the green. I could see a single coming in low and fast and told him to hold up. Jet proceeded to do a hard banking turn between us and the green in full afterburner mode. It was very cool. Swear it looked like you could have hit him with a chip shot.

10-13 July, get in position early.

https://visitpensacolabeach.co...ppening-blue-angels/

Looks like July 12 & 13 for the Blues performance.

Pensacola beach were the beach ball water tower is decent. I’d Pay the 25$ entry fee to Gulf shore seashore federal land or if you have a season pass from feds that works ( includes entry to historic fort pickens). It’s a 1 way in and out road that dead ends ag Forg Pickens with several beaches with Parking along the way. The beach directly across from NAS Pensacola will fort Pickens There’s a pier behind fort pickens where you can see across the water to the NAS. Fort Pickens is very neat to see as well. Every summer there’s a group that puts on a baseball game in their 1800’s uniforms in the parade ground of the fort. Not sure the time this summer. At or Near Pickens, That would be my preferred site.

Depending how many days you are here, go onto the NAS and visit the air museum https://navalaviationmuseum.org/. Free entry and parking. Budget 4-6+ hours depending how much you love planes. Just can’t have any guns they will ID all people coming in the car at the base guard station. Again depending on how much time you have another hour east in Mobile is the USS Alabama battle ship and they also have a bunch of vehincles and planes on display And less than hour west is airforce armament museum https://afarmamentmuseum.com/. On Eglin AFB. Which is our largest AFB By land size.

If you haven’t yet watch the blue angels documentary that just came out. On Amazon prime. https://m.imdb.com/title/tt18573650/

Are you going to actual show over the beach, or to watch a practice at NAS? The practice is cool, basically the whole show, and not too crowded. You can either go watch it from on bas at NAS or get a pretty good view from across the bay at Ft. Pickens.

The official annual show at the beach is pretty cool, but to get the full effect you really have to be right there. They come in really low over the water and it sometimes looks like they're going to hit the pier. The downside to that is that it's a traffic nightmare...my in-laws told me that traffic was backed up all the way into Pensacola over three-mile bridge last year.

In the past they used to do a "practice" over the beach the day before the actual show, and not everybody knew about it so traffic wasn't as bad. We would always go to that instead of the actual show date, just to avoid the traffic. It's been quite a few years, though...the last time I was down there for that Fat Albert did a JATO demonstration, if that tells you how long ago that was!

These days we just go to the practices at the NAS. The dates are published on their website. Admission is free, and you can get right out by the flightline. It had been a few years since we'd been able to do that, because they had the base closed to the public for years after the Saudi student went on a shooting spree in 2019. They finally opened it back up so we went to the practice when we were down there in April. There were probably only about 2-3000 people there. We got there about an hour early and had no problem finding parking. We walked through the museum while we were waiting for the show, which unfortunately got scrubbed at the last minute due to low cloud cover. I still haven't seen a Blues show with the Super Hornets.

This is true. Traffic will be a shit show. Get there really early and stake out a space and nap till show time. Or go on base during practice.

Neighbor is a civilian employee on base and says they practice many folks in the building are known to take lunch at same time. Even if you have seen them a bunch the sound of freedom never gets old.

"Traffic will be a shit show"

This.
Last year I got stuck on the Pensacola/Gulf Breeze bridge and got to see almost the entire show sitting in traffic.

Fort Pickens then Pensacola beach maybe down closer to Navarre Beach in that order.

Maybe you have to requisition a boat, launch 45+ minutes away, come in from the sea??

quote:

Originally posted by sourdough44:
Maybe you have to requisition a boat, launch 45+ minutes away, come in from the sea??

When we were there for the show, they had the USCG out there keeping boats out of the box, but I imagine you could still see it pretty well from further out, and it would definitely beat dealing with the traffic on shore!

quote:

Even if you have seen them a bunch the sound of freedom never gets old.

This is definitely true!

the show is centered at the pier
go to beach ball water tower

I used to love it, when I lived out there, but I don't do crowds much anymore

Okay, so if we plan to arrive at the Pensacola beach water tower at 7am, will we be too late, or should we plan on arriving there at 6am?

I'd like to get an idea for how early is early enough.

We watched a couple practices on the base. Bring lawn chairs and water.

We will be watching it from our friends boat this year. Can’t wait. They live in Pensacola and know what they’re doing so I’m just along for the ride.