Florida - outside Orlando, day or overnight trip suggestions?

[Alien]

Any suggestions on things to do & see or nice beach communities near Orlando that are worth checking out? We reached a stage where we like to do few headliners and get out of the theme parks. We plan to stay onsite but would love to explore some of Florida next time

Where have you been, how long was the drive, how long did you spend there, what did you think of it, was it worth the trip?

We most likely will have an European beach vaction so sitting at the beach won't happen and we don't need just beach as such

[Sew109]

We have always down st petes lovely beach but limited cheap dining and also there were so many rays this time it did stay in your head when paddling.

We ended up in Fort Lauderdale 3 hour drive and it was brilliant loved stayed at pelican beach resort will stay there again

[FloridaNuts93]

We like St.Petes for a night or two, and usually do a dolphin watch tour. Check out dolphinlandings
Highly recommend.

[Uptonspark]

Kennedy Space Centre, Gatorland, Busch Gardens, not sure if that's the sort of thing that you meant but if so we can recommend all three.

[MikeC1964]

I did a lot of reading up here regarding a 'different' day out and came up with these two days:

We did do a trip to the seaside - but we didn't sit on the beach (much!).

We had a day trip to Anna Maria Island. I took a couple of hours to get there, but we left early and came the long way around and over the Sunshine Skyway bridge (short way home!).

We parked at Manatee Beach (more commonly known as Holmes beach - good car park there) and then took the (free and air conditioned) trolley south as we had booked a 90 minute trip with Paradise Boat tours on Bridge Street. Had a fab trip out with them. We were lucky as although there were dolphins aplenty, we also saw a manatee which was unusual for August. At one point the boat was also surounded by thousands (and I mean thousands) of cownose rays. The captain had never seen this before. It was quite magical. We then took the trolley back north all of the way to City Pier (boy we were glad of the 20 minute trip and the AC!) and went to Two Scoops for a fab sandwich and ice cream. Then we walked along the surf to the Rod and Reel pier. Back on the trolley to Manatee Beach where yes, we did dit on the beach for a while and go in the sea and whilst there we ate at the beach cafe and watched the sun go down to the sound of a band playing there. It was great, but it was HOT! The water is so warm it doesn't really refresh you that much.

On another day we went 40 minutes north to a place called Mount Dora. A quant little town nice to wander around (although very hot again!). We also went on a boat trip there with Premier Boat tours. This time for two hours which included the Dora Canal. Real genuine Florida swamo land. Saw lots of wildlife again (if that's your thing!).

The kids enjoyed both days, but not being in the parks and having freqent AC was quite difficult with the heat.

P.S. Oooo! And we had our first trip ever to Gatorland. We really enjoyed that, although I found the 'gator wrestling a little 'uncomfortable' to watch. Seemed a little cruel.

[COL41]

We went to BG and then drove to Clearwater and spent the night there. Visited the Marine Aquarium and then drove back to the Orlando Villa. Would have liked to have had time to do one of the dolphin tours