Marco Island Travel Guide

David and I took a mini trip, and spent a long weekend on Marco Island! If you’re not familiar, Marco Island is a small island just off the coast of Naples, in Florida’s Gulf Coast. I’ve been wanting to visit for a few years, ever since I saw a photo of Tigertail Beach. I am so excited to share our Marco Island Travel Guide with you today!

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How we got there

Let’s kick our Marco Island Travel Guide off with the most important part: how the heck do you get there?! We flew into the Fort Meyers airport, as only smaller crafts can get into the Naples airport. We rented a car with Turo, which Dave and I highly recommend, and made the hour drive onto the island. Dave picked out a fun little Corvette, and had a blast driving it around the island! It was definitely a conversation started for the valets at the hotel, who were fantastic!

Oh yeah, like I let Dave have all the fun?! 😉

Where we stayed

We stayed at the Hilton Marco Island Beach Resort and Spa. The property had a great location right on the beach, in a stretch of hotels. When we booked, a small resort fee was added to the price. This included towels and chairs on the beach. We did have to pay extra for the umbrella – and definitely needed it.

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Our room had one king bed and a decent sized bathroom. The balcony didn’t directly face the water, rather, it was angled so we had a pool and Gulf view.

I will mention that room service stopped after breakfast and before dinner. Mildly frustrating when we checked in and were pretty hangry! But we headed down to the bar instead, which ended up being super fun!

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Where we ate

The first night, we opted to eat at our hotel. Dinner on The Deck at 560 was SO good. Their coconut shrimp ceviche was heavenly, and Dave loved their calamari.

Each morning, we had the breakfast buffet at The Deck at 560, which was included when we booked our room. There were SO many options, including: a made-to-order omelette bar, tons of fresh fruit, parfaits, and sausage and biscuits!

On a referral from friends, we drove across from the island to Snook Inn.

This place was a blast – and we never would have ended up here without our friends telling us about it! So here I am, your friend, telling you to go!! They had live music and a very casual atmosphere. People arrived by boat, foot, and car. We had a great view of the bay, and enjoyed watching boats and pelicans. We were told people often see dolphins playing around, too! Snook’s had a great menu, and most entrees came with a free visit to their salad bar.  I highly recommend the coconut shrimp appetizer!

Pro tip: The Bar at 560 offers a from Key Lime Colada. ORDER IT. You’re welcome!

What we did

Since this was our first trip without the girls… since, well… the girls were born, we took the majority of the first day to just lounge on the beach. As mentioned above, the hotel’s resort fee covered a chair for each of us, but we did purchase an umbrella for the day, since we needed some shade!

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The sand on Marco Island was powdery white, and there were so many pretty shells, but not to the point that you couldn’t walk – that may also depend on the time of year when you visit!

There is a service called The Gulf Cart, that is literally a beach-ready golf cart with a selection of drinks!

We had amazing sunsets from our stretch of the beach, and made a habit of taking an evening walk, to see the sunset before heading up for dinner.

One night, we stumbled upon about a dozen Florida Fighting Conches that had been covered until low tide!

It wouldn’t be a Marco Island Travel Guide if I didn’t break down HOW to get to Tigertail Beach! We couldn’t wait to venture to Tigertail Beach. We drove into the park, paid for parking, and were given 2 options: hike the beach around the lagoons, or kayak through it. (OK, we could have walked through it, but the seaweed was SO dense, and giant fish were jumping out of the water all over, so walking across wasn’t a real option for me!).

We rented kayaks, and the guys at the rental stand were super helpful (as I have never actually kayaked before). They told us the best stretch of the beach to aim for to find great shells, and off we went!

Paddle boards, double kayaks, and paddle boats were also available to rent here.

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I cannot begin to tell you how amazing the shelling was on Tigertail Beach. We didn’t even go at peak shelling time, and still found a ton of sand dollars and other gorgeous shells.

We headed back to Tigertail Beach on our last full day, and opted for the hiking route. It was super hot, and quite a long walk, but the vast span of beach that welcomed us literally took our breath away! We had never seen anything like it. Once we made it around the bend, there were more great shells, but nothing like the portion of beach we had kayaked to.

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There were a handful of cute little beach shops and a fun ice cream parlor (that had key lime ice cream!) across the road from our hotel, as well as mini golf!

While driving around and exploring the Island, Dave and I stumbled upon a cute little row of condos! They all have the cutest name like The Karen.

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I am already planning another trip to Marco Island – since there was so much more to explore, and we just couldn’t fit it into 3 days! Have you visited the Island? Where did you stay? And where do we need to eat next time?

Want more? You can check out our Okaloosa Island Travel Guide here!