With bike week just around the corner, bikers from all over the country are pulling their motorcycles out of winter storage and cleaning up their leathers in anticipation of a motorcycle rally like no other. While Daytona is definitely the place to be the week of March 5th, Florida offers some great stretches of road through pristine landscapes to some great biker destinations.

About an hour and a half north of Daytona on A1A lies the bustling beach community of Jacksonville Beach, which will be our focal point because, well, that’s where I’m from! On any given day you’ll find bikers and their motorcycles parked and hanging out at the Jax Beach Pier parking lot. Just across the street is the famed biker bar Mango’s, a great place for bikers to meet, have some good home cooking and shoot some pool. Summer weekends will generally find some heavy metal band performing outside on the covered deck.

Our first day trip will start from Jax Beach and head north on A1A to Fernandina Beach, a quaint little island town with its own unique attitude. If you follow A1A north, after bearing left at Mayport Naval Station, you will be cruising through the marshlands at the mouth of the St. Johns River and come to a dead end at the ferry in Mayport Village. A traditional fishing village, this is where most of north Florida gets their seafood. Shrimp boats, party boats, and deep sea charters line the docks, and you can even take a gambling cruise from here. If you’re hungry, there’s an old wooden shack sitting on the water that serves some of the best seafood available. Singletons is not much to look at, but it’s been there forever and people drive for miles to sit on the water enjoying the freshest of Florida seafood, while watching the pelicans scrounge for theirs.

Backpacking tours have always been one of the stimulating alternatives to break away from the regular escape and genuinely get in contact with mother nature. Meant for the genuine adventure romantic, there is nothing greater than packing a small quantity of necessities and heading into the wild to explore and sleep beneath the moon. Have you ever wanted to live your life just like the wandering cowboys of the old west?

Backpacking seems to be straightforward on the surface. Load up your bags with food, minimal shelter, water, as well as a handful of other things you might need on the trail. Plan on taking in basic meals grilled over a simple fire (or these days, heating device) and doing without the basic necessities many of us take for granted. Many may travel with just a sleeping bag, food, drinking water, and the clothing on their back.

The Grand Canyon is one of the most scenic and thrilling locations to back pack. Quite a few will stay near the rim the night just before, and have a morning descent all the way down to the base. A few hours later, the backpacker will find themselves enclosed by untainted natural beauty. There are plenty of tracks to pick from, some pursuing the Colorado River at the base, some wandering away towards the desert wilderness. Grand Canyon backpacking is for the romantic, or at the minimum the daring.

A camping holiday can be a fantastic experience for the entire family. The great thing about these trips is that they can be enjoyed by young and old. They also allow us to spend time together, enjoying each other’s company in a relaxed environment.

There’s nothing better than relaxing around the camp table, enjoying a meal that’s just been cooked on the campfire. It provides a time for us to forget about the stresses that we associate with everyday life. We can ignore the worries that we might usually be thinking about.

Our camping holidays allow us to get close to nature and to live in a relatively simple way. Does this mean that they involve very little preparation? It certainly can do, although you may find that you can really make the most of such trips by thinking about them in advance.