Instead of businesses opening now for the tourist season, here in North Florida many are closing for the winter months.
In South Florida, their tourist season started last month and runs until about March when most of the snowbirds have flown back to their northern or Canadian homes. If you drive through Hollywood (S. Broward County) during the winter you may see more Canadian Flags than US Flags. But here in Panama City Beach, in March we are just opening up for the start of our tourist season.
While we have better weather during the winter than the North and Midwest, we can't match the 70's and 80's of South Florida so we miss the influx of the rich Yankee tourists who go to Ft Lauderdale, West Palm and Miami Beach.
Our season starts about March and goes to around November and we draw from neighboring states whose residents want to come down and go 'to the beach' either renting a home or condo or using their already owned second home. Our area tourists are drawn from more working class folks thus the term 'Redneck Riviera'.
