We built a garage at our home, thinking about buying a small boat. Our daughter's ex-boyfriend had 4 Sea Doos, so he brought them down one week. We launched them in the bay off 331 a couple of times. No facilities or amenities. Pretty boring. So we never did that again.
This is not the place to be if you're into boating. You need to be in Destin or Perdido Key or Hilton Head or somewhere else.
Our best friends own several condos at the Destin marina and a compound of several houses on the bay side. We've had some fun times with them going back and forth between the Gulf and the bay.
We almost bought a home with a dock at Perdido Key where the homes have docks on the bay and they go to dinner via their boats. Pretty cool. But you have to cross a 4-lane highway to get to the beach unless you have one of those homes that is scarily close to the Gulf in terms of elevation.
So we bought in South Walton County. Hubby who is from Madison, WI, with all of the beautiful lakes there, misses the boating life. But the beaches in South Walton trump that. Even though every time we cross the 331 bridge he is sad about the lack of boats on the bay, we have no regrets.