Panama City Beach reminds me of the beach towns I grew up visiting in the Northeast: lots of souvenir shops, a pier for walking and fishing, and more tourist attractions than one could squeeze in during a vacation.

There’s plenty of good food in PCB, including a crepe shop adored by reviewers on Yelp, but I’d say the area’s general vibe is best described as “touristy beach town.”

The landscape changes entirely when you drive just 15 or 20 minutes to 30A. High-rise hotel chains become private rental cottages, and souvenir shops give way to luxury shopping venues.

The overall vibe seems to switch from a busy vacation spot to a place where you’d do beachfront yoga and sip freshly pressed juice before spending your day on a quiet, white-sand beach.

Communities alongside 30A, like Rosemary Beach and Seaside, have some breathtaking beaches with white sand and clear blue water.

To get onto most of these, you need a wristband or beach tag — visitors can typically get one from whichever rental property they’re occupying.

I think the beaches benefit from the lack of large nearby hotels and public access. With limited visitors, there’s less of a strain on 30A’s beaches, resulting in a beautiful setting that feels more intimate.

There are some spectacular sunsets along the Gulf of Mexico, and 30A is a great place to see them.

On my trip, I especially loved watching the sunset from Bud and Alley’s, a Seaside restaurant with sweeping coastal views. Another evening, I watched the setting sun from the beach and was equally blown away by the beauty around me.

During my stay in 30A, I chose a rental property between Alys Beach and Rosemary Beach.

Fortunately, the area is very bikeable, with ample spacious sidewalks and bike lanes throughout. Lots of condos or hotels here come with bicycles, plus there are many rental companies in the area.

Often, I’d take a beach cruiser from my condo to Rosemary Beach for coffee or a meal, or I’d bike down 30A and stop to explore each town.

Since I also had a rental car, I drove to some spots farther away, such as Seaside and Santa Rosa Beach. Parking was easy to find, and the area was simple to navigate by car with my phone’s GPS.

My favorite spot in 30A was Seaside, a beach community where the movie “The Truman Show” was filmed.

It had beautiful beach houses, a small boardwalk area with shops and restaurants, a collection of food trucks, and an outdoor amphitheater for concerts.

I loved exploring the area. It felt relaxed and not too pretentious, but more upscale than Florida beach towns such as Fort Lauderdale, Cocoa Beach, or Panama City Beach.

It felt family-friendly, too. It’s the spot along 30A where I saw the most groups with children.

If Seaside is a family-friendly upscale beach town, Alys Beach is on the opposite end of the luxury vacation spectrum.

This small community is filled with white-washed, stone vacation homes and Mediterranean-inspired architecture — it felt like a big resort.

In fact, I haven’t seen anything comparable to Alys Beach in Florida. Because of its stunning homes and high-end feel, Alys Beach feels like one of the areas least accessible to the public in 30A.

I didn’t spend much time here, especially because I saw so many residential streets with signs prohibiting the public from walking through or taking photos.

If you’re interested in vacationing in a more private area of 30A, though, Alys Beach is worth taking a look at.

Rosemary Beach has made its rounds on TikTok, going viral for how it seems to resemble a small town in Europe.

Its downtown area is lined with cobblestone streets full of shops and al-fresco eateries, and it has a hotel complete with spires that reminded me of something I’d see in the Swiss Alps.

While there, I passed many street carts selling wares, like scarves and fresh flowers, as well as stunning homes with European-style architecture.

The area also has beautiful private beaches accessible by a key card.

Seaside, Alys Beach, and Rosemary Beach are perhaps the most famous spots along 30A, but I was also impressed with the lesser-known areas I visited, such as Santa Rosa Beach.

You could make an entire day out of exploring the tiny towns and communities that make up this picturesque part of Florida.

In addition to beaches, shopping, and dining, 30A has lots of beautiful, natural landscapes to show off.

I stopped by Eden Gardens during my visit — a 163-acre state park home to sweeping gardens, a bayou, plenty of walking trails, and centuries-old oak trees.

The area also has a collection of coastal dune lakes, a rare saltwater and freshwater phenomenon that exists in only a few places in the world.

As someone who’s spent time on both the gulf and ocean side of the Sunshine State, I can say 30A is one of the most stunningly beautiful areas in all of Florida.

This means a lot coming from someone who’s lived in Florida for over a decade. Truly, few places have impressed me as much as this one.

There’s so much to see and do in the area, and it has a peaceful vibe I’ve rarely found in Florida beach towns.

I can’t wait to go back to 30A, and I think it’s the perfect destination for everything from bachelorette parties to family vacations.

This story was originally published on May 5, 2025, and most recently updated on June 17, 2026.

For me, the first problem with this seasonal Blizzard was the texture. It had these chewy, colorful bits of sugar sprinkles that felt a bit off — like they weren’t supposed to be there.

However, the almost unbearable sweetness of this Blizzard is what earned it a spot at the bottom of my list. This dessert tasted like pure sugar to me, and my teeth still ache a bit thinking about it.

I could picture younger kids absolutely loving this, but I can’t see myself ordering this again.

Many people picture M&M’s candies when they think of a classic ice-cream mix-in. That symphony of crunchy, chocolaty bits with smooth, creamy dessert is a kid’s kryptonite on a summer afternoon.

My M&M’s Blizzard came exactly as expected — with the bite-sized candies slightly crushed and evenly dispersed throughout the vanilla soft serve. It was a simple yet satisfying option.

Even so, this Blizzard was pretty underwhelming, especially when compared to the other ones on the menu. I think it could’ve benefited from the addition of brownie chunks to make the chocolate flavor of the candies stand out more. 

Full disclosure: I don’t care much for rocky-road ice cream, so I knew I wasn’t going to be wild about this one from the start. 

This Blizzard contains all the essential flavors typically found in rocky-road ice cream: chocolate, peanuts, and marshmallow.

This dessert also contained brownie chunks, plus a gooey marshmallow core in the center of the cup. I can see this being a dream for anyone who loves marshmallows, but I felt that the core overpowered the rest of the Blizzard.

At one point, I thought the peanuts were missing, but they’d really just collected at the very bottom of the cup, which made every bite pretty inconsistent.

This Blizzard absolutely lives up to its name. To me, it tasted exactly like a cherry slushie.

It’s very, very sweet, but I didn’t find that totally off-putting. The bits of cherry in this offered a nice pop of tart flavor that made my lips pucker.

My order also contained plenty of tasty chocolate chunks, which cut through some of that intense fruity sweetness.

I believe this Blizzard will appeal to a lot of people (Shirley Temple fans, looking at you), but it was too sweet for me to find it enjoyable after a few bites.

If I wanted a fruit-forward Blizzard, I’d go with the Raspberry Fudge Bliss instead. (More on that one later).

I’m still confused about what the Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Party was supposed to be.

I thought it would have chunks of peanut-butter cookie dough, but it actually contained chocolate-chip cookie dough.

Peanut-butter topping was swirled into DQ’s signature vanilla soft serve and — even more confusing — it had a crunchy peanut-brittle topping and sprinkles, which, for me, just added an awkward crunchiness.

Still, it wasn’t bad. The sauce was blended so seamlessly into the vanilla soft serve that it tasted like peanut-butter ice cream.

However, I think DQ would be better off pairing peanut butter with something that contrasts its nutty flavor more, like dark-chocolate brownies.

With such a fun name, I had high hopes for this limited-edition Blizzard. Unfortunately, it underwhelmed me. 

Essentially, it’s a hodgepodge of chocolaty flavors. Mix-ins include chocolate-chip and chocolate-chocolate cookie dough, which were pretty much indistinguishable from each other.

This had potential, but the similar toppings didn’t add much flavor. I had a hard time distinguishing this from the regular cookie-dough Blizzard, which is disappointing.

I was eager to try the Blizzard because I think Heath is an excellent, underrated candy bar.

The Heath candy bits were finely chopped and distributed well throughout the soft serve. This gave the entire Blizzard a strong toffee taste, which I personally loved.

However, the biggest issue with this one was the texture. Toffee is notoriously sticky and hard, especially when paired with a cold substance.

As I ate my Blizzard, I noticed small bits of the candy getting stuck to my teeth, which made me unwilling to finish it.

Although I never attended summer camp myself, I have many fond childhood memories of eating Oreo dirt pies at birthday parties.

Normally, the dessert is made using pudding as a base, but here, DQ is putting its own spin on this with its soft serve.

I appreciate the sentiment DQ was trying to convey here, and I’m sure kids will go nuts for this, but I’m not sold on the idea of gummy worms mixed into soft serve.

As a topping, gummy worms are fine. However, I didn’t care for getting random bites of chewy candy in my Blizzard. There was already enough texture from the cookie pieces and fudge. Plus, it’s not like the gummies added that much flavor.

On a more positive note, I loved how the added extra fudge crumbles really doubled down on the chocolate flavor.

Ultimately, I’d much rather get the regular Oreo Cookie Blizzard, which tastes similar but has no unpleasant gummy-worm additions.

This Blizzard brought me back to childhood days at my grandma’s house, where I’d often dig in her freezer in search of chocolaty Drumsticks.

And every time, I’d devour the cone in minutes, and my fingers (and the floor) would end up covered in chocolate.

Years later, I’m still a fan of Drumsticks, but I rarely eat them to avoid the mess. Thankfully, DQ has largely solved that issue by creating a Blizzard with Drumstick bits blended right in that I can enjoy with the convenience of a spoon.

And let me tell you, it did not disappoint. As is the case with most of its Blizzards, the vanilla soft serve made for the perfect base, accentuating the peanut-waffle-cone-Nestlé chocolate flavor in the mix-ins.

Peanut was definitely the predominant flavor, but it wasn’t so overpowering that I didn’t taste the chocolate.

I wish the peanut bits were larger, though, since they kept getting stuck in my teeth. I understand the peanuts on a drumstick are tiny as is, so there was no changing this.

Still, if you’re looking for a peanut-butter dessert that’s not too chocolaty or sweet, try this Blizzard. 

In my mind, peach cobbler is usually served warm and topped with ice cream, so I was curious about this deconstructed Blizzard version.

Overall, this was so-so. The tiny chunks of cold cobbler were easily the star of the show, offering a buttery flavor that was delicious against DQ’s basic vanilla soft serve and a shortbread-like texture that was pleasantly crumbly.

That said, I don’t know if the peach-topping swirls worked for me. It could have been how my Blizzard was mixed, but I found the flavor distribution to be wildly inconsistent — I had to dig around before I got any peach flavor. 

Although I enjoyed this Blizzard, it seemed super similar to cookies-and-cream ice cream.

On a positive note, DQ’s signature vanilla soft serve tasted mellower and had a more delicate finish than what you’d find at the grocery store. I also liked that I could taste the Oreo icing. 

However, I probably wouldn’t order this one again unless I was on the go and craving something familiar. For the price, I would rather purchase a pint of high-quality cookies-and-cream ice cream from the grocery store.

Given its name, I expected this would contain a mix of brownie and cookie-dough chunks, but I only found the latter.

The dough provided more texture than flavor under the blend of vanilla and chocolaty brownie-batter soft serve.

More than anything, this tasted like a Wendy’s Frosty to me — not bad, just underwhelming.

Introduced in 2024 as June’s Blizzard of the Month, this Ultimate Cookie Blizzard is made for people who appreciate lots of texture.

Featuring a blend of vanilla soft serve and Nabisco’s finest — Chips Ahoy, Oreos, and Nutter Butters — every spoonful from start to finish contained some bit of cookie chunk. Yum!

Sadly, the Chips Ahoy cookies were barely detectable under the flavor from the Nutter Butter and rich cocoa notes coming from the Oreos.

I’m not complaining because it’s all tasty, but I wouldn’t call this as memorable or impressive as the Oreo Brookie Blizzard.

As a chocolate lover, I was surprised that I didn’t like this one as much as I’d hoped. This Blizzard is proof that there can be too much of a good thing.

This comes with brownie pieces, chocolate fudge, and chocolate chunks. I enjoy all those things individually, but it’s almost too much when they’re all packed together in an 8-ounce cup.

It was clear to me that the chewy brownie chunks were the star of the show, and the other two chocolaty components didn’t add much. The brownies were so fudgy that they blended together with the fudge chunks, too.

Part of me feels like the fudge chunks were thrown in just to give this Blizzard its “extreme” name. 

The kicker of this dessert is that it came with vanilla soft serve — not chocolate — but I honestly couldn’t taste it underneath all of the toppings. 

This Blizzard consists of vanilla soft serve and a generous amount of nutty, scrumptious Butterfinger bits. I immediately noticed the little orange bits sticking out of the creamy soft serve when it was handed to me.

Taste-wise, this Blizzard was good but not incredible. The candy bar seemed ground to a fine powder, allowing the nutty flavor to blend seamlessly into the soft serve.

However, I felt the candy’s chocolate coating got completely lost in the mixing process.

The symphony of textures makes Snickers one of the US’s most beloved candy bars, and the same holds true when it’s paired with delicious vanilla soft serve.

Yummy chocolate, smooth caramel, and crunchy peanuts gave this one a pleasant blend of flavors without overpowering the soft serve itself.

Of the candy-themed Blizzards I tried, this was one of the better ones.

Don’t ever try to tell me that brownie flavor and brownie-batter flavor are the same thing — they’re not.

This Blizzard is evidence of that, as it had an almost malted flavor, making it slightly sweeter than other chocolate ones I tried. I absolutely loved it.

This tasted like someone froze a bowl of brownie batter. Even better, DQ was not skimpy about the brownie chunks.

I got a bit of chewy, fudgy brownie in every single bite — even as I approached the bottom of the cup.

As advertised, this Blizzard came with vanilla soft serve and noticeable chunks of Reese’s peanut-butter cups.

As expected, everything tasted great. The Reese’s chunks had that familiar melt-in-your-mouth flavor that I know and love. However, the further I got into my Blizzard, the fewer peanut-butter cups there were, and the less enjoyable it became.

Still, if I had to choose a candy-themed Blizzard, I’d probably order this one again over some of the others.

Puppy chow — or “muddy buddies” depending on where you grew up — is a common snack at many a childhood sleepover, movie night, holiday party, or school event. It’s a treat made using basic cereal like Chex, melted chocolate, peanut butter, and powdered sugar.

I’m not surprised Dairy Queen turned it into a mix-in. Still, I wasn’t blown away by this flavor. 

It was tasty, and the peanut-butter flavor came through nicely on every bite.

However, in my order, the few squares of puppy chow in the mix were clumped toward the bottom. When I did eat a piece, though, it was delicious and nicely softened under the weight of the soft serve while still retaining a slight crispiness.

The pieces also seemed to add a subtle salty taste that I felt was missing with the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Blizzard.

Like the chain’s traditional Oreo Cookie Blizzard, this comes with vanilla soft serve and chewy Oreo bits. The main difference is that this takes the Blizzard to the next level by adding fudge and yummy brownie pieces.

This was good, but it wasn’t much of a standout to me because the Oreos seemed to fade into the background.

The brownies dominated the dessert, which wasn’t a problem for me as a chocolate lover, but it made me question whether the Oreos were necessary at all. 

The blend of buttery pecans, caramel, and vanilla on this Blizzard was absolutely divine. I also liked that my order contained pieces of whole pecans. 

However, I found the chocolate fudge shavings to be unnecessary because they weren’t noticeable at all. That said, this Blizzard earns high marks for its uniqueness and great taste. 

You may be thinking, “Wait a second, Dairy Queen has always had a Drumstick Blizzard with peanuts.” Correct. This one is different — it has all that and caramel.  

Visually, it looks no different from the other Drumstick Blizzard. However, as soon as I took that first bite, it was clear this was a huge step above the original.

The caramel topping was blended seamlessly into the soft serve, offering a tasty touch of sweetness that paired incredibly well with the peanuts and chocolaty Drumstick pieces.

In all, it’s a wonderful combination of slightly salty, sweet, and nutty flavors.

People who are hoping to get huge globs of gooey caramel might be disappointed. However, if you want something that’s delicious and sweet but not quite as intense as some of the candy-flavored Blizzards, this will hit the spot.

Just when you think DQ hasn’t done enough with Oreo, the chain adds tiny, dime-sized chunks of brownie-and-chocolate-chip-cookie hybrids. The more cookies, the better. 

Upon the first spoonful, I thought this Blizzard tasted like a typical cookies-and-cream one. Once I got a piece of the brookie, though, I understood why this was so special.

The brookie pieces brought a yummy, fudgy chewiness that was absolutely delightful in contrast to the slightly crunchy Oreos.

The chocolate-chip-cookie component brought in a buttery sweetness that popped against the vanilla soft serve. It was kind of like eating chocolate-chip-cookie-dough and cookies-and-cream ice cream with brownie chunks all at once. It was delicious.

Even though the chocolate was the standout flavor here, I didn’t find it as intensely cocoa-flavored as the Oreo Brownie Blizzard. Since the chunks of brookie were smaller than a coin, they didn’t really overpower the Oreo flavor.

This Blizzard came with chunks of cheesecake, crunchy fudge pieces, and Oreo cookies.

I accidentally ordered this with chocolate soft serve instead of the default vanilla, but I didn’t feel that made too much of an impact on the flavor.

In my opinion, this is a great option for the cheesecake lover who also wants a little bit of chocolate.

The ratio between the two star mix-ins was fairly even, which meant no one taste dominated the other. In fact, they enhanced each other. The cocoa in the Oreos popped each time I got a bite of them with the creamy cheesecake.

Cookie dough is one of the most popular ice-cream flavors in the US, and I get why. 

The dough bits in this Blizzard were just the right size — and, best of all, there were so many of them. This Blizzard was heaven with a great ratio of soft serve to cookie dough. 

The chocolate fudge really made this Blizzard stand out from basic store-bought cookie-dough ice cream.

The fudge made the soft serve extra chocolaty, which brought out the sweetness of the doughy bits.

Frozen Thin Mints are a thing for a reason, and I’m glad DQ found a way to harness that perfectly cool, chocolaty deliciousness into a Blizzard.

Here, the soft serve had a delicate minty flavor that tasted like a dead ringer for the iconic cookie. The vanilla soft serve with mint swirled into it created a pleasant, refreshing sweetness.

The bits of Thin Mint cookies were basically the cherry on top here: perfectly chewy, with their smooth chocolate flavor dancing on the creamy, cool vanilla-mint swirl.

This turned out to be one of my favorite Blizzards. The addition of a fudgy chocolate swirl is the only thing that could make this even better. 

My initial thought on seeing this Blizzard was that it seemed the most “adult” to me because it’s got actual fruit in it. 

By far, the best part of this Blizzard was the fresh raspberries. They added a layer of tartness that counteracted the intensity of the chocolate-fudge chunks.

I just wish there were more of them in the Blizzard because once I got a quarter of the way in, all that I tasted was vanilla and chocolate.

Frosted animal cookie pieces and confetti frosting combine to give this Blizzard the perfect level of sweetness.

The sugary cookies also had a nice chewiness and stood up well to the soft serve without getting soggy. 

Best of all, after a few bites, the colorful icing and sprinkles on the cookies melted into the Blizzard, which made the entire thing taste like a delicious confetti cake.

I’m always a fan of a good dessert within a dessert when it’s executed well — fortunately, this Blizzard was a hit. 

The creamy cheesecake chunks made for a superb mix-in: They had a slightly chewy yet smooth texture that stood up well to Dairy Queen’s soft serve. I also found that they had a pleasant, sweet flavor that didn’t taste artificial or overly sugary.

However, it was the strawberry mixture in the center that seriously elevated this Blizzard. As soon as I got to the core, strawberry flavor began to seep into every corner of the cup, giving every subsequent bite a burst of fruity flavor.

Bright, fruity, and delicious, this Blizzard tasted like something you’d pay big bucks for at a creamery.

The cheesecake chunks were plentiful and melt-in-your-mouth soft, and the strawberry topping was blended so fine that it permeated through every corner of the ultra-smooth vanilla soft serve.

I hardly noticed the chocolate chunks mixed into this one, but I didn’t mind because the rest was so delicious.

I’d happily take 10 more of this Blizzard.

When two classics come together, you’re bound to end up with something delicious. That’s exactly what happened with the S’mores Blizzard, which is why it was my absolute favorite.

Unlike the Royal Rocky Road, which was overpowered by marshmallow, and Chocolate Brownie Extreme, which was too chocolaty, the S’mores Blizzard had just the right amount of everything. 

Instead of mini marshmallows, which can easily turn rubbery when cold, this contains chocolate chunks with marshmallow filling and a marshmallow topping. It also has graham-cracker pieces and dust coursing throughout the entire Blizzard, giving the soft serve that irresistible, toasty flavor.

Because of the graham-cracker dust, every bite tastes like a s’more. In other words, this Blizzard is the perfect summer treat, and I can’t wait to order it again soon.

This story was originally published on August 17, 2020, and most recently updated on June 16, 2026.