Bean Point is the northernmost tip of Anna Maria Island, where the Gulf of Mexico meets Tampa Bay in a constantly shifting mix of sandbars, currents, and seabirds. To get there, you park in the Anna Maria city area and walk north along the beach — there is no car access to the point itself. The crowds thin with every step, and by the time you reach the point you are likely to have it largely to yourself.
The water at Bean Point is excellent for shelling, and the sunsets are famous: you are facing due west, with the full sweep of the Gulf in front of you and nothing between you and the horizon. Dolphins cruise the bay side regularly. This is the spot that long-time visitors guard jealously and new visitors discover with a sense of having found something genuinely overlooked.