Defiantely stick the cooler in the fridge or even better the freezer the night before. Also, freeze seveal bottles of water the night before-these will keep everything quite cool at the beach and will be great for drinking as the day goes by.Works for us all the time!!

Keep the cooler in the shade if you can - like under an umbrella. We wouldn't be able to spend a long time at a beach with no shade. Too intense for my skin.

Thanks to all who answered my question about how to keep things cold in the cooler. Since we aren't experienced with being in the hot sun all day with a cooler, I just wasn't sure what the best method was so I appreciate your tips!

you're so welcome and thanks for collecting all the tips ... I can use them too.

I forgot to say the one about freezing your little soft cooler but that's one of the best.

I'm just going to put this out there for you to think about when the time comes. The basic idea of trying to spend a day in the sun with a soft cooler and keep stuff cold all day is kind of an unworkable premise, and you probably won't see a lot of local folks doing it.

What I see on the Big Island is the locals go the opposite from the small portable cooler. They have the BIG cooler that's rated to keep stuff cold for days, preferably on wheels. They make a "base camp;" at the part of the beach close to the cars, preferably at a picnic table.

This is the way to go for real "picnic at the beach" days.

So it's unlikely you'll do this, but you could still have a "real" cooler in the car. Then put a couple hours worth of stuff in the soft cooler. Consume it. Replenish from the "base" cooler.

I would never spend a whole day in one spot on the beach, never more than two hours, so I'm working from imagining wanting to do this. It is the tropics, and the sun is fierce, you know.

But surely you won't be THAT far from your vehicle that you can't go back once or twice.

Soft coolers only work marginally well in the tropics, although having frozen bottles of water helps a whole bunch. As was said, it's not so much the cooler that has great insulation but the degree of cold of what you have in the cooler. But all that frozen liquid and cold packs makes for a heavy hike, add to that the stuff ...

I suggest keep it light and keep your home base in the car.

We have the BIG cooler on wheels that truly does keep drinks cold for 5 days. We use it all the time on camping trips rather than using propane or electricity to cool the fridge and freezer.

And where do you get one? Why Costco of course! :)

Our last trip to the beach we were staying in a villa, so we put our bottled water in the freezer the night before and used this to cool the contents of our soft sided cooler for use the next day.

Not only did we have cold water to drink when the frozen bottled water started melting, it kept our sandwiches and beverages cool also.

We found this worked great for us, hopefully it will work for you too!

I like the "frozen bottled water" idea. Never thought of putting the soft cooler in the freezer the night before , but will give that a try also. Thanks for all the great ideas!

My DH digs a hole in the sand and bury's the cooler inside the hole, and leaves about 1 1/2 inch of the cooler sticking out, and puts a towel over the cooler. When we want a sandwich or cool drink, we reach in and take one out. Its funny, because it looks like theres just a small towel laying on sand, and we've seen people kind of look at us when we come up with a cold drink. Apparently the sand is a natural inslulator, and keeps everything cold for a long time.

Bellini

Now that's funny! Gotta be the best tip yet! I can just imagine what that looks like to other people when you reach in the sand and pull out drinks and other goodies!:)

Another frozen bottle of water lover here. The only note is that if it's a new bottle - open it and take a drink prior to freezing it. If you don't it ends up being a geyser when you open it!