Sunshine Open Water Swim May 15

The Sunshine Open Water Swim is run as a passion project by Coach Leo, intentionally preserving an intimate feel by capping participation at 150 to 200 swimmers. Rather than a crowded mass start, the gathering offers a quiet seaside setting where competitors can focus on their own rhythm against the gentle Gulf horizon. The program caters to a broad range of ambitions, laying out distances that include a quarter-mile (402 meters), a half-mile (805 meters), 1.2 miles (1,931 meters), a 5K (5,000 meters), and a marathon 10K (10,000 meters). Coach Leo places a strong emphasis on personal achievement and inclusion by featuring a dedicated Champions of Abilities division. Swimmers enter the calm coastal waters in staged waves to keep the sea unobstructed and the pacing smooth.

Under this rolling schedule, the 10K swimmers wade in first at dawn, setting out on their multi-hour loop before the beach warms under the midday sun. They are followed shortly after by the 5K racers and the 1.2-mile participants, who launch alongside the Champions of Abilities division. The half-mile and quarter-mile heats round out the morning arrivals, allowing everyone to finish along the quiet beachfront well before noon.

Pass-a-Grille: grillers' fires, historic cottages, and sunset bells

Behind the sand lies an architectural historic district originally recognized for 97 historic structures and later expanded to encompass hundreds of historic structures. Life on the waterfront today remains unhurried and easily explored on foot. Swimmers and their companions can rent beach umbrellas and lounge chairs directly on the sand to rest tired shoulders. Boutiques, local art markets, and waterfront spots line the nearby avenues, all an easy walk from the finish line. Visitors gather at the historic Merry Pier to cast lines from the seawall for snook, redfish, and fast-running Spanish mackerel. As daylight fades, the shoreline embraces a beloved community tradition that draws residents and visitors back to the edge of the Gulf. Each evening at dusk, a bell is rung precisely 15 times to salute the setting sun, honour the surrounding seabirds, celebrate guest bell-ringers, and keep the maritime ritual alive.

Sea temperature and the 2027 Sunshine series at Pass-a-Grille

Sea temperature at Saint Pete Beach averages 25.6°C (78.1°F) in May, with a range from 22.6°C (73 °F) to 28.7°C (84 °F), according to seatemperature.org. The Sunshine Open Water Swim Series has two dates at Pass-a-Grill Beach in 2027, March 6 and May 15. Every participant in the Champions of Ability category receives a medal recognizing them as a "Champion of Ability". Pass-a-Grille is a small beach neighborhood and former town at the south end of St. Pete Beach, in Pinellas County. The Don CeSar hotel opened on the north side of Pass-a-Grille in 1928. Pass-a-Grille was incorporated into the city of St. Pete Beach in 1957, and in 1989 it was recognized as a National Register Historic District.

Shell Key and Pinellas Refuge: shifting sands and rookeries

Just about two kilometres away lies Shell Key Preserve, an expansive 1,800-acre sanctuary of mangrove islands, submerged seagrass beds, and a completely undeveloped barrier island. Shell Key itself is a young landmass, having emerged only in the early 1960s from an underwater sand shoal. The island continues to grow and change as offshore swash bars steadily migrate onto the beach under the push of waves. Gulf storms have breached the fragile spit in the past, and it remains naturally vulnerable to seasonal surges. Because Shell Key forms an essential wintering and nesting refuge for migratory shorebirds, public access is restricted to the northern and southern tips, shielding a sensitive conservation core at its center.

About five kilometres from the race course, the shallow channels open into the Pinellas National Wildlife Refuge, a 394-acre sanctuary accessible only by boat. Established in 1951 to safeguard breeding colonies of coastal birds, it forms a chain of protected reserves in Tampa Bay alongside Passage Key and Egmont Key. The refuge spans Indian, Mule, Jackass, and Tarpon Keys, providing nesting trees for brown pelicans, egrets, herons, and cormorants. Tarpon Key is particularly renowned among naturalists for sheltering the largest breeding rookery of brown pelicans in the entire state of Florida.

Boca Ciega Bay and Mullet Key: Tocobaga middens and coastal forts

Long before modern beacons marked the coast, the Tocobaga people thrived between 1000 and 1500 CE, harvesting clams, conchs, oysters, whelks, and saltwater fish from the Gulf. About twelve kilometres away on the eastern shore of Boca Ciega Bay stands the Jungle Prada Site, where Tocobaga settlements once spanned more than three miles of shoreline with mounds. Today, a massive shell midden rising 23 feet high and measuring 900 feet long by 300 feet wide still stands beneath the trees, marking the location associated with the landing of the Spanish Narváez expedition. The surrounding park maintains a public fishing pier and boat ramp opening directly onto the bay flats. About eight kilometres to the south sits Mullet Key, a barrier island shaped like two distinct arms meeting at a sharp right angle.

One wing faces the rolling breakers of the open Gulf of Mexico, while the other is shaped by the strong tidal currents of the Tampa Bay shipping entrance. The constant motion of tides, wind, and storm surges reworked the sands so dramatically that the park's land area grew from 970 acres in 1970 to over 1,140 acres four decades later. Mullet Key also holds Fort De Soto, erected between 1898 and 1906 with thick foundations poured from an innovative seashell concrete formula, fronted by walls built of stone and crushed shell. The fort still mounts four 12-inch M1890 coastal mortars and two 6-inch Armstrong guns, preserved in place as the last surviving artillery pieces of their kind anywhere in the country.

Egmont Key: lighthouses, channel currents, and the Narcissus wreck

About eleven kilometres from Pass-a-Grille lies Egmont Key State Park and National Wildlife Refuge, isolated when rising sea levels separated it from the mainland roughly 11,000 years ago. Storms have consistently reshaped this sentinel island: the Great Gale of 1848 inundated the land and destroyed its original 1847 lighthouse, leading to the construction of the resilient tower. The waters off Egmont Key also preserve maritime archaeology beneath the surface. During the American Civil War, Union naval forces blockading Tampa Bay used the island's lighthouse as a key observation post. Today, the submerged remains of the steam tug Narcissus, wrecked off Egmont Key in 1866, form Florida's twelfth Underwater Archaeological Preserve and are listed on the National Register of Historic Places, resting about nine kilometres from the starting beach.

Just inland across the bay mouth, about six kilometres away, the surviving spans of the old Sunshine Skyway Bridge form the Skyway Fishing Pier State Park, recognized as the longest fishing pier in the world. On windy days, the open channel fills with kiteboarders, windsurfers, and sea kayakers sharing the breeze.