Fort de Soto

It was a long labor day weekend and we had all of Sunday to spare so I thought it be neat to check out a local park.  A quick google search of nearby points of attractions yielded a very well reviewed park called Fort De Soto Park which happens to be the largest park in the Pinellas county park system, so we decided to hit the road to check it out.

The first thing you need to remember is that in order to get to Fort De Soto, you’ll have to go on the toll-roads FL-682 and FL-679.  FL-682 costs $0.75 cash or $0.53 with a Sun Pass and FL-679 costs $0.50 cash and $0.26 with a Sun Pass.  Getting into Fort De Soto costs an additional $5.00 (no Sun Pass discount here) to cover for parking and park maintenance.

After entering the park, you’ll have the option to either turn left to go to the East beach or turn right to go to the fort and the North Beach.  The East beach provides 3 picnic shelters along with a quaint beach atmosphere.  The beach here is not as good as the North beach as it contains a lot of vegetation and the sand is very pebbly.  However, here you can’t beat the views of the tall and mystifying Sunshine Skyway Bridge and all the big cruise and cargo ships that go underneath it.

In case you made a right after the entrance, after a mile or so, you’ll come across the parking lot for the fort.  The fort, named after the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto, was built by the U.S. Army in 1898. With the onset of the Spanish-American war, the military saw a need to defend the entrance to the harbor and thus decided to build a fort.  The fort also served as a major preparation point for troops getting ready to invade Cuba.  Many mortars and cannons can still be seen positioned at the base of the fort.  There are a lot of long empty hallways and due to the lack of any kind of signage, I had no clue as to what they were used for back in the day.  One room did have a lot of old pictures from when it was an active fort, but with the hot stagnant air I opted to only spend a short few minutes in there.  After you have explored the main level of the fort, you’ll have the option to take the stairs to the top.  On the top, you’ll see a lot of vegetation and expansive views of the bay. All in all, I was not very impressed by this fort.  The park folks did not do a good job putting up informational signs and the signs they did have were in poor shape.

Since we were parked at the fort, we decided to leave our car there and check out the beach right behind the fort, indoor concessions, and restrooms. The water here was much clearer compared to the  other central gulf beaches (Madeira Beach, Indian Rocks Beach, etc).  We decided to do some snorkeling and saw plenty of sliver fish, needle nose fish, sting rays, and sand dollars.  As it was the labor day weekend, people had started slowly trickling in and soon beach umbrellas were lined up within 10 feet of each other. We saw others grilling and having a typical classic labor day weekend with friends and family, and the atmosphere was very relaxing and friendly.

Unfortunately for us, storm clouds rolled in, and we had to end the day at Fort de Soto early. Before heading out of the park though, we headed north to see what else there was to explore on the next time we venture here. We discovered we weren’t actually at North Beach, and that beach was further north from us. It has a little lagoon with nesting birds and a wide beach complete with lifeguard and  white sand. There were also lots of pavilions for grilling and relaxing in the shade and restrooms. If we come again, we will definately head to this beach instead.

Fort De Soto also offers plenty of other activities such as kayaking, fishing, snorkeling, boating, bird-watching, and picnicking.  Although we didn’t get to kayak ourselves, we’ve been told that you can see manatees.