A Day at the Beach

7:00 a.m.

Sunrise at Siesta Beach is a slow unveiling. From darkness, the sky warms to blue. Then the green Gulf waters start to sparkle. Finally, from the shoreline in, that famous expanse of Siesta sand fades from pre-dawn gray to brilliant white.

When the early risers begin their beach routines, the least terns and laughing gulls stand rooted in the sand, grounded flocks all facing the wind. At the shoreline, the soft whoosh of the breeze is accompanied only by the distant hum of a beachcombing tractor sifting row by row toward the sea oats and Australian pines. Even the waves are hushed—more like the lapping shore of a lake.

The Best Beach in America starts its day as a quiet neighborhood lane. Sprinkled across the wide stretch of sand are a few joggers, walkers and leisurely bikers on fat-tired beach cruisers. Many give a cheerful “Good morning” in passing, as though they’ve spotted each other in the driveway retrieving their morning newspapers.

A few treasure hunters cast metal detectors back and forth over the sand. A hunched old man marches back and forth, never looking beyond his feet. Other treasure seekers are younger and more social, calibrating their machines together and cursing their luck that the tractor has already combed this section of shore. One of them, Norman, a 20-something North Port native, looks up to the sands farthest from the water, where the tractor hasn’t yet combed. His eyes light up: “Volleyball courts!” he exclaims, then sets off hiking high-kneed in the soft sand, to the distant parts of beach that are still asleep.

A lone yoga practitioner in leggings and a long-sleeved shirt stands with her eyes closed, oblivious to the occasional passersby. She takes a deep breath of sea breeze, then bows, places hands to the sand, then, back arched and head pushed upwards, offers slow and careful sun salutations to the Gulf.

This, you think to yourself, must be what it’s like in heaven.

9:00 a.m.

By 9 a.m., subtly at first, the tempo begins to quicken. People trickle in from the parking lot and pass through the 50-year-old pavilion, a historical structure designed in the late 1950s by legendary Sarasota architect Tim Seibert. An icon of the Sarasota School of Architecture, with its simple, efficient geometry and prominent horizontal lines, the high-ceilinged breezeway is both massive and unobtrusive, integrated seamlessly into an oasis of sea grapes and cabbage palms. It serves as a main gateway between parking lot and beach.

Lisa Labonte, who for the last decade ran a snack bar in Nantucket, Mass., now raises the metal shutters at the Siesta concession stand. She and her husband, Warren, competed for more than two years to earn the coveted Siesta lease; they took over concessions operations last year during spring break, when renovations forced them to set up tents and generators for serving Cokes and ice cream on the beach. “It was un-believable,” she says of the spring break trial by fire.

Now at home in the breezeway, the Labontes start the morning by setting out baskets of bagels, greeting the neighborhood coffee klatches and the regulars buying bottled water after their runs. Beachgoers pause at the concrete tables to adjust their hats and re-gather their towels before setting off over the boardwalk.

There, on a shaded bench just outside the pavilion, sits Barbara Bender, 83, slender and elegant in a white blouse and visor. A professional model who moved to Sarasota in 1976 and often posed for photo shoots on Siesta Beach, Bender now spends an hour or two a week just sitting, taking in the growing energy as the morning progresses. “I can’t get out in the sun anymore. Too many skin cancers,” she says with a smile. “I like watching the people now.”

On the beach side of the dunes, new beachgoers step into the sunlight, emerging from the palms and sea oats with their pink foam noodles like Field of Dreams’ Shoeless Joe materializing in the corn field. They kick off their sandals and start the long march to the shore, 100 yards of sugar sand away. There, by the water, lifeguards in red trunks are already beginning their mandatory pre-shift hour of physical training, jogging and swimming as the earliest sunbathers set up camp.