It was a polite crowd — relatively speaking.
Gasparilla 2014 proved to be much tamer than parades of shenanigans past.
With heightened security including surveillance cameras scanning the crowd, the annual Seminole Hard Rock Gasparilla Pirate Fest Saturday yielded far fewer incidents than in the past.
[jump]Sure, there was the usual law-of-averages' stumblers, mumblers, pukers and stone-cold, passed-out revelers but area residents and visitors alike, agreed the atmosphere was tidier.
“We really didn’t see any unruly behavior,” Valrico resident Donnie McLaughlin said. “I was pleasantly surprised that several adults caught beads and then gave them to my children.”
McLaughlin, accompanied by her son Michael, 10, and daughter Dagney, 5, hadn’t attended Gasparilla since she was a child. It was a first for her children.
“It was really well organized with an ovbious police presence,” McLaughlin said.
Tampa Police chief Jane Castor attributed this year’s beefed-up security to last April’s Boston Marathon bombings.
Castor conferred with Boston and Massachusetts' public safety officials regarding enhanced safety measures to prevent similar inciidents.
“We heard first-hand what worked and what didn’t work,” she said.
Police dogs sniffed all 140 parade floats and each vehicle participating in the parade route. Credentials of all participants were scrutinized closely. Police officers perched on raised, cube lifts scanned from above the crowd.
Earlier in the week, Castor referred to the officers as "cops in a box."
According to Tampa police, 42 arrests including three felonies along with 63 open-container citations fell short of 2013’s 68 arrests and 131 citations for alcohol.
Twelve people were arrested for underage drinking and seven people for boating under the influence.
Flanked by several hundred festooned boats and its flotilla,, the 165-foot steel-hulled “Jose Gasparilla”, towed by tugboats, crossed Hillsborough Bay on schedule at 1 p.m.
After docking at the Tampa Convention Center, Ye Mystic Krewe of Gasparilla pirates demanded Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn hand over the key to the city.
The Parade of Pirates, originating at Bay to Bay and Bayshore Boulevards at 2 p.m. followed the Bayshore route before ending at Curtis Hixon Waterfront Park.
Don Barnes, Executive Director of Ye Old Mystic Krewe estimated Saturday's crowd at 300,000, up 50,000 from 2013.
"Because of the stellar weather and our new pedestrian walking patterns, the flow of the parade was almost flawless," Barns said. "More people also gathered towards downtown for all the festivities but the bottom line is good weather makes for a good parade."