Euclid-St. Paul's Holiday Bike Crawl Skips the Bars This Year and Stops on Neighbors' Porches

For most of its history, Gears & Cheers has been a ride that leaves the neighborhood. The Euclid St. Paul's Neighborhood Association signs everyone in, the decorated bikes head out, and the cheering happens at a brewery, a grille or a sports bar somewhere past the boundary streets. This year, on Saturday, Dec. 5, the holiday edition stays home. ESPNA's listing says organizers are "doing something a little different, making stops at several porches and front yards throughout the neighborhood," and calls the evening "a neighborhood-wide holiday porch party."

That one line in an event description changes where the night happens. It also brings the crawl back to the thing this neighborhood has organized around for years.

Where the cheers used to happen

ESPNA describes Euclid-St. Paul as the blocks between the southern edge of 22nd Avenue North, the western edge of Dr. M.L.K. Jr. Street North, which is also 9th Street North, the eastern edge of 16th Street North, and the northern edge of 9th Avenue North. Past crawl routes on the association's own event pages tended to run outside those lines.

Check those addresses against the boundary. The 1776 11th Avenue North address is west of 16th Street North. Sunset Grille's 2996 address on Dr. M.L.K. Jr. Street North puts it well north of 22nd Avenue. JWags is on 4th Street North, east of the M.L.K. corridor. Flamingo, at 1230 Dr. M.L.K. Jr. Street North, sits on the street that forms the neighborhood's eastern edge. Creative Loafing Tampa Bay called Flamingo Jack Kerouac's favorite St. Pete bar when it celebrated its 55th anniversary in August 2024.

Both rides that started at 1776 11th Avenue North began just outside the neighborhood, and that same building helps explain the routes.

One address, three breweries

Since the 2019 ride rolled out, the starting point at 1776 11th Avenue North has had three owners and three names. Creative Loafing Tampa Bay has followed each change:

1. Flying Boat Brewing poured its last beer in the taproom on Jan. 30, 2022, after Tampa's King State bought the building. Flying Boat kept brewing there under contract at first.
2. The Brutalist, King State's bar and brewing space there, soft-opened on March 10, 2022. It later closed.
3. Outcast Brewing Company came next. Richie and Jill Hamm bought the 10,747-square-foot property for $2.3 million plus the brewing equipment and renovated it, and Creative Loafing reported a grand opening set for Sept. 13, 2024.

Outcast held a one-year anniversary party on Sept. 13, 2025. Its events calendar for this month lists live music on Friday, Nov. 6, and a Salsa Dancing + Tacos afternoon in the Backyard on Sunday, Nov. 8, billed as family and dog friendly. St. Pete Rising places the property between Historic Uptown and North Kenwood.

So through three different businesses in the same building, the crawl's starting line stayed on the far side of 16th Street North. A ride that starts at the neighborhood's own porches doesn't depend on any one taproom's lease, menu or calendar.

Porches were in the plan from the start

The porch-party idea isn't new for this group. The RSVP address on the 2019 Gears and Cheers listing began with "porchparties@." In the City of St. Petersburg's 2016 "Living Local" video on Euclid St. Paul's, residents describe a socially active historic neighborhood that holds porch parties about once a month. They also describe the houses as varied, each with its own personality.

That variety makes a porch route worth riding. Each porch stop depends on who signs up to host, how they decorate and what they put out. ESPNA's description of the 2026 ride asks riders to "deck our bikes in dazzling lights and cruise around historic Euclid St Paul's," and the riding itself now happens on the neighborhood's own streets.

The bike crawls already fill a regular spot on the association's year. ESPNA's About page lists two annual crawls, one in summer and one in winter, along with Family Movie Night in March, the Neighborhood Garage Sale and Block Party in April, the Back to School Party in August, Oktoberfest in September and the Haunted Hike in October. The winter ride is the one that has now moved onto porches.

Twelve days of front yards

The crawl falls in the middle of a December schedule that ESPNA has built around the same front yards.

• Friday, Dec. 4: Holiday Social & Board Elections. Ice cream and hot cocoa start at 6 p.m., followed by the general meeting and board elections at 7 p.m. The listing gives the venue as TBD. ESPNA's general meetings are usually held in the St. Paul's School cafeteria unless the association announces otherwise.
• Saturday, Dec. 5: Gears & Cheers: Holiday Edition, 6 to 10 p.m. Riders register at a neighborhood meetup spot, which the listing gives as TBD, before heading out to the porches.
• Tuesday, Dec. 15: Holiday Decorating Contest. Entries need to be decorated by Dec. 15, and judges will tour the neighborhood and pick winners in several categories. The listing welcomes "classic Christmas charm" and creative seasonal themes.

The order matters for anyone hosting a stop. A porch with lights up for the Dec. 5 ride is already decorated for the contest ten days later. The 2024 contest gave a sense of what the judges reward, with six categories: Best All Around, Most Festive, Character Themed, Children's Favorite, Winter Wonderland and Most Eclectic. Winners that year were announced Dec. 23. The 2025 contest invited entries from a home, a yard or a balcony, so condo and apartment residents within the boundary could take part too.

Put the three events together and two of ESPNA's three December events happen on porches, front yards and residential streets inside the four boundary streets.

Before you clip the lights to the handlebars

A few details from earlier rides help with planning.

Registration. Past crawls have encouraged signing up in advance. The 2025 summer ride required every attendee to sign a liability waiver and asked riders to register and sign it ahead of time. The 2026 holiday listing on espna.org is where the meetup spot and sign-up details will be posted.

Cost. The 2019 ride was free for ESPNA members and $5 for nonmembers. Both 2025 crawls, in summer and at the holidays, were free for members and $10 for nonmembers.

Dress code. The 2026 listing asks riders to "dress in something jolly and deck your bikes with holiday cheer."

Timing. The ride runs 6 to 10 p.m. on a Saturday, the night after the Holiday Social. Neighbors who go to both will see the board elected on Friday and visit their neighbors' porches on Saturday.

For an association whose 2019 RSVP address already started with "porchparties," a holiday route that stays between 9th Avenue North and 22nd Avenue North fits the group that runs it.

If you're hosting a porch stop or entering the contest this year, the front of your house will get more attention than usual for a couple of weeks. That's a good time to find out what it's worth. Kym Coyle knows Euclid-St. Paul's streets and the homes along them, so request your instant home valuation and see where your place stands this December.