We were on a jetty usually used to tie up draggers. No idyllic sandy beaches or granite type rock formations nor that dreamer walk by the sea stuff. I got over that "by the sea" thing years ago. Mostly what you do get when playing around the coast-line outside, is salt spray in the air, maybe a pile of sand, some of which is blown into the air vents of your drums and you get a sticky salty film on your kit that you'd better clean off right away or the hardware will pit no matter what type of wax or protection you have on them. Cymbals turn green almost instantly by the way and pedals slow down if you don't keep them well lubricated. Oh yeah, and those jelly fish? they stink very quickly. Also if it's fairly warm you never have troiuble with stick slippage. They get sticky in your hands very quickly. We do a lot of full cleaning our gear down here all the time, even in the city or away from the coast.
The air is constantly laden with a high content of salt.
Myself I try to avoid as many out door gigs as I can around here. Too much clean-up every week with the kit. The automotive trade labelled Nova Scotia as the salt capital of the World decades ago. Rust and corrosion are our constant companions here. That's why I use things like Collinite insulator wax on my kit and hardware. It's designed for high sppeed racing boats and jet aircraft and is used extensively by our Navy. I use Paiste cymbal cleaner and cymbal wax on all my cymbals Paiste or not, because of the climate. At the moment I'm using Zildjian K customs, Constantinoples and Armand vintages, and they are done up with that set of products. I don't mess around with the climate here. It can kill your kit in about two months if you don't take care of it.