Yesterday turned out to be “a Beach DAY”…. Then “open mike night at Dockside”.

The beach at Sombrero was wonderful… First time this season for the crew of AB.

OH…. I did my first boat “rescue” at Boot Key yesterday also…

I was sitting in the salon, and I hear some loud engine noises to our stern…. HUMMM Interesting, because there’s a shoal to our stern…. I climb up into the cockpit to see a catamaran not more than a dinghy length behind AB…. Reving ONE (of two) outboard motors (power for that cat) like crazy!

He must have been caught on the shoal… but he was sliding over it…albeit slowly.

He came really close to our port quarter, but missed us when he broke free of the shoal… So by then all the boats around us were “out” watching this show… Then he crossed over two rows of moored boats and tried to pick up an empty mooring ball… BUT with one engine (only one working)… cranking full out…” missed it by a mile”… and in trying to back the cat up… really got "OFF center", and sideways in the channel…

One of the gentlemen, on board, got into a dinghy, and began to tow the cat, from the port hull… but it wasn’t quite enough to center the cat on the intended mooring… So I got in our dinghy; motored up there and PUSHED the starboard hull… so that they approached the mooring ball straight on…


Anyway…. The Sombrero Beach event was wonderful, but not without drama… Joe Pooler’s outboard motor kept flooding… due to “too much pressure” in the fuel tank… sitting in the hot sun in the afternoon… (Lesson: Always crack open the fill cap or open the vent…)

The evening was spent at Dockside Bar and Grille, where there was “open mic” night…

Great music, and Great friends…. (see pics) (Kathy, and Earl; Pierre, and Micheline; Joe P.)