Today my Uncle Al and Aunt Fran drove over to see us. It's almost a three-hour drive from their place to Stuart. I had mentioned taking Fuzzy to the vet yesterday, and Al said they had a little dog, too. I suggested they bring him along if they wanted and they did. Al called when they got to the marina and Bud, Fuzzy and I dinghied over.

We sat at the marina and talked for a bit and then we walked back down the riverwalk to the Pelican Grill for lunch. We took both dogs and it worked out fine. We were pointing out the lift bridges, the railroad bridge and the highway bridge right next to it. The railroad bridge is normally lifted for boat traffic. It's automatic and only closes when a train goes by. I told them in the time we'd been there trains had only come by at night. A few minutes later I noticed the railroad bridge closing. We all watched the bridge close; soon we heard the train coming. It was the Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey Circus train! I took a picture of it and put it in the gallery.

After lunch we walked back to the marina. We offered them a dinghy ride out to the boat, but since we wanted to fuel up and pump out the holding tanks, we said if they wanted we'd bring the boat over to the gas dock and they could board it there to see it. They both really wanted to see the boat (and you can barely see the mast from the marina) and I think if we hadn't offered to bring it to the dock they might have ventured out in the dinghy, but they opted to board from the dock.

It only took us a few minutes to go back out, drop our mooring and bring the boat over to the fuel dock. Uncle Al, Aunt Fran and Sammy all came aboard. They came down in the cabin for the tour. By then it was almost 4 o'clock and they still had that three-hour drive home. I took the photo of Fran and Al in the cockpit. Al is holding Sammy, but they are in the shade and Sammy is black so it's hard to see him. I took one last photo of Uncle Al and Aunt Fran on the dock and they had to go.

Bud and I finished pumping out and filling the water tanks and then went back and grabbed our mooring ball again. A nice day and the first visit from family since we left home.