Step right up for the big show...

Beautiful weather to start the day.  We did some running this morning: got the binoculars sent off to Canon, stopped at the store.  On the way home, the bridge was out... at first we didn't see what was passing through, then... Willie's Tug.  I called Herb on the phone... "Hey, you people going through the bridge are slowing down those of us who want to pass over the bridge!" ;-)  Herb had been out on morning on his Tug.  He said, "You should be out here..."

"We will - this afternoon."

It's been quite a while since I had the motorcycle out; I remedied that.  It was around 70º and bright sunny sky; no wind.  I stopped to get a new owner's pass on the way back in (you have to have that to get by the security gate at our village).

"Ready for a boat ride?" Joan asked when I put the bike away.

"Absolutely!"

By the time I got covers off the window and the boat ready to shove off, low scuddy clouds moved in.  The temp dropped.  It looked like it might be fog moving in.  No matter, we are heading out.

Moving down the ship channel, we saw two dolphins...

They swam close by the boat, then disappeared.  I was thinking that might be all we were going to get for a dolphin show today.

Plenty of shrimpboats heading out...

We swung around and paced the shrimpboat, betting that some dolphins would be bow surfing before long.  Yep...

The overcast moved in heavier; looking towards South Padre Island...

And then, more dolphins!  All around us - through the windshield of Wild Blue...

And I just know they like to tease us: look how they lined up perfectly with my line of sight, tucked behind the bow rail...

A great spy hop off to the side (that's why it's a bit soft on the focus)...

Look to the left, they pop up on the right... then, vice versa...

At one point, we estimated there were between 15 and 20 of them around us.  We had them to ourselves for quite a while, and then were joined by a couple excursion boats...

Notice the people on that boat are wearing jackets; we were comfortable in shorts and shirts in the cabin of Wild Blue.

We turned back up the ship channel and headed for home.  These pelicans whizzed by just above the water...

Other birds along the shoreline...

As we pulled up to our dock, the clouds opened to the west, giving us blue sky - "Looks like we might get a sunset tonight!"  I fired up the grill for burgers, and by the time the grill was hot, the sky was perfectly clear...

Nice way to end a very pleasant day!