10/20 - 10/22 - Gulf Coast Gathering

I have to agree what a great time! I'll try and get the photos up tomarrow. John and Sherry's house is truely a work of art. They were able to host over 50 people under the roof of their barbeque privillion, park a bunch of RV's, Cars/SUV's launch boats and dock about 15 C Dories and similar boats!

What a great bunch of people.

We came directly home--about 200 miles on the water in less than 10 hours--3 of it after dark. Thanks to all who made it happen!
 
Many, many thanks to organizer extraordinaire Byrdman, Mark and Anita of Wefings, and hosts John and Sherry, who all spent the weekend and many hours leading up to it hard at work making it wonderful for the rest of us. All the while making everyone feel they were enjoying it too. The essence of gracious hospitality. Patty and I really enjoyed our first C-Dory gathering and meeting all who were there.
 
Byrdman the omelette man (delicious), Marc and Anita, John and Sherry and the Wefings crew. A big thanks from Kay and I. Your hospitality was overboard! Our first gathering was a great time for sure. A quite impressive spread of great food, a fantastic place and a bunch of super nice people all drawn together over some unique boats. Wished we had more time to swing by the shop and take a look around.
 
Thanks for the Good times at our first Gathering .Great food and Hospitality from the Wefing crew .We got many good ideas on how to make the most of our Duck. Loree and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves .It was good meeting all of you and looking forward to another Gathering and Seattle Boat show

Thanks again Marc , John and Patrick for throwing a great Gathering.

The Duck make it home in 9 hours back to Naples .
 
You are all very welcome , and we would like to thank all of you for the great turnout of wonderful folks that all came together to make this first Gulf Coast Gathering a success . And Byrdman too.


Just kidding about Byrdman , he got back on the road this morning towards Montgomery and then back to Tennessee . WE WILL do it again next year , and really look forward to it !!
Marc Grove
 
I just rolled into Naples. It was a wonderful trip and Mark, John, Sherry and all the gang were the best host and hostess one could hope to have.
Leaving was the hard part...it meant no more great food and conversation.

We hauled out at a Carrabelle, Fl. due to high winds and the prospect of good fishing blowing away at the same time. If you are ever in that area I can recommend The Moorings Marina for your needs.

I would like to also thank The C-Dory factory for underwriting this event and hope someone will point out to Jeff that the oysters were great and worth every cent .....I eat a whole lot of "cents" worth.

Again I think you, Brother Boo thanks you....and future C-Dory Owners will thank you.
 
I just put up about 30 more photos. I have more but they are semi redundant--or in some cases--may be be suitable for a family web site--just kidding.

If any want their boat photos, please send me an E mail at thataway4@Cox.net. I can send a moderate resolution. The photos were taken at high resolution, and if you wish that file, I will be happy to burn it on a CD. If there is enough interest, I will gather all of the photos from everyone who took photos, and put them on one CD and mail the CD to everyone who was at the gathering.

Again what a great time--and it was fun just going over the pictures!
I hope that folks from other parts of the country look over what was done down in Apalachicola and come on down next year--it is a venue which cannot be duplicated anywhere else in this country!
 
Byrdman et al!! Great gathering, great photos, congratulations to everyone on a new Gulf Coast Event! Wish we could have been there, have a contract on our Northern VA house now and are currently in DownEast Maine decompressing.

Maybe next year Sally and I can make it. Still trying to figure out how to retire when they want to keep paying me...

Charlie and Sally
 
Gee, Charlie - they pay you? :lol: :lol:

Congrats on the house contract - come on out this way and play cuz the latch string is out and the scotch at ready.

Missed the trip back to your coast, but the doc was pretty vocal. He can't afford losing another patient. Sure appreciate the offer, though, and maybe soon. Getting better and may get cleared to take a TX trip soon.

Dusty
 
10/25 @ 12:30 central time:
Byrdman after 2 fuel filter changes is still sputtering his way home and Terry/Last Dance is in Chatanooga waiting on a starter for the motor home.
 
YYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAA!!!! And that is an understatment. Thanks to all for helping us with this gathering. It was truly a great reminder that we have some awesome folks within our C-Dory ownership crowd. Everyone always willing to help no matter what the need....launching folks, retrieving folks, welcoming folks in the dark, sharing this and that about each of the boats ......and the up river trips were a blast too. What an awesome site of looking thru the bow rail,,,and seeing 3, 4, 5 abreast and all C-Dory boats. This was one fun gig for sure. If you did not gain some weight....you simply were taking a nap or something during the meal "times.."

Thanks to everyone who tossed in beverages, coffee, deserts, foods, time and efforts. Thanks to all for making my sister Joan welcome within our fold. It was the 1st time in about 10 years that Joan and I actually got to spend time together with nothing to really have to do...or the rest of the Byrd family population group. They are all fun...but what we miss with this large family, is time to just sit and chat with just one other sibling. That in itself was a great gift to me from yall.

Wefin's, John and Sherrie, Anita (Apalachiacola Chamber of Commerce) and of course the C-Dory factory...thanks for throwing assets, time and fun into the mix.

The joint efforts of all made this one great weekend.

Now...all yall that were there....start looking around your own local water areas for similar get togethers as to allow us to enjoy your waters. Just like the two river cruises our group took....without local knowledge, those special trips do not take place and we miss that stuff.

We can all show up self contained and throw together pot luck dinners for these trips....and I am always good for burning a few eggs and stuff for omeltes for breakfast....and a bit of BBQ for other meals.

Thanks again...great photos...and YES BOB....great idea about putting together a gathering CD. That is part of the fun at the Seattle Boat Show gathering... we all have a pot luck dinner at the hotel Friday night....and folks from differant gatherings bring the CDs and they run on a laptop over in the corner allowing us all to see other waters and places to enjoy each other and our boats.


WOW... where are we going next?? See some of yall in Bahamas....and will be putting together a quick Nashville Gathering REAL SOON...as to let Roger Johnson from SENSIE to use that plane ticket to Nashville....Roger... let me know the dates..

Byrdman
 
Byrdman

Just wanted all to know we are safely land locked again and to say thanks to everyone who tolerated our continuous boating questions. .

Reinhold Messner in this issue of "National Geographic" says "Without the possibility of death, adventure is not possible". Our Monday, October16, 2006 cruise from Middle Ground Pass to Pensacola Beach Bridge was definitely an adventure.

My three mile walk through timber trails, cool, invigorating, with fall foliage showing its early colors is stimulating to my well being but does little for intelligence. My next adventure to Key West, FL in December is drawing near.

I have not set our time to central standard time but instead desire to remain on Byrdman time.

Bill and Brenda Russell
 
This was my first gathering and I had an absolute blast. My wife Donna is still whining about not being there. I don't think that will happen again. Thanks so much to our host John and the folks at Wefings for the mooring and great time.

I am a real rookie being 51 and having my first boat a Tomcat 255 and sure was happy to get some great advice from all. I think I only had the sea brats running to protect their boats from mine one time the whole trip.

The food was just outstanding and Byrdman can sure serve up some BBQ. A special thanks goes out to Byrdman for helping me get the Tomcat up on her trailer and putting his life in danger trying to get her centered. I think it took an hour away from other certainly more fun activity and I am very appreciative. I have got to figure this part out as my fiberglass took a bit of a beating.

Any and all suggestions would be appreciated. I have considered getting an electric wench or additional bunks installed on the outside but all of these ideas seem to have as many pitfalls as benefits. Each time I've put the Primadonna on a trailer, I've had folks with lots of experiance helping but still had great difficulty. She will be staying on the lift until I figure something out.

Again it was a pleasure meeting everyone and hope to connect again with all soon. Glenn
 
Glen , I got wind of your trailer tribulations . We will take care of that for you .Ill let you know when and how we get it to fix it . Thanks for coming to our gathering and we hope you bring your wife next year !!!!!
Marc
 
Bill and Brenda,
We were concerned about you all--but didn't call, since I figured you had your hands full. For those who didn't run back up on the water--the winds got to be over 25 knots on Monday--and it was a tich rough on the bays.
 
Bill and Brenda: Glad you and Falcon made it home safely. Great to meet you both. If Kay and I had the vacation saved we would meet you in Key West. It is at the top of our list of places to putter around. Be sure to click a few photos and get the photo album going. Keep us posted of your adventures. Any luck finding the water ski gloves?
 
Don..... I mean Glen... :mrgreen: Was very glad to be in the mix helping you with the recovery efforts. There are some items you can do to help with your trailering ordeal, and Marc and crew have put together some nice trailers. All trailers are just parts put together. With the TomCat...they just have to be HEAVY parts and guides. The shallow draft of the TC are not really in their favor with the wind blowing cross the aft section as it was. I like the idea of an electirc wench. Take a gander at the Discovery photo albumn. Brent and Dixie had a real nice heavy duty set up on their TC24 trailer. It too would work great for the TC255..

Bill and Brenda: What a blast to once again be able to sit, laugh and enjoy your offerings and wisdoms. I'm gonna have to print that little walk thru the woods gig and adventure and ponder it a bit. That is pretty deep stuff...but oh so true. Go take another shower, and please hug that beautifully smiling lady Brenda of yours. .....not all at the same time...or we will be looking for further adventure postings. :mrgreen:

Toss the watches, enjoy the boats, enjoy the friendships
 
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