Port Isabel Christmas Lighted Boat Parade and Louie's Back Yard

This afternoon at 4 PM our Winter Ranch Bus took 44 of our people to Louie's Back Yard on South Padre Island to watch the 28th Annual Port Isabel Christmas Lighted Boat Parade and have dinner. Our sister park, Trophy Gardens, filled another bus and many others who couldn't get on the bus drove down for the festivities. Lee and I drove down as we missed getting signed up for the bus. Many other did the same. We had about 100 people at Louie's Back Yard for the parade.

 A pelican

 It's getting dark so the boats may be

 starting out from Port Isabel shortly

Louie's Back Yard has a Buffet Special on Saturdays which is all you can eat for about $24. Since the all you can eat includes shrimp prepared in lots of different ways, crab cakes and crab legs with butter, we always get the buffet. The prime rib looks really good too though and you can get it off the menu for $15! We just can't seem to pass up the seafood!

 Some of our group waiting in the Buffet Line at Louie's Back Yard

 Bill and Jean Snyder

 Elinor and Jan

 Sun has set

We ordered the $5 drink special which was a Tsunami (a huge tropical fruit drink made with various types of rum.) The other special was a Blue Smurf (a margarita drink). Both of them were $5 each and I can sip on it all night long! Then we ordered the buffet and went over and picked up our appetizers - all kinds of shrimp made various ways, crab cakes and a few other tasty morsels. Since we arrived before the bus, we held down a table for 10 for our group, however, Louie's had a section that would hold 100 reserved for all of us so we had plenty of room. 

 Char and Jack showing off the crab legs - all you can eat!  YUM!

After the buses arrived, Lee and I went back to the buffet. We skipped the salad bar all together and filled up on more fresh shrimp and crab legs! After we stuffed ourselves with all of that, Char and Jack talked us into sharing a piece of pumpkin cheesecake. It was deliciously sinful!

Some kids were feeding the catfish off the side of the deck at Louie's so I got up and took a picture of them.  There were tons of them!

 Pearl and she said to let everyone know 

that the drink was not hers!!

 Rosie getting ready for the next plateful

Lee and I showing off our Tsunamis - They are a tropical fruit and rum drink - very sweet!  The Tsunamis and the Blue Smurfs (a margarita drink) were the $5 specials for the evening!

 Richard and Donna enjoying their drinks!

 Lud and Connie - you can see these drinks go over well!

 Pat and Beth

 Marvin and Della

 Steve and Judy 

 Bob and Kathy

Char and Jack talked us into sharing a piece of 

pumpkin cheesecake.  It was deliciously sinful!

 John and Ginni

 Dave and Donna

 Jack and Donna - Jack drove one of the buses down

 Don and Sylvia

AND THE BOATS HAVE ARRIVED AT LOUIE'S

We had plenty of time to eat before the boats arrived at Louie's. Then everyone was up and taking pictures of them. One of them put off a bunch of fireworks which looked a little dangerous to us but was pretty!  

This boat let off fireworks and in the end you 

couldn't see the boat anymore!

Then while everyone was figuring out the bills and the boats were gone, these kids came ski boarding by the back yard at Louie's so we took a couple of pictures of them. It was dark so they didn't turn out too well. It seems to be boarding in the dark isn't the safest thing to do but they were young and probably felt indestructible!

We walked out with the people heading to the buses. The police were asking the buses to get off the street as we came by so Jack and Jim, the bus drives, pulled into the big parking lot. We have one bus that we share with Trophy Gardens but we borrowed a bus from another Wilder park so that more people could go. The two buses were full (88 people on them) and we had a lot more of us drive down so it was a real party!