This big beautiful 24 foot Blue Wave with a 300 hp Suzuki went out this morning, but never found a keeper. I am still seeing a lot of shrimpers out in the morning.

Lina is learning the complexities of our irrigation system. Here she is learning how to set the timer in the pool pump enclosure. Yesterday she ordered eight additional controllers online out of Houston and Fed Ex brought them out this morning. She also purchased four large popup sprinklers from Home Depot in Corpus. Our lawn was spoiled during the spring rains, but now it is suffering.

On Sunday night Simona(604) found these two baby doves under the palm trees. She took them in for the night to be sure critters didn't get them. Monday morning I made them a makeshift nest and used an old net to get it off the ground. You can see one of the parent birds walking over to check them out. However, cars kept coming in and disturbing them so I moved them into the hibiscus bushes next to 701. We watched the parents feeding them the next few days until they could fly.

Last week a guest in 203 caught this blacktip shark right behind my condo. I've had several poles out the last few days with only one ladyfish to show.

Gerald, Mike & Brenda Weiss' (303)big catch yesterday morning near marker 16.

Mike and Brenda waded the HEB shoreline this morning and she picked up an 18 inch trout.

This morning Jerry and Lina completed the project that we discussed at our last annual meeting. The tide at this time is so low boats are having great difficulty exiting our channel without getting on a full plane and hoping they get through. Jerry reported some areas are not even knee deep to him. Lina, not so much. They placed the PVC at 20 yard intervals and 20 feet apart. The total length of shallow water is just over 200 yards long. The idea is that boaters will get on a plane as soon as they pass the NO WAKE ZONE sign next to John Cieslewicz house and try to stay centered between the markers. This should blow out the loose sand that has filled our last dredge and create a V bottom that will make the entry and exit easier. Texas Parks and Wildlife uses this method in areas of our bays that have shoaled to the point of being closed off to boat traffic and it seems to work well.
Dredging will cost in the area of $120,000 and last about a year. Let's hope this works.

 Not yesterday, but the Saturday before, will be a day at Bayfront that will live in infamy. A very large group rented a few condos here and a good number at Phase II. Party central was held at our pool. We had a myriad of complaints from guests who were not part of this party. They took over our pool completely. They erected a cabana designed for being in a pool, put a keg next to the fence, turned up the music loud and the louder language was often vulgar. We had three board members here and we all shook our collective heads about what could be done. Our security was busy handling complaints, but we were all caught off guard. We also had complaints about the number and collection of cabanas erected on the beach. They even used our bench to secure one of the cabanas. Our pool was so polluted we had to shut in down on Sunday morning and our pool service has been coming out twice a day since to try to clean it up. Even today the water is not yet cleared up. We cannot let this happen again.  Our next board meeting will be focused on what can be done.

About ten days ago in the mid morning hours we had this sudden and heavy shower. I checked radar as no rain was in the forecast. Radar showed one very small blip of rain in the whole state of Texas situated right over our complex. We actually got .25 inches in about 15 minutes.

We had a decent incoming tide about 10 days ago. This loaded tackle box floated into our marina. It was about half full of water, but Jerry pulled it ashore and I dried it out here in the sun. No one every mentioned losing one. I have to guess it was lost out in the bay and found our channel. Many years ago the then current owner of 208, and he still reads my blog, and I were fishing Cedar Bayou while it was still open. He set his tackle box down on the beach and we walked a few hundred yards toward the gulf. When we returned the tide had risen rapidly and his tackle box had floated toward Mesquite Bay. We never found it.

Colson and Conner(308) had a good two days fishing on Friday and Saturday. Not bad for not even needing a boat. Colson was having no luck from the crossbridge on Friday morning so I showed him where the current hot spot is. At least he shared the information with his little brother.

There are still some nice fish at Port O'Conner.

Daily Limit Guide Service

Another great day of fishing! 4 man limits of trout, beer salt, modelo, and a bonus flounder. Released several more up to 27"! July 30th is still open, give me a call and we will slam some fish!!! 361-649-6509

Also I'm seeing something out my bay window this morning that I have not seen in years. There are 8 shrimp boats working close in to our condos. This is what we were hoping the opening of Cedar Bayou would do.

Lina is always tuned in to watch for trip hazards. Here is what she sent me showing Kimi taking care of one of these hazards. BTW tonight Kimi is pulling security duty. She has been very helpful to our operations.

Attached are pictures of the steps between the 500 and 600 building that are being painted.

We are painting them white for now to avoid a future liability of a miss-step and fall such as myself that almost occurred.

From the upward view, it doesn't look like steps, just looks like a small downward hill versus looking from the bottom of the steps it's visible during the day but I am sure at night if it's dark, you would not see them.

I took a picture of Kimi with the water view and who wouldn't want to work in this environment.

Jerry finished the drain line for the pool back flush to go into our sewer today. Helen Porter, 206, helped Jerry out a bit. He welcomed the help. Helen will be a senior this year at Ingleside where her mother, Lynne, is the assistant superintendent and her father, Butch, is a football coach.

Every summer when we have to backwash our pool daily, the grass turns a bright yellow from all the chemicals released on it. Jerry considered trenching all the way to the sewer behind 708 to install a drain line for the pool water. I told him that years ago we placed a conduit and a 2 inch pvc pipe under the roadway at the corner below that runs to the area next to my condo. It would be less work to drain the water that direction. It's hard to see in the picture, but the pvc pipe is just above the conduit.

Jerry dug into the ground next to the sidewalk and found the end of the pvc pipe and sewer pipe also. He spliced into the sewer pipe and below his friend, Shelly, watches him make the final connection to drain the pool water into the sewer, on this side anyway. Now he will have to connect the end near the pool pump.

This is our pier gate lock after someone kicked their way in again. This has happened several times this summer. The lock costs more than $300 and it takes a lot of time to repair the gate to reinstall a lock. After years of not locking the pier, interlopers seem to think they have a right to fish on it. Could be folks who spend their summer week in Rockport at a facility that does not have a pier and have grown accustomed to using ours. Late at night our gate is just at the mercy of those who are determined to destroy it.
Ironically, I have not seen, nor have I heard of a single, not even one, keeper fish being caught off this pier in my recent memory. After all the heavy rains this spring, it seems the fish have moved to water with a higher salt content. Even the mitigation site has produced nothing. I think in legal terms our pier is just an attractive nuisance this year.

Kimi spent part of today sprucing up the paint on our office. It seems as if every time I see her she has a paint brush in her hand. She seems to always wear black when she plans to paint. She says it makes her paint more carefully. I've tried that, but invariably, I end up with paint in all the wrong places, on me.

 Kimi has learned how to clean our lift station. It's a really dirty job, but somebody has to do it. She cleaned it here before the 4th, but today, after many flushes over the weekend, she cleaned it again. What a mess. We should be cleaning every day during the summer, but Jerry's bad back won't let him lift the heavy lid on this thing. Mike(608) has made a new, lighter lid and will bring it down soon.

We survived another July 4th. Again the condos were full, but the crowds were not that bad. The dumpsters were not even overloaded. Of course, as we can see above it would have been better to have let these charcoal leftovers cool and put them in the dumpster instead of dumping the hot coals on our newly planted grass. Pretty obvious which condo guests did this.

Kimi washed the entryways last week. Below is the before and after the washing. These little details are often overlooked.

Lina and her daughter, Kimi, marked off a target for the dumpster truck driver to place our dumpsters after he dumps them into his truck. He had been putting them any which way. When he emptied them on Monday, he hit the targets perfectly. I told Lina we should call the Allied office to let them know the driver did a great job. I'm sure they are used to getting only complaints.
Also, we had a short HOA board meeting on Sunday and named Lina our newest property manager. She is doing a great job. Her experience in property management is a real asset for our property.