Dragon Boat Festival!

We went to the local Dragon Boat Festival in at Wooten Park Tavares.  We had errands to run later in the day so we were mostly interested in seeing the opening ceremonies. Particularly the  Taiko drummers. They were amazing and we videoed some of the performance. You will have to excuse the people walking in front of us. The video is long so skip to the middle when the drummers really start getting down.

When entering they stamp your hand with a dragon and then you can wonder around the different tents. Viewing the teams or checking out the vendors. Or the big tent with tables where the drummers were and then you can also lay out a blanket and picnic while watching the boats race.
We decided we wanted to see those drummers and headed straight to the big tent with tables.


Dragon stamp

Dragon

Dragon's head

Friday the first day they have a big ceremony with fireworks and everything. We always seem to miss it. But I think next year we will try to go to the ceremony before the races so we can see the dragon moving.

Famous train from O' Brother where art thou?

We had followed the train tracks in and didn't miss seeing the famous Tavares train the Orange Blossem Cannonball. If you come to Tavares you can ride on the steam powered train that was in all the movies. It's a lot of fun. The Planes, Trains and BBQ will be going on in a few weeks and we will put some pictures from inside the famous train up.

One of the teams getting ready to go.

 The dock for the dragon boat racers to start is right in front of the gift shop which looks more like an old Florida beach shack.


Our spoiled dog with his lei around his neck.

It's not that our dog is fat or out of shape. He thinks he is a Chihuahua and he gets scared and wants to be carried. It's really quite a site because if we don't pick him up he will get behind us and start jumping up and down smacking us on the butt then people start starring. So, it's just better to carry him. Also some times he will be shaking just like a Chihuahua. But the Dragon Boat festival is definitely dog friendly.

 Boat's all lined up.

 

And they are off!



The race is on!

We decided to walk out on one of the docs to get a better look at the boats. And we found a little gator hiding in the grasses.

Baby Gator!

Hiding from the commotion of the race.



Walking the dog on the doc.

The lady behind me has a real chihuahua and he did not like Reese.

 There were a lot more boats to see than just dragon boats. Recently Tavares put in a lot of extra docks and there were all kinds of boats parked around.

Party barge or gator tour? It didn't have any info so I'm guessing it was someones private boat.

Also think this was someones private boat. It was a neat one.

Pick me up!

This boat would be great to camp on.

This boat was floating four pallets lashed together behind it. His own private floating party dock.

We also saw plenty of sea planes in the sea plane city. For a small fee you can even catch a ride with one of these guys. An air tour of the town.

 

Sea plane! Circling for a landing.

We realized we had to head back and finish our errands. So we walked back toward the new Lakeview Inn  and our car.

 

You can see the two new Inns right across from the lake. Boy they look like the place to stay.

We were all getting hungry even our little friend.



Lunch just ahead!

We followed the tracks back to our car.

Live band at Al's out back BBQ. No time!



Was that the cannon ball?

Our faithful hound stiffed every car before finding ours.

 

Ruts we left after getting the car unstuck from the sand.