Salty Podcast #30 | ⛵ Sailing Through Time: Bear Point Marina's Rich History ⛵🏖️ - Salty Podcast: Sailing

Episode Transcript
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Tinsley Myrick (00:00):
Good evening everybody.
This is Tinsley Myrick and thisis a combined, special combined
episode of the Salty Podcastand the Gettin' Beachy Podcast.
I'm going to put this up hereand read a little introduction.
I felt it fitting to combinethis topic because this will
pertain to both sailors, boaters, as well as Orange Beach Gulf

(00:23):
Shores area and real estateenthusiasts.
Tonight, we're diving into thefascinating history and exciting
future of Bear Point Marina,now known as Bear Point Harbor,
in Orange Beach, alabama.
We'll explore the marina's richpast and its journey through
various improvements andupgrades.
We'll discuss the remarkablerecovery from Hurricane Sally in

(00:44):
September 2020.
The conversation will blendhistorical insights along with
modern advancements.
It's perfect for both sailingenthusiasts and real estate
investors.
Now let's meet our guest, whowill share their unique
perspectives and experiencesMarcus Kruk, giving us the
historical perspective, andCraig Reeves, the current owner,

(01:05):
giving us present and future.
Without further ado, we are now.
Thank you very much, guys.

Marcus Kruk (01:14):
Marcus and Craig, how are you tonight Good, thank
you, thank you.

Yeah, great.
So, marcus, okay, I'm soexcited to talk to you.
I'm excited to talk to both ofyou, but let's start with you.
So your dad bought Bear PointMarina 1968.
Now, I think, from mycalculations, you were four.

Yes, right, yes.

I can't ask you what you remember of that day,
probably, but why don't you tellus what you heard about when
your dad bought the marina in?

1968?
Yeah, so to give you a littlebackground, my dad was a Navy
helicopter pilot and I wasactually born in Tom's River,
New Jersey, near Lakehurst NavalAir Station.
And dad was got out of Vietnam,got stationed at NAS in
Pensacola and he was on a hopsomewhere and he had the copy of

(02:16):
the Wall Street Journal and hesaw Bear Point Marina for sale
in that journal and as soon ashe landed he made the calls and
set up the meeting and actuallywound up purchasing the marina.
My mother, my grandmother, hadto mortgage her house to get
them the money to which I thinkwas $120,000 when he bought the
marina and he bought it and ofcourse he was stationed at NAS.

(02:42):
My mother was a dental hygienist, so of course we we came down
and moved into the Marina.
We moved in upstairs where thebar is now.
There was an apartment up thereand, like we were talking a
while ago, we were up there forabout four or five years before
we moved into a different housebehind I say behind the Marina,
actually behind the parking lotback there.
Stay there for a year year, andthen we built a house, um gosh,

(03:07):
down over on washingtonboulevard.

Craig Reaves (03:09):
But uh, yeah, it was, it was a dream come true.

It was, uh, you know, coming.
Coming here is a little boy.
I do remember it.
I remember I was so scared Iwould fall through the cracks
can I just ask you a question?

I've got, I've got the uh, the picture that you
sent me from 1968 that your dadtook from the helicopter, this
house right here.
I don't know if you can see it.
Is this the house that youlived in, this up here?

No, well, we lived in the top of the marina, so
upstairs, downstairs was thelounge, you know the crooked.
They had the crack in the floor, it was all.
The floor was crooked andupstairs was a.
It was three bedrooms, littlelittle small bedrooms, a kitchen
and a little living room, andthat's that's where we lived

(03:56):
upstairs for many years, yeah,and dad was still in the Navy in
the beginning and my mother wasa.
She was a dental hygienist, sheworked in Foley, so they both
worked 24 seven.
You know people.
When I tell them I grew up in aMarina, I think all that had to
be fun.
It was just like being on afarm.
I mean, we never stoppedworking.

(04:16):
You know storms are coming, youhad to get out and check the
boats and I was the gas pump boyfor forever.

But yeah, there was fuel.
There was fuel back then.

Yeah, sure, sure was, yeah, and of course you
know the Bear Point Pier.
There there was a connectionfrom the marina to the pier and
it was just traffic back andforth.
People were coming up to themarina to get Cokes and snacks
and we sold Stewart sandwiches.
I don't know if anybodyremembers that, but it was like
a, a little, little oven.
You'd pop in this littlesandwich and it was in a little

(04:49):
plastic bag and, uh, but we hadthe pickled eggs and uh, of
course we had cold beer.
You know, we had pool tables, uhand uh, we, my dad, found these
old ship, uh, ship stores.
They were, uh, looks like, ofcourse we call it epoxy now, but
it was resin, but it was likean old door off a ship and we
had all those in there.

(05:09):
Uh, and it was a.
It was a neat atmosphere.
My mom, she loved to decorate,she, uh, she did some stuff on
the outside and, uh, we hadrattan, uh, wicker, uh, rugs all
over the floor and it was, itwas a neat place.
We had a jukebox and all nightyou know when dad's back there
tending bar after he's been, youknow, at the navy base, all day

(05:29):
um, I always sat on top of thejukebox and uh, and I'd get in
trouble a lot of times becauseI'd be, you know, rapping to the
music.
You know, of course, all youknow 70s music, which is still
on my heart probably from that,but uh, just a, just an
incredible place to grow up.

Well, what did you think about New Jersey to
Orange Beach Alabama.

Well, you know, my memories of New Jersey are
really faint.
I don't really remember much atall you know, because we were
living with my grandparents whendad was in Vietnam and of
course he made that, you know hegot stationed, he came home for

(06:11):
a little bit and then gotstationed right down to
pensacola and then acquired themarina very, very soon
thereafter.
So and he was, I think he hadanother year or so left in the
navy and then of course he gotout at that point.
So and then and then, and then,at that point he opened up the,
uh, the boat sales uh, whichwas in I think 74.
Uh, he opened the boat saleshowroom which is now where the
parking lot is, uh across thestreet, and we we had, uh,
believe this or not, we werenumber I think three or four in

(06:34):
the nation uh on mercury, uh,mercury motor outboard sales
down there in little bear pointalabama I want to.

okay, so if you can see my cursor, like this
part right here, I just findfascinating.
There's nothing there likethere is now, so I'm going to
show you a picture of it nowfrom Google.
Oh, wow, yeah, so it was justthis part, and it wasn't even
like there weren't that manyboats in here and there weren't

(07:05):
that many big boats in there atall.
But all this I don't know whenit was added.
Maybe Craig knows, but that'san amazing difference.
And then here's a picture thatCraig sent.

Oh, this is Craig's picture.

Because I can see Craig's boat right there.
So I know this is a recentpicture.

We did have some.
We had 10 sheds.
The boat sheds covered slips.
We did have some big boatsbecause me and my buddies we'd
camp out and then we'd alwayssneak into the boats at night.
So you know something fun andmischievous to do as a youngster
.

What were you doing on the boats at night?

We were looking for alcohol.
That's when I was, like youknow, eight or nine, so you know
.

Oh yeah, I did things like that, yeah, so,
craig, what do you think aboutthat price?

We yeah.
So, craig, what do you thinkabout that price?
We did a little bit worse thanthat, I'm afraid $120,000.

You know, I'm a real estate agent and I can look
back at the records that wehave that we pay for in our dues
and everything and it only goesback to $95, 95.
And I couldn't find anything.
I did find one thing online.
I did a chat GPT and it said itwas built in 52.
And I tried the city of OrangeBeach and they said that

(08:37):
supersedes the city of OrangeBeach, which was in 84.
So I tried Baldwin County andthey said you need to contact,
help me out here US Corps ofEngineers and look for the
dredging permit date.

I don't have it.
The dredging didn't happenuntil, probably until the 68th
edition, when they cut the basinin or somewhere in there.
But I've seen a picture fromprobably 1920s of a Bear Point
Marina sign with a wooden gate,I mean like it's been here, for
there's been a marina here for along time.

(09:17):
I don't think it was in presentform, but of course.
But yeah, I wonder if it wasthere?

I wonder if it was there I wonder if it was.

Yeah, it was the same same place, but it the, the
, uh, the, the basin that wehave cut in the l-shaped part
that comes in from the, from thebay now for monica bay.
Um, it probably ended, itprobably began some, some in
some form from there, but butI've never seen, you know, I've

(09:46):
never seen that.

But yeah, interesting Huh, so you think
that I wonder when the permits?
All that's all that you know,having to have a permit to
dredge, and all that.
I don't know when that started.

You know if that's in the 60s before, I would
imagine that they didn't have apermit you know, back, then they
probably just dug it out, youknow it's like yeah.
You know, there's a few othermarinas, you know, around that.
We had, you know, sportsman'sMarina, which was interesting.
I had one of my best buddiestoday, you know, we were the

(10:21):
same age and his parents wererunning Sportsman's Marina and
then the Peters, they had theOrange Beach Marina and we'd,
all you know, ride the bustogether.
You know the bus would come.

I found a date for that one 1978,.
I believe Orange Beach, marina.
Okay, yeah, yeah, but I did notrealize sportsmen had been
there that long.
Yeah, yeah, for sure, yeah it.
It was, of course, totallydifferent, obviously, but uh,
and they did the same thing.
There was a, there was a housethat they, in the marina, you

(10:53):
know, they sold fuel, they sold,uh, snacks and stuff like that.
I don't know if they had a baror a lounge, like we did, a gulf
gate had the lounge, which wasreal.
I remember gulf gate yeah, yeah,that was the Sunday happening
spot.
You know, with Kenny Stablerand all his buddies back in the
day, gulfgate was always goingcrazy.

(11:13):
You'd see the Canal Road justlined up with cars.
You know, back in the 70s withGulfgate just going crazy.

I was here the night that it burned in the 90s
what's that?
I was here the night that itburned in the 90s.
What's that?
I was here the night that itburned in the 90s.
Oh, really yeah.

Oh, I forgot about that.
I've been here since 1990, butyeah, I think I remember
something about that.
So, craig, let's switch over toyou.
We're not done with you, marcus.
So you came down here lookingfor a trailer park to buy.
I did.
You ended up with marina yeah,my son.

My son had just gotten in the commercial real
estate business and uh, hecalled me one morning.
He said I found your trailerpark.
He said, but it floats.
And uh, he was not wrong.

It's the same thing, the same principle, for
sure but it started in 2013 yoursearch, and you actually ended
up buying the marina in 2016,right?

that's right.

Yeah, that's about right, so yeah, I have a
story to tell her about that.
I came in to get some some fuelat the dock and I was like,
well, who's this guy?
And I thought, well, maybe heworked there.
And you said, no, I'm the newowner.
I was like, oh, and you werevery humble, you weren't
insulted or anything, but youwere there to help me with my
fuel and I was I I had my boat.

(12:37):
I was staying at bear pointmarina at the time and um, and I
didn't even know it was forsale.
The guy before Ken, what was?

his name Nettles yeah.

Did he have it for a year or less than a year?

A little over a year, I mean like 14 months or
something like that.
So just and Robin Wade had itfor many years before that and
I'm not sure I think he's theone that did the renovations in
99 and that kind of thing, themajor money that was spent in
there.
But yeah, I started out notknowing marina business at all,

(13:14):
other than being a boater all mylife, so it was an education.
The learning curve was prettysteep, I can tell you curve was
pretty steep, I can tell you.

But yeah, tell about the uh experience when you
bought it and what you wereexpecting when the day you
showed up and what actuallyhappened.
That's a good story well.

So we, we went to closing on friday, uh, friday
morning about 11 o'clock and, umthe uh, the previous owner
handed me a really just a bag ofkeys and I mean like a Ziploc
bag full of stuff, and that wasabout it.

(13:54):
I said were we going to meet atthe marina?
I had some understanding thatwe didn't really write down
exactly what we were going to doand I really didn't know what
to ask.
I made a lot of assumptions,probably, but anyway, I said
were we going to do?
And I really didn't know whatto ask.
I just made a lot ofassumptions, probably, but
anyway, I said are we going tomeet down this afternoon?
He said, oh yeah, we're goingto go get some lunch and then
I'll see you this afternoon.
And so my son and I went afterclosing got some lunch in

(14:16):
Fairhope which is where closingwas and so meandered down here
and got to the marina and therewas nobody.
It was a ghost town.
There was.
All the lights were off, therewas a sign on the door that said
closed for inventory, and I waslike this isn't good.

(14:41):
And so I run into some guy inthe parking lot who turned out
to be a liveaboard guy down here.
That just kind of.
Who was that John John?
I can't remember his last name,but anyway I remember.

John, yeah.

But anyway.
So that's the first person Iran into.
I said you seen the previousowner and he goes, or seen Ken
and he goes.
You probably won't see him.
I'm like, what do you mean?
He said, well, he's alreadycome and gone.

Oh, I lost your.

How in the world does that?

work.

So John knew that it was.

I'm sorry.
Yeah, yeah, he did.
He was one of the few.
It was not on the market forlong.
It came up like on a Fridaymorning.
We had it under contract onMonday, so it was quick and so
it was.
And it was never reallyofficially hit the MLS anyway,
because there was a kind of apreemptive like just an email

(15:39):
blast to all the agents inBaldwin County and my son was on
that list and so that's how heknew about it.
I missed it, yeah.

It was quick.

I mean, we had it nailed down pretty quick yeah.

Yeah.

But yeah, so I did that, but anyway.
So I walked in or I go to thedoor.
The door's locked, the sign onthe door says closed for
inventory.
All the lights were off.
I mean, I was there two daysbefore that and they had a cute
little perky blonde behind thecounter.
There was a dock hand andlights were on and they were
selling beer, they were doingall their stuff and you know,

(16:15):
everything looked great.
I'm like I'm going to be hereFriday after closing.
I'll introduce myself.
We'll, you know, we'll, we'llroll on, you know, and pick
these people up and it wassupposed to be kind of a handoff
.
I'll let me show you how thingswork and all that they were
supposed to be.
It turned out that, uh, itturned out that the cute little
perky blonde was the?
Um son's girlfriend who was thedockhand, and I didn't know

(16:38):
that either.
And uh, anyway, there was alady that I'd never seen before
behind the counter and she toldme who she was.
She was paid out for the restof the day.
She used to work in the storeand help run the marina.
She'd been there for severalyears, but I'd never seen her
before.

And she quit shortly after.

Ken got it.
She quit.
Yeah, I was like where's Sherit?
Yeah, she didn't.
I was like where's Sherry?

Oh, she didn't like the new situation, and so
she left.

That's exactly right.

She popped up.
I guess Ken said hey, can youcome help the new owner?

That's exactly right.
Well, he didn't even do that.
All he wanted to do was get herto close his books out, so he
could close and leave.
And so that's what he did, andhe anyway.
So she was paid till 5 o'clock.
This was about 3.30.
And I said, well, how would youfeel about working here for a

(17:37):
while?
And we had this mutual jobinterview.

That was the right person, Marcus.
That was the right person to bethere.
She knew, she didn't know shewas actually.

She knew where all the skeletons were.
She knew how everything worked.
We were out of fuel.
She knew who to call.
I mean we had.
We had more stuff like that.
I had no idea.
I thought I was going to havesome on the job training from
this guy, but I didn't see foranother two months by the way.
And we were out of fuel.

He was hit, for the hills he was man, he'd had
enough.

And so, yeah, we called, and I called Davidson
Fuel no account set up, no,nothing, no credit card number,
no, nothing and said, hey, weare out of fuel, I need to get
tomorrow's Saturday.
We need to.
We can't be out of fuel.
I need to get tomorrow'sSaturday, and you know we need
to, we can't be out of gas.
Right, and they sent us 10,000,or you know, 8,000 gallons of.
They sent us 8,000 gallons offuel with nothing, and and and

(18:34):
got us out of the hole.
We did it all in a week.
Oh my God, yeah, but yeah,exactly, I mean, I'm like you
know so anyway, so so needlessto say they're still our fuel
supplier and

will be there you go.
Yeah, you made it happen.
You and god was shining, waslooking down on you when he sent
sherry up there because Ihaven't seen her in a long time.
I was glad she came back.

I was so happy she was gone for a year, and or
more, and, and um a little overa year, and so no, but she was
the right person, it wasabsolutely a God thing.
And she agreed to work for twoyears and she's still here and
has been eight.
Oh wow, that's awesome.
So she really is anunbelievable work ethic,

(19:16):
unbelievable person.

She runs a tight ship.

She does, which makes up for me because I don't
I need management.
So anyway, she's been super.
The community has beenfantastic.
It's all been an amazingexperience, given where I
started and not knowing morethan I did, so I've been very
blessed for sure.

That's awesome, that's awesome, that's awesome.
You worked in demolition andwaste management.

Yeah, we had a landfill, a roll-off container
company, that kind of thing,building, demolition,
environmental contracting, thatkind of thing.

Well, that kind of seems like you'd be ready for
anything.

Well, it has been.
I mean, the experience I've hadwith the electrical stuff and
just the construction backgroundthat I've had has kind of led
to me I kind of keep the wheelsglued on, I guess down here.
There you go.
So that's worked, it's beengood.

All right, let's go back to old, old, uh, old
old.

You know, I didn't mean that, marcus hey, I just
turned 60, so watch out, I amright behind you.

So let's just look at um.
I want to show some of thesehistoric.
Now tell me what's going on inthis picture.
This is really cool.
Uh, so this is the building youlived in, is that right?

See the two windows and then the motor, the
outboard motors to the right,which was just a plastic motor
that you know, mercury.

Oh, I see it right there.

Yeah, but those two windows where that was the
living room and then directlybehind that was the kitchen,
which looked out of the otherside of the marina, out on the
road, and to the left was mybedroom and then to the right
was a little guest room and thenmy mom and dad's room.

And in the staircase.
Well, is any part of this stillhere?
Craig and Marcus.

You know, I don't know, but I do know that when I
walk into that space, it, the,the, the space feels the same.
You know, the, the size, the,the feel, um, you know, of
course, whenever we would go upupstairs, we would we wouldn't
enter upstairs the way it is now.
We would go, um, I guess, wherethe kitchen is, that's where we

(21:36):
would go upstairs to getupstairs, yeah, uh, and then
there was a side door that wouldgo outside.
And then outside to the right,we actually raised pigeons, so
we had a big pigeon coop outthere, but yeah, and of course
then the piers right down belowit.

Well, back in 2000,.
I haven't told Craigig this, um, I had, I, I got married, and
so my shower, my bridal, it was2000.
My bridal shower was in theupstairs room at the restaurant.
So is that where you lived?
Yes, well, oh, my god.

Well, the bar that's up there now that where
you lived, yes, oh my God.
Well, the bar that's up therenow that, I guess would have
been.

I haven't been up there in years so I don't
know, what's up there now, Craig?
Am I right that?

looks completely different up there.
The downstairs is similar indesign, but the upstairs was
completely.
Definitely some modifications.

It was an apartment.

Yes.

It was a house.
Yeah, the ceilings were taller,ceilings were real low, um, I
remember that, um, but uh, andof course you know we didn't
have, I think, when we got there.
I don't think we had airconditioning for a while, so we
had the windows open and I tellyou you want to go to sleep like
.
just listen to those bargesgoing up and down the bay at
night would just put me right tosleep.

(23:04):
That is still one of myfavorite sounds ever to hear a
tugboat at night, and it's justso soothing.

So do you recognize these boats here?

No, I don't, I don't Not then, because that was
that was that we were there fora little while, I guess because
we had we, I think when wefirst got there we did not have
the Mercury dealership, so thatwas probably, you know, 70,
maybe 69, 70, probably in thatshot.
And then this is a shot ofacross the street.

(23:37):
We had a big metal showroom.

This is you, this is him.
Right here, craig, across thestreet, we had a big metal
showroom.

This is him.
This is him right here.
Craig, that's, this is me.
Yeah, my mom, my dad, my sisterand we carried uh, we carried
gosh 27 different brands.
We had mako aquasport.
Uh, we had, uh, the skinautique.
Uh, we had checkmatehydrostream.
Those were go fast boats and alot of people came to us because
we had some really good boatriggers and we would rig up a go
fast.

(24:03):
So you take a hydro stream witha course Nowadays the motors
are huge, but you know, put a150 on a little, you know 14, 15
foot hydro stream and had thehot foot and the jack plates,
and so it was.
It was kind of a thing we wereknown for back in the day, which
, of course, kenny St his crewwould come down here.
That brought us a lot ofpublicity and a lot of his

(24:24):
friends and other people wouldcome down and then we also had
the indian motorcycle uhfranchise I was going to say
those yeah yeah wow, those aredirt bikes.
Uh, so you know, you know indianas a as a street bike, but I at
some point they might havegotten acquired by amf or or
somebody else at that time, butthey did have the dirt bikes and

(24:45):
of course all the roads downthere were all dirt.
You know all.
You know just, uh, red clayroads and I had the indian 50
and indian 80.
You said it was it was a lot offun, uh, and it was, matter of
fact, hard becoming an adultafter that, but, but, but it was
a lot of work.
I, I, you know I always thatwas my first boat, um, and me

(25:07):
and my buddies would get in thatthing and and I'd get in
trouble all the time because wewould be in the middle of the,
the boat basin paddling aroundand and the boats are trying to
navigate around us and uh, um,but yeah, that was, that was
just a, uh, an old wooden boat.
Dad, I don't know, maybe heacquired it with the Marine and
it it wound up being my, myfirst boat.

But uh, you didn't have.
You didn't have an engine.

No, no, just the paddles.
You see my two apps, tommy andGeorge Whittle.
They're, they're my, they're mymotor.
And then, uh, corky is the guyon the back, and I cannot
believe I remember their names.
When I found this picture theother day, it just come flooding
back to me and, uh, but no,that was, that was paddle.
Paddle power or we throw theanchor paddle power and then,
and then pull it.
You know, throw the anchor, pullit.

(25:50):
You know that that was anotherway to get her get around, but
so, craig, this is where yourboat is now.

Isn't that incredible how different that
looks yeah, it is, it is.

It really is crazy .

And my boat's right over here somewhere and
look, here's the, here's the,the bear point.
I guess that uh that launch wasthere.

Boat launch.
Well, I don't.
I know we had a boat launch inthe Marina as well, and uh, yeah
that was, that was one of myjobs.
It was, uh was.
We had a sign up, you know, adollar fifty to launch, and if I
wanted to make extra money Iwould just go down there and
collect and I would keep the 50cents that was, that was part of
mine and my dad's deal.
So there's a lot of people,wouldn't you know?

(26:33):
They wouldn't put any money inthe box, but but I know I know
you were standing there.

They had to, yeah, they had to.
They're standing there.

They had to, yeah, they had to, and of course, they
want me to help them.

I'm going, oh, I'm just here to collect the
money, so it was part of yourproperty, craig yeah, so did
somebody sold it?

I'm not sure what it was within the basin.

Yeah, I'm not sure at what point that became.
I think initially it was partof the marina property.

It got deeded to the bpca at some point.
I think, um, am I right aboutthat, marcus or gosh?
You know we back then.
You know, being younger, Ialways just assumed it was all
of ours.
You know even that.
You know the the piece across.
You know the basin where allthe sand is over there.
Right, I never knew it wasn'tours, but I think a sliver of it
was.
But uh, but, uh, yeah yeah, butuh look at that okay isn't it
something?

(27:29):
my mom had to wear that ski vest, so that little ski uh ski
thing keep me from drowning.
But I I took it off as soon asshe turned her back.

So yeah, you know, I don't see it on you
there.

Yeah.

You were a cute little fella, by the way.
This is your grand.
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Yeah, we sold those ski barges, which were neat
boats, uh, of course, themotorcycles.
We had, uh, sunfish, we had uhhobie cat, um, so I learned to
sail, you know, as a youngster.
I I still today I don't knowany nautical sailing terminology
, but I can take a catamaran andand fly the hall all the way

(28:19):
across the bay.
But I I because because we just, you know, didn't know, we just
took the boat and went sailing,you know.
So we had airboats.
We didn't get into any of thebig boats, but just usually
anywhere from, you know, up inthe upper 20s, the Aquasports
and Makos.
They got a little bit bigger.
But yeah, we had a verysuccessful business.

(28:44):
And then one of the challengeswe ran into was after frederick
in 79.
Uh, of course, we had a lot ofrecovery.
There was a lot of damage andthen, of course, the economy.
You know, um, with jimmy carterwas in office, there was a lot
of excise taxes on fuel, um,luxury taxes, and so that was a
combination of those thosethings.
The economy, the hurricane, thatwas a combination of those
those things, the economy, thehurricane, that, that that you

(29:05):
know, that's when we put theMarine up for sale and when it
was sold, I was like, well, whatam I supposed to do?
That was my, that was what Iwas going to do for my life and
it, you know it is actually.
This entire interview was alittle emotional, because then
my wife just tells me to get agrip, but because it was such a
you know, to to leak to, to nothave it anymore, for it not to

(29:25):
be part of our life, uh was Ibet it was really really
devastating for for us and uhyeah, you were about 16 when I
guess yeah, oh my gosh yeah, 17,and uh, it was like that's,
that was the plan.
So you know, such is life, right, every plan's changed.
That's my dad to the right, mygrandfather to the left and

(29:48):
that's me and my dog.
And that was a boat Dad had inNew Jersey.
It was the first fiberglasslures and it delaminated like a.
You know, it was horrible.

It did last too, long.

But we had.
It was a charter boat and wechartered it Captain Gaston
Hunter, who lived down there inBear Point.
He was our captain and I wouldbe the mate.
But I was a horrible matebecause I just wanted to fish.
I didn't understand.
I was supposed to be working.
So, Captain Hunter.
He said he told my dad he saidyou better get your boy in line.
He's not going back out with meanymore because he's fishing

(30:24):
over the customers.
But you know I'm slow so ittook me a while to figure it out
, but I finally got there, wow.

Again.
You were really cute.
So this was how old were youthere?
About 10?
.

Probably maybe seven, eight, maybe Eight or 9.
73, 72, something like that1970.
Yeah.

Okay, and here's .
Stan Kruk and his wife Dee,announced the Dockside Club and
what is the Dockside Club?

That's not really ringing any bells.
I guess it might have been justthe uh, the bar inside the
marina.
Uh, because we, you know wereally got it.
It was a hot spot back in theday, you know everybody down
there, of course oh, I'm suretoday you know, everybody would
come down there and I don't know.
You guys probably know this,but there was a big crack in the
floor.
You know, all the way down, uh,east, uh, east to west, west

(31:22):
was a big crack and you'd walkin.

Is the crack still there?

Craig no, Did you ever hear about the crack Craig?

I never did no.

Really yeah, so it was a big thing, even when I run
into people.
You know, from the day theytalk about that.
Yeah, it was a significantcrack in the floor.
It all tilted towards the boatbasin.

Oh, so the structure got affected by?
When did that come about?

No, don't know.
So it was there whenever webought it, so it was just part
of it.

We just let it be Worked around it.

Yeah worked around it.

It was a good place to stump your toe, because
nobody wore shoes back then.

Yeah, I guess they made you fix that.
Let's see you have any otherthan Frederick.
Did you have any memorablehurricanes?

No, there really wasn't any.
I know, you know, everybodywould talk about Camille and
then Frederick, and that wasreally it.
You know we, we never reallyhad anything other than those
two.

You were there.
You didn't really get it badfor Camille, though, did you?

No, we weren't there for Camille, right,
Because Camille was what Well?

it was 69.
It was 69.

Yeah, 10 years later, 79 for Frederick, yep.
Right so no, we didn't reallyfeel anything from from that.
But but no, you know, I don'treally never was ever really
tuned into the fact that we werein a place that had hurricanes
until Frederick.
And then you know, obviouslythere it was.
But I remember we we came downcanal road and we turned, turned

(32:58):
to come down to the Marina andthe water was up about more than
halfway up the road.
You know it was up that highbut not a lot of damage to the
marina.
We lost all the tops of all theboat sheds but that was really
really about it in damage.
So yeah, we weathered fairlywell.

What about the boats that were in there?

Boats did fine, fine, yeah, boats did good, um,
but that's, you know, I don'tremember any boats, you know.
Then, again, back I was, whatwas I?
Maybe 16 then, or maybe or may,no, um, I don't, I don't, but
it I don't remember anythingwith.
Uh, I do remember all the metalyou know, tops of all the boat
sheds were all, were all goneand uh and a lot of.

So there were.
There were tops like peoplethere were, yeah, covers over
the slips.

Yes, we had covered slips.
Sure did yeah we did.

You know that craig yeah, I did.

I knew somebody had a boat, or their grandfather
had a boat in here in the early70s.
Um, or their grandfather had aboat in here in the early 70s.
Is the name of the boat, by anychance, dean Stewart?

Was it the Marco?

I don't know, it may have been.
It was a trawler, and I've gota picture of the little spider
monkey that y'all had on thecounter going through the
cabinets.
Yeah Well, the monkey goingthrough the cabinets.

Yeah Well, the monkey, because I hated that
monkey, the monkey.
Whenever we built the showroomacross the street, we leased out
the lounge and then we also hada mechanic shop on property and
we leased the mechanics, leasedthat out and the people that
leased the lounge had the uh how, the spider monkey.

(34:44):
But craig, I think that that'sthe boat it was.
It was a trawler style wooden.
It was called that sounds right, yeah, yeah and uh and mr
stewart, I think he had uh onearm that's possible.
I don't know, I don't, I reallydon't, I'm not sure I think he
was missing an arm, but uh, butthat was.
That was the you.
I was getting a little olderthen and that was where we would

(35:06):
camp out and in all the littlehoodlums down in Bear Point.
We'd all gather down there andhad so much fun.

Well, what was it like back there in the
neighborhood at that time?
I know it used to be justpretty much, and in the time
I've been here since 1990 I'veseen it change drastically from
trailers to now a lot morehouses and trailers it was rough
.

It was I.
I told this to my landscaper.
I uh, he installed some yuccaplants around my, my barn and I
said I didn't want yuccasbecause I we had in the pool
tables a lot of the guys thatwere coming in there.
They would try to rig the pooltables to get free pool.
You'd put a match stick in thething and push it in and the
balls would come out.

(35:51):
So I told dad.
And then the next night here arethese, you know, teenagers
grabbing me and they werehanging me over the yucca plants
.
And you know, yucca plantsdon't feel good, uh, but the
boat rigger and the boatmechanic came and and kicked the
crap out of them.
So I was, I was good there fora while, but it was a rough
place, uh, you know, you hearstories of like billy walker and

(36:13):
, uh, butch frith, um, and thoseguys were uh, I've heard about
the friths, those are somecharacters if they wanted ice
and nobody was there, and if theice wasn't a machine but the
ice, you know, maker, had a lockon it, they would pop the lock
off with a crowbar.
I mean, it was, and there wereno.

(36:33):
There were no police, you know.
There were no cops at all downthere at all, so there was no
law enforcement whatsoever.
We had to enforce our own placeand we had some tough guys,
though we had a couple of reallytough boat riggers, a mechanic
and a system mechanic, but itwas our own police force to
prevent theft or prevent damageor anything.

So the boat owners would come out there and
take care of whatever problems.

Yeah, we did really , but it was a rough place.
It was.
You know, I would probablynever consider myself a fighter,
but growing up down there youhad to because it was
interesting, but a lot of thepeople that were there they were
coming in from mainly.
You know, I would say centralAlabama south was a lot of the

(37:22):
trailers and a lot of the homes.
You know it was just a getawayfor people that.
You know they had their trailerthere.

So it was a lot of second homes, a lot of second
homes.
I was imagining, like fishermenand stuff that lived back there
.
No, it wasn't.

I don't know who built that down there or created
those roads or really tried tomarket it or promote it, but it
was really all second homes.
I had hundreds of friends thatwould come down and in the
summertime it was so much funWe'd all go down to the pier and
hang out, but it was very fewpermanent residents, mainly
people just coming in.

(37:56):
But even the residents downthere really weren't fishermen
per se.
You know.
I know we were known as afishing community but that's
something that really didn'tever, really, you know, wasn't
ever part of my art.
My thought process at the timeit was more farmers and, and
because we did so well withmercury, it would be the farmers

(38:16):
.
They would come in because youknow foley and roberahel,
alberta, all the big farms thatwere down here, and they'd come
in in their overalls and reachin their pocket and pull out a
big wad of cash and buy, youknow, a Mercury motor or a boat
or you know from Dad and Dad hada.
Dad was really a neat.
He had a lot of following downthere.

(38:37):
People really loved dad and dadloved everybody.
And you know, at the time wehad plans.
You'll enjoy this.
We had plans at the time,before Frederick.
Dad had all this in works, tomove the road behind where the
parking lot is now, yep, andthen we were going to do dry
storage and we were going to doa couple of condos, and then we

(39:00):
were going to get into somedifferent, different boat lines,
um, but then that's whenfrederick hit, and then then the
economy, and then.
So all that never happened.

But that was, that was the future, future
plans we had for it at the timewell, when I looked at the
county website um, because youknow, being a realtor I noticed
that that parking lot is deededto Bear Harbor, bear Point
Harbor LLC.
And I was wondering if thatroad had been added, like if had

(39:28):
all been one big piece ofproperty ever, or was it like
acquired or something?

yeah no we cleared that off to build the, because I
remember the tree.
You know trees over there.
There's a road behind it, youknow, it's really just like it
is now, other than that was justall wooded and then we cleared
it off to build it.

But you bought that.
Your dad bought the propertywith.

I don't think he.
I don't think he bought it withthe Marine.
I think he acquired it after.

Okay.

But I'm not 100 sure.
My understanding is.
My understanding is one of thepaper companies one of the large
paper companies is whooriginally developed the 50 by
100 foot lots, laid the roadsout and they were dirt back then
, um, and so I think that'swhere all the central alabama
people came from.
They were a, it was almost a.
It was developed there reallyfor workers to have fishing

(40:24):
places and that kind of thingfor the workers of the paper
mill.
That's awesome, and so a lot ofthe management types had places
down here and that kind ofthing and other people as well.
But that was my, that's whatI've heard.
But you know who knows?
Yeah, I think you're spot onthat.
That was my, that's what I'veheard but you know, who knows?

yeah, I think you're spot on.
That's, that's what.
That's the way I alwaysunderstood it to be, because it
was a lot of plant workers, umand uh.
But I tell you you're talkingabout shrimping and and fishing
and floundering and it was somuch of that going on.
You know, I mean it was uh, uh,water skiing.
You know it was uh with smallboats.
You know, uh, it still todayblows my mind when I cruise to

(41:03):
Arnicott Bay heading over.
You know we weren't going towant to go down to Pensacola
Pass and how rough it is outthere now and it just never was.
I had a little B craft.
It was a little, I don't know,maybe a 13, 14 foot B craftraft,
a little 10 horse horse,mercury on the back, and I was
only allowed to run inside theboat, mason until I would go so

(41:26):
fast and then the boats wouldrock and then they'd complain to
dad.
Dad finally said okay, get outof the bay, which is my plan all
along, but I can take thatlittle boat anywhere I could go
over to, you know, head out toAlabama point or and uh, you
know, of course, I wasn't goodon fuel management.
So many times I came home witha five gallon tank over my head

(41:46):
draining all the fuel down toget home.
But uh, uh, yeah, it's, uh, itwas, it was, it was but where
did you go to school?

Where did you go to school?

Yeah, I went to Foley high school.
Where did you go to school?
Yeah, I went to Foley HighSchool and it's so funny.
You know people all run intothem, you know and go.
Oh yeah, I grew up down thereI'm going well, when and they
tell me I'm like well, I didn'tsee you on the bus.
And they, oh, no, no, no, mygrandfather had a place and I
went to McGill or I went here,like, okay, like you said, all

(42:17):
the marina, the folks, gulfgateLodge, which is the McCarrans
and Sportsman's, the Adams andOrange Beach was the Peters.
That bus was not even.
It wasn't a shore bus, it was abit full-size bus but it wasn't
even halfway full.

Then you had to go to the Swing Bridge and Gulf
Shores with all those guys.

That's something I don't remember.
I don't remember the swingbridge in Gulf Shores.
I know I did, I know what over,but I just don't remember it.
But I do remember the one overthere towards you know, the one
at Alabama point, because dadbeing in the Navy when we first
got there, he would actually thefirst.
When I first went to school Iwent to St Benedict's because he

(43:03):
would take me that way overthrough Alberta, drop me off and
then he would go to the NavalAir Station.

It was a long ride to school.

Yeah, yeah, and he would.
Of course we'd get caught onthat bridge sometimes and he
would.
You know, being in the Navy,you're very, you have to be
punctual.
So I remember him speeding downthat road, you know, at high
speeds, to get to get me toschool and then to get to get to
the base, but yeah.

What a chore to get to school, I mean.

And, and you know Foley going to Foley on the bus,
you know you get that hot busand come all the way to the bear
point you, by the time you gothome, you were, you know, you
were exhausted, you weredehydrated, and we of course
nobody knew the word hydrationback then, right?

so right, yeah, nobody drank water, but when I
moved here in 90 there were nolights.
In 1990 there were no lightsbetween gulf tours and foley.
I mean you could just drive itwas awesome.

And, speaking of water, we would get our water.
It was a well pump behind thewhich is the keg now, but that
was the post office and we wouldgo there and fill gallon jugs
and that was our drinking waterand then we had fresh water from
a well there, but it was soacidic or tannic that everybody,
everybody that lived down there, even vacation on there you

(44:17):
know white T-shirts were popularback then lived down there,
even vacation down there.
You know white t-shirts werepopular back then.
Everybody had orange t-shirtsbecause the uh, when you wash
your clothes that water wouldturn all your white stuff orange
, but you can tell anybody tolive down there, but that's
where.
when I tell people that's wherewe'd go get our drinking water,
they go like, no, they, theywouldn't, they, they don't
believe me.
I mean, no, that's how.

(44:38):
That's the water we drank.
We would, we would have to gothere to get, we would fill up
four or five gallons of water ata time, you know.
But but then, whenever citywater came in and I don't
remember when that was uh, butuh, of course that you know went
away, but it was probably umlate 70s, mid to late 70s.

Well, the city of orange beach formed in 84.
I don't know if it was you know, if it was, I don't know if it
coincided with that.
It was definitely before then,when we had you know not
non-well water, so yeah, so Iwant to ask Craig that we talked

(45:16):
about Frederick.
Now let's talk about Sally.
That was your introduction tomarina ownership, just a few
years after.

We had a few little practice sessions, with
some tropical storms and thatkind of thing and some near
misses.
That was pretty real.
We got off light.

You had already started making some upgrades
before.

Yeah, we had done a lot of dock rebuild and that
kind of thing.
Really, the things that gotdestroyed and carried off were
things that needed to be tornout anyway and replaced and it
just it was the timetable was alittle pushed up from what I was
planning, but it all worked.
I mean, we really got off light.
We didn't lose the.

(46:03):
We lost the docks, didn't losemany of the pilings, and so we
were able to just go re-dockeverything.
For the most part it was a bigcleanup.
I mean, it took us a yearreally to get it all back
together, but we were.
We were operational by March,by the beginning of the next

(46:25):
season, and we were really thefirst ones to do that.
I mean, everybody else couldafford to miss the season.
I guess I couldn't.
So we dove in and got it done.
But how did?

the restaurant and the dock store do.

They probably about four feet of water in each
one and so, or you know, rightat three feet anyway, and
breaking waves on top of that.
But we did some innovativethings, I don't know.
We tore things out.
We tore things out prettyquickly and got our you know in

(47:06):
and, uh, they're just tried tostabilize everything as well as
we could the electrical systemsand that kind of thing.
We did some things that I did Inever thought I'd do.
We, we rented a water trailerfrom United Rentals.
They they ended up getting abunch of equipment to us pretty
quickly after the storm.
We pulled all the breakers outand rinsed everything down with

(47:28):
fresh water All the breakerswhich are still operational
today and we doused them all.
We washed them out with freshwater and then we coated
everything in WD-40.
With fresh water.
And then we, uh, we coatedeverything in wd-40 and by the
time they pulled the, put thepower back on.
We put them back into the tothe boxes and they're rolling.

So I don't know how many more times city
inspection yeah, well, it didn'tdidn't change anything.

We, the the boxes all made it, all that stuff was
fine.
So wow, it was um.
But yeah, it was um, it was alot.
I mean, we we really got offbeing on the north side of the
island.
We ended up um, shelteredsomewhat.
We got a lot of east, you know,and and west, but we didn't get
that southern exposure thatsportsman and all those guys

(48:13):
really got hit with, and barbaraeven that's where I was, yeah
yeah, um, I had just moved overthere from Bear Point.

That's right and then right next to sportsman's
at Messabout Marina, yeah, andabout a month and a half later,
here comes Sally.

Yeah, it was interesting.
But you know, I'm going to tellyou the coolest thing about
that and in this community I'mso thankful to live where I live
.
As soon as the water went down,we had probably good people
that kind of suggested that wehave rental equipment there.

(48:52):
So we had a long list of stuff.
United Rentals got it rightdown here.
I was kind of the head of thelist because we just moved.
It was suggested that we getthose things on site.
We ended up getting everythingbefore everybody kind of started
putting their orders in and solike on the Friday, after the

(49:13):
storm hit on Tuesday the waterwent down, everybody cleaned up
their 50 by 100 foot lot.
We had probably 40 people or 50people from the community that
showed up with shovels andbrooms and whatever, and by the
weekend it really didn't looklike anything had happened.
I mean like in some areas ofthe marina it didn't look so
hard hit like you know thebarley, like it was ready to

(49:34):
open, um, those kinds of things,that.
But and these people justshowed up and I, I it's amazing
we have people from you knowthat that have got places there
from michigan that drove downand you know jumped in and you
know the charter guys in themarina down here and and uh,
incredible community, it justand nobody expected anything out

(49:55):
of it.
They just it was their place,they take ownership of it
somewhat and they, they, theytake.
You know they want to see itthrive, which is an incredible
partnership that we have withthis community and I love it.

It's been great well I know I was that was one
of the questions I wanted to askyou, so that just happened.

It you didn't request help, it just happened
no, they showed up like what canwe do?
A pile of people.
But they were.
I mean, there were people thatwere.
They would go buy 30 pizzas andride around and give it to
whoever's working in theneighborhood to clean it up.
I mean it was just.
The whole effort was justneighbors helping neighbors,

(50:35):
people showing up loadinggenerators, and I had people
drive over.
My brother drove over fromDestin with a big cooler of beer
and water and ice and a biggenerator and a bunch of stuff
and dropped it off.
We had several people do thosekinds of things that were just
so nice.
It just was thoughtful.

(50:56):
It really was one of thosethings I tend to pay back.
We have to think about thatwhen another area is hit that we
have a connection with orwhatever, to dive in and help
that way.
It's just such a blessing.

Well, I know that you've done something
recent, done something recentthat the Fairpoint, the help me
out here the launch area, you'veloaned some of your property,
haven't you?

We have?
I mean, it was that boundarylayer, that just the setback,
you know, around that we owned.
That really was kind of a.
I mean, we were maintaining itbut we didn't really use it.
It was too narrow of a strip todo a whole lot of good, but it
was next to a bunch of parkingspaces for golf carts and that
kind of thing.
And we have an excellentrelationship with the leadership

(51:50):
of the Bear Point CivicAssociation and they're, you
know, we work together on allthese things, and so we did.
You know we worked together onall these things, and they so we
.
We did, you know, take thefence down and let them, you
know, rock all the way to thedock, which, you know we're not

(52:14):
having to mow much rock.

So the grass being gone doesn't hurt my
feelings, isn't that?

nice Marcus.
Yeah, that was such a nice.
You know the, the flow thatwould go from the marina down to
the, to the, to the associationpier and, and I remember the
the fence being there.
When I saw that fence it waslike, oh no, you know, because
it was, it was such a symbioticrelationship.
I mean, everybody just wentback and forth.
That's, that's awesome.
You guys did that.

That really is yeah, now you can walk right
right from my boat slip.
I can walk right out there,yeah perfect, I'm not going to
trespass but I could.
But you're fine.

It's open and nobody the marina people
especially they've worked great.
The Civic Association has hadreally have gotten along great
and worked together on a ton ofstuff and it's really just a you
know.

Yeah.

You don't often see that.
I mean I'm in real estate.
I know a lot of HOAs are alwaysfighting with people.
That's right.
So that's right then.
So what?
When?
So that was like four yearsafter you bought the marina when
, um, when all the people cameto help.
So did that just solidify like,wow, I'm in the right spot yeah

(53:29):
, I mean I already knew I was,but it did that.

That nailed it home for him.
It drove it home for sure.
I um it really.
It just it's been a thiscommunity that when I bought the
marina, I looked at the numbersand I looked at the and I've
been through here, you know,buying fuel since the late 90s,
um, and that kind of thing kindof been eaten in the restaurants
here that were here through theyears, that kind of thing and

(53:53):
um, and so it worked financially.
I had no idea what was behindthis over here.
I didn't.
I didn't know anything aboutthe neighborhood.
Man, what a gem.
This place as a place to liveis fantastic.
It really is just a greatcommunity.
Really.

(54:14):
Everybody gets along and itworks.
They don't get along all thetime, but it gets worked out.
People are people, but I meannot everybody's on the same page
all the time, but it's the bestcommunity I've ever lived in.

Yeah, for sure, that's great, you're a great
leader there.
Yeah, you are, so tell us aboutthe Oso transition.

Well, we just kind of looked around a little bit.
Tyler Keene was a friend ofmine.
He owned the Fairhope Inn forabout 20 years and that was one
of my favorite places to eat inFairhope.
You know, I went and talked tohim.
It was kind of a weird deal.
I went and talked to him justkind of doing some, exploring

(55:02):
what else we might do here with.
You know, just a differentvision and a different you know?

Yeah, there was Flippers there.

Yeah, Flippers.

And I guess I can't remember how long they
were in there.

They were there for about, I guess about nine
years.
I think they opened in 2009 orso and I think we changed out.
Well, I guess 11 years, 19 wastheir last season.
Anyway, we just kind of wanteda fresher start, a fresher take

(55:36):
on the deal, and I knew Tylerwould run a tight shift and knew
that he did, and I just atethere, like a week ago, and it
was wonderful it's verydifferent than from every time
I've eaten there with you sinceyou've had it, it's been awesome
well glad to hear that.
But we um anyway, yeah, tyler,and that was another god thing

(55:58):
um, I went and talked to tylerand he said, yeah, I'm
interested.
This sounds like fun.
I'm tired of the whitetablecloth and the you know the
wedding things and all that kindof stuff.
So he was kind of interested indoing something after 20 years,
doing something a littledifferent, something more casual
and that kind of thing.
And so, anyway, he called meabout a week and a half after

(56:22):
that and he said hey, I hope youwere serious about this deal
because, um, I just had a ladywalk in here and make me an
offer on the end that I can'trefuse all right well, come on,
so we'll think we'll figure itout.

So um so did he have.
Oh, so early first I was reallysad that they closed.

Yeah well, we tried to move the breakfast
thing down here to replace thatand I don't know why it has not.
I think they had more volumedown there for sure than we've
had with the breakfast thing uphere.
Maybe it just takes a while tobuild into a new place.

But was that Tyler's?

Yeah, but he did Oso here, he did the restaurant
here and we opened it in 2020.
And then I guess it was 22 orso when he opened Oso early.
Oh, okay, so I didn't have anyinvolvement.

No, oso early was just a good one did.
No, it's the best omelet I'veever had in my life and I wish,
oh my god, I used to go there.
Just for that it was.

It was so delicious yeah, they changed the
menu fairly often.
I mentioned that.
I mentioned that to them, sothey did change it a pretty good
bit and then, uh, and so it.
You know just, you may see itagain.
I don't know, I just um, butanyway all right.

So, uh, let's see, um, what I okay, you've
changed.
You've changed, uh, that wholesection there into commercial,
and I'm sure that was a verysmart business decision, I'm
sure.
So how's that going over withall the business there and
everything?
I'm not going to ask for yourP&L sheet or anything.

(58:08):
I'm on a call.

I think everybody's doing well.
Of course we had some recordyears during COVID.

I got a surprise guest.
He's just going to say hey,this is Wade Ward.
Oh my gosh.

Wade, hey, wade, wade.
I interviewed your son.

I want to interview you, but there's Wade, he's my
buddy.
Tell him I want to.

You got to get a commitment from him because I
want to interview him.
He's a Gulf Shores historian.
Come see it.
I, because I want to interviewhim.
He's a Gulf Shores historian.
Come see it.

I'll come see you tomorrow, Hi buddy.

Yeah, you're going to have to watch Joey's.
I'll send you.

Craig and Joey's interview, because he's such a
character Okay.
That's his dad right there.
Dad's not the character, he'sthe dad.
He's a good dad, he's anawesome dad.

Welley's got great stories about the different
things that that wadeaccomplished here in gulf shores
and joey's a good storytelleryeah, he is so um, tell us, tell
us about the how you'veincreased the commercial, the
commercial business there wejust we've kind of just tried to
maximize parking and maximizetheir space and make it a more

(59:22):
comfortable, inviting place andmore versatile.
Really, you know, turning whatused to be the sandbox or
whatever that we've turned, thatwe've used now for the green
area out there, the turf area,used it now for the green area
out there, the turf area and theshading, all that has enabled

(59:44):
us to use that for events aswell as just even the people
waiting to get on a dolphincruise or a charter boat or just
a nice sitting area.
It kind of expands.
We did some things, changed thebar around last year, moved the
stage to the other end, sothere's more the way we had the
bar done.
To start with, it kind of cutthe audience in half, so we kind

(01:00:06):
of slid, kind of swapped thatup a little bit so that we're
open.
It's kind of a challengingspace anyway because it's so
long and skinny and narrow, butI think we probably took a wall
out and did kind of increasevisibility from the band out to
the green space, to the eastdown there, which enables us to

(01:00:27):
have a larger crowd or more thanone event going on, so we can
have multiple things going on atonce.

Tinsley Myrick (01:00:33):
Yeah, you got two stages right yeah, that's
right.

Craig Reaves (01:00:38):
So that's working well.
We have plans to kind of expandthat or optimize it a little
bit, do some things like that.

And you move the regular boaters people like me
to the other side and maximizethat space for commercial.
I think that was well.
You know this.

That was very smart well, by the time I got
here it was mostly commercialover there.
Anyway there were.
There were just a couple thatwe had to slide across.

So a couple of outlanders that were that were
fighting the system, weren'tthey, they were hanging in there
, yeah, but uh they wanted to be.
They wanted to park right infront of their boat.
I don't blame them, but I wastalking, I can't remember his
name.
He's over there next to me now.
He said that it's actually alot more peaceful over there.
There's not so many peoplewalking by.
So yeah, he was happy I'm glad.

I'm glad he is.

Yeah, he was one of the holdouts, so uh and then
marcus he, in order to bookthose slips that are out there
in the rocky area that gets fromthe waves.
I don't know why I'm so halting.
Help me out, Craig.
You put lifts in.

We've got about 16 lifts in for smaller center
console boats which we werenever able to lease those very
effectively just because thewater was so rough for the
smaller boats.

That's a great idea.
That's a great idea, isn't thatsmart?
Yeah, it's worked.

It's been good and we've had a good response with
that A lot of people in theneighborhood.
It's kind of like having access, like waterfront access to your
boat, where all you do is haveto go hit the switch but you're
not paying for waterfrontproperty.
So it's been a good fit here.
It's been pretty well received.
A little bit of a maintenanceissue, but you know it survived.

(01:02:34):
All that stuff survived.
Sadly, we got it up out of thewater and you know it makes us a
little more hurricane resilient, resistant, whatever there.
I think that was really smart hewas having trouble renting them
because the fools that comedown the ICW create yeah, we saw

(01:02:57):
a lot of that this weekend, soBlue Angels is my favorite
weekend in a lot of ways, andnot my favorite in that way so
what else are you doing outthere?

what have we not covered?
What great ideas have youimplemented or have in the
future?

this year we're kind of.
This year we're kind of you gotthese shirts.
You got these, that's right,the v-neck shirts yeah, yeah, it
was your request that we we didI gotta come, I gotta come get
one yeah well, come on yeah thestore looks great, looks better
than I've ever seen it.

I always wanted to buy a shirt, but Women like
V-necks.
No matter how fat you areSkinny, you are ugly good
looking.
We look better in V-neck shirts.
So, I thank you, craig.
So, anyway, you were going tosay something about Sherry.

Yeah, no, the store is Sherry's ballgame.
She is.
She does a great job over therekeeping us stocked, decorated,
new inventory or new items in,and she I don't know, she never
quits moving.
She's like a shark, you knowWell, you're smart enough to let
her loose.
Oh yeah, let her go Absolutely.

(01:04:21):
She's something.
She's been a huge blessing.
I can tell you my greatest one,I think.

Marcus, have you met Sherry?

Marcus Kruk (01:04:31):
I have not no.

You'll have to check her out.

I will, she's a character.

She's another character.
She is a character.

She's in a great place then.

Yeah, that's right.
That's right.
Marinas are always full ofcharacters, so anything that you
guys want to cover that wehaven't.
Marcus, do you have any goodstories you want to share with
us?

with that, we just can't live without oh, you know
it's uh you know I just growingup, you know I I'm, you know
I've you got.
You guys have all mentioned Goda couple times.
It was just a true blessing touh, to have grown up there and
to have that opportunity to youknow, to live, live in such an

(01:05:18):
incredible place with so manyincredible people, and it's
something that's always near anddear to my heart, and it was
near and dear to my dad's heartbefore he passed away, and my
mom and we, just it's part of us.
I mean, you know it's in ourblood.
And I'm so glad, craig, thatyou're there, cause you, you're

(01:05:41):
very fitting you.
It, it's an honor to see you atthe helm and it makes me feel
good and you know it's it, it is, it's.
It was an emotional thing whenwe left and I had trouble going
back for the longest time.
You know, but, but, but nowthat you're there, I'm, I.
It's almost yes, it's almostclosure for me.

And that means see right here on the salty
podcast.
These are the things thathappen.
Well, I guess that's it then.
I hate to end it, but we havebeen on here for a little over
an hour.
I know you guys have things todo do, but maybe we can do it
again.
Maybe there'll be some morestories, some more pictures when
you get those.
So just for the people that arewatching and this will be on

(01:06:27):
audio podcast too, by the way,um, spotify all those apple.
Um, when you get you, marcushas a uh, an attic full of
slides and one day he's going togo up in there and we're going
to convert them to images.
Maybe we can come back on hereand we can show some more images
, some historical photos.

I promise, I promise, I even found the
projector.
So whenever we, whenever wesail, here and we get it.

I haven't heard that in a while.
Let's get the projector out.

I put a sheet up, I guess, to put it on there.
I don't have that.

Put a sail up.

Yeah, there you go.

And so Craig can put.

Craig wants to put them out throughout, you
know, the restaurant and thedock store and everything I
think that would be an excellenttouch.
Pictures of your dad and yourmom and you and everything.

Yeah, I love the history of it.
Yeah, awesome.

All right.

Well, thanks so much for coming on, you guys.
This has been a lot of fun, andyou want to say something else?

Just saying it's great being with you and hearing
the stories from Marcus and allthat A lot of fun, thank you.

All right, guys, and the way I like to end my
salty podcast is to say salty,abandoned out.

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Salty Podcast #30 | ⛵ Sailing Through Time: Bear Point Marina's Rich History ⛵🏖️

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Salty Podcast #30 | ⛵ Sailing Through Time: Bear Point Marina's Rich History ⛵🏖️