Watery summer delights for us locals

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Granted, ferry rides might be routine affairs for us jaded, maritime’ish Port Townsend residents, but there are two water voyages coming up this summer that are quite special. Ones we happened across by accident.

One: If you take the ferry from Coupeville on the last day of the Wooden Boat Festival, Sept. 10, around 3 p.m., you’ll sail into PT amid the colorful spectacle of the festival’s closing Sail By. You’ll see hundreds of boats. A mini, peacetime Normandy, one might say (a lot more color than olive-drab green).

Two: But our favorite unexpected nautical spectacle was sailing from Port Angeles to Victoria’s Inner Harbour (Canadian spelling, please) and witnessing the Victoria Symphony afloat and playing the 1812 Overture — with fireworks, of course.

It’s the closing event of that graceful city’s annual Summer Splash festival. Catch the 5:20 ferry from PA on Sunday, Aug. 5 to see this memorable floating-orchestra show.

Obligatory comedy angle: When I saw this waterborne spectacle, I immediately recalled the closing scene of the Marx Brothers’ 1939 classic, “At the Circus,” in which Groucho plays shyster lawyer J. Cheever Loophole. (“I have an agreement with houseflies,” Loophole cracked. “They don’t practice law, and I don’t walk on the ceiling.”)

At movie’s end, Chico and Harpo cut the ropes to a barge supporting a symphony orchestra playing the prelude to “Lohengrin,” and the band drifts out to sea. The choice of music was no doubt a dig at “Lohengrin’s” composer, anti-Semite Richard Wagner, a Hitler favorite.

HOT-WEATHER TEA: Continuing our summer theme: Ever tried a summer treat called bubble tea? Only place you can get it on the Peninsula is in the annex to Khu Larb Thai, right across the street from The Leader. It’s a sweetened cold drink with giant tapioca pearls. It’s been a hit in Asia for years, and it’s addictive.

Bubble tea is so popular that some Asian fast-food outlets up in Vancouver are now also serving Bubble Waffles. Warning: If you eat too many of these munchies, you’ll have to let your shower curtain out.

VINYL TAPPED OUT: We’re lucky in PT to get so much good radio from nearby Canada. I spend a lot of time while in my car listening to 97.7 from Vancouver, getting au courant with Québec French, which I once needed on my French-language radio show in Montréal.

Here’s a show fellow Boomers will probably love: Randy Bachman’s “Vinyl Tap,” heard on 90.5 FM, Victoria’s CBC outlet, Saturday nights from 7 to 9.

Bachman, of Bachman-Turner Overweight, er, Overdrive (popular Canadian joke) plays great rock tunes and has funny stories from his bands’ years on the road, while also offering insights on such worthy rock subjects as The Kinks and Specialty Records.

He recently told one funny story about his days in The Guess Who, who were denied rooms at a hotel because the manager thought the Winnipeg band was Brit group The Who, famous for trashing hotel rooms. (I once helped the Montreal concert promoter bail The Who out of jail for destroying a room, a longer tale for another time.)

When The Guess Who finally got their hotel rooms, the plus-sized Bachman sat down — and accidentally broke a chair in his room. Embarrassing.

As Ricky Ricardo would put it, Bachman had lots “of ‘splainin to do.”

BUS MANNERS: I recently told a Jefferson Transit driver I had just ridden a packed bus up in Vancouver, but almost every passenger exiting the bus told the driver “Thank you.”

The PT driver shook his head and replied, “That’s crazy talk.”

(PT resident Bill Mann has written the humor column for USA Today and CBSMarketWatch.com. He’s always looking for funny items — and funny people. Newsmann9@gmail.com)