Last night a group of friends (I think there were at least forty of us) got together on a cruise of a local lake. The cruise was billed as a sunset music cruise, but for some of us it started out more as a mystery cruise. Why? Well, about an hour before we needed to drive to Lake Pleasant, we began watching clouds roll in over the area. My husband and I weren’t sure whether there would be a cruise or not.

At 5 PM we decided to go ahead and drive to the lake and check it out. Of course it started raining as we got near the park entrance. Cars were leaving in droves. We were among the few still driving toward the lake.

The attendant at the gate couldn’t tell us whether or not there would be a cruise. We decided to wait a few minutes. The rain eased up and then we paid our entrance fee and entered. We saw quite a few cars in the parking lot. That was a good sign, so we parked and then wait for the shuttle that was supposed to come and take us down to the dock.

Guess what? It came, and by then, others were waiting with us. When we got down to the shore, there were many friends also there.

The ferry over to the boat was rough–choppy water bouncing the small boat around and strong winds whipping everyone’s hair (and hats that weren’t strapped on). We finally made it onto the larger cruise boat and got our seats. My husband and I sat on the upper deck where it was cooler and still a bit windy, but comfortable.



After a while, we were pleasantly surprised at how pretty the sky was, especially when a big rainbow appeared. The rain was gone and the storm clouds that were left behind made the sky perfect for photos and helped create a spectacular sunset.




About halfway through the cruise, we saw wild donkeys on the shoreline, and I zoomed in to get closer looks at them. Here are a few of them.



As night fell, the sky was still pretty spectacular. If you look closely at some of these last photos, you can see the rainbow shrouded in red.



I took a lot of group photos of the friends on the cruise, but I forgot to ask them if I could post one of those on this blog. For now, I’ll leave you with just the lake, sunset, and donkeys.