Dockside Guide Lands in Mobile Bay's Summer Fun Issue
Somewhere in a drawer at my house, there's a napkin.
It's the napkin. The one I pulled across the table on a Saturday afternoon a decade ago when a buddy and I were sitting on a boat and started listing — just for fun, just because we could — every place on the water we'd actually pulled up to and stayed awhile. The list ran longer than either of us expected. We folded the napkin up. I kept adding to it. Years went by. The napkin became a notebook, and the notebook became a website, and the website became a stack of printed merchant maps we hand out at boat shows, and somewhere in that arc the whole thing turned into a job I get to do every day.
I'm thinking about that napkin this week because the May issue of Mobile Bay Magazine — their Summer Fun Issue — landed on stands with Dockside Guide tucked into the boating section. Amelia Rose Zimlich wrote the feature, "A Guide to the Dockside Life," and the editorial team at Mobile Bay handled the whole thing with the kind of care that makes you grateful to be a small piece of a bigger conversation about coastal life in this part of the world.
A few things I want to say about that.
First — thank you to the readers who've made this real. Every time someone tells me they tried a new spot because the Guide pointed them there, every time a boater pulls up to a dock that didn't used to be on their map, every time a restaurant tells me they had a Saturday they didn't see coming — that's the whole point. The napkin only mattered because somebody else needed the list, too.
Second — about the must-haves. Mobile Bay asked me to pull together my favorite gear for a day on the water, so I did. The Huck bucket because it's bombproof and holds everything. The L.L. Bean Boat & Tote because some classics earn it. Bajío sunglasses because they cut glare on the bay water like nothing else I've tried. Neutrogena Sport Face SPF 70+ because Gulf sun is not playing. And yes — Pabst Blue Ribbon, because as my crew says, "It's not bad beer. It's good water." The full list is on page 25.
Honorable mentions that didn't make the printed list: a soft cooler that doesn't sweat on the deck, a real first-aid kit (not a gas station one), and a backup phone charger you forget you brought until somebody's whole afternoon depends on it.
Third — what last summer taught me. I spent more time on the water in 2025, and what kept hitting me was how much of this place you genuinely cannot understand from the road. The Bon Secour River at golden hour. The way the Flora-Bama looks when you boat in instead of fight for parking. The fact that Tacky Jacks Fort Morgan has five hand-painted signs in the rafters from restaurants that no longer exist on that same waterfront. You have to come in from the water.
That's the whole idea. That's what the napkin was always trying to say.
So if you're picking up Mobile Bay Magazine this week — thank you. If you're new here because of the magazine — welcome aboard, the EAT, BOAT, and STAY pages are where most folks start. And if you're a Docklines regular — go grab a copy off a newsstand, because the photography Frances Sadler did for the cover and Maggie Lacey's editor's note about happy places will hit you right in the summer.
See you on the water.
— TT
Pick up the May 2026 Mobile Bay Magazine at newsstands across Mobile and Baldwin counties, or read online at mobilebaymag.com. Thank you to Amelia Rose Zimlich, Maggie Lacey, and the whole MB team.
