Fall Back Festival promises good wine, food, fun

Mark your calendar for an evening good wine, good food, good music and good fun. The date is Saturday, Nov 3, and the occasion is the Fall Back and Ain't Nothin' But the Blues Music Festival along the boardwalks of the Port A USA Center, which is anchored by Pelican's Landing restaurant.

The festival, from 7 to 10 p.m., is a celebration of the end of Daylight Savings Time, and is a benefit for the Port Aransas Community Theater (PACT).

Admission is $30 at the door. Tickets are on sale at the Gratitude Gift Shop, 316 N. Station St. next to the Crazy Cajun restaurant.

New to this year's celebration will be a fortune telling booth with Madame Lu offering to read palms or look into her crystal ball for $2 a reading.

As always, the celebration includes samples of food from various Port Aransas restaurants, a wine-tasting, a blues concert, a Chinese auction and a costume contest. The costume contest is a hold-over from previous years when the festival fell just before Halloween. Organizers decided to continue with the costume contest because of its popularity, even though the event will be held after Halloween because of the change in the switch from Daylight Saving Time to Central Standard Time.

Fun lovers are encouraged to "dust off your costumes or put on your thinking caps and create new personas" for the contest.

The auction features gift certificates, merchandise and services from various Port Aransas businesses. Tickets are $1 each.

Dicky Neely, a Coastal Bend musician whose blues career spans 30 years in the Coastal Bend, orchestrates the Ain't Nothin' But the Blues portion of the evening.

Headlining the entertainment will be Dawn and Rich Segura of Austin's Sweet Potato Pie. Rich Segura is a guitarist and Dawn Segura is a vocalist.

The Dicky Neely Blues Band, with Neely on harmonica, Fred Jarmon, Antone Perez and Franz Schlievert, will open the show.

Participating restaurants will be Hooks, Trout Street Bar and Grill, Port A Pizzeria, La Playa Mexican Grill, Castaways, Venetian Hot Plate, Fins Grill and Ice House, Island CafÈ and Smokehouse, Family Center IGA and Deli, Wharf Restaurant, Zama's Dangerous Kitchen, Pelican's Landing Restaurant and Quiznos. Tacqueria San Juan is unable to participate this year as far as offering food, but has lent monetary support to the event and promises to return next year.

A $50 prize will go to the restaurant with the best-decorated table.

Distributors providing wine for the tasting will be Glazer's Liquor and Wine Distributors and Republic Beverage Company, Inc.