PORTSMOUTH — Mike MacFarlane, scrambling around Saturday during a particularly busy day at his Sunset Cove restaurant in Island Park, shook his head as he motioned toward the back lawn overlooking Bluebill Cove.

“Can you believe that out of all the millions of places he played over the years, his last show was here?” he said.

MacFarlane was referring to his friend Jimmy Buffett, the singer of “Margaritaville” and a host of other tropical yacht rock favorites, who showed up as a surprise guest during bandmate Mac McAnally’s concert at Sunset Cove on July 2.

Early on in his set, McAnally started playing “It’s 5 O’Clock Somewhere,” a song recorded by Buffett and Alan Jackson 20 years ago. As he sang one of the key lines — “What would Jimmy Buffett Do?” — Buffett himself strolled onto the stage to the utter surprise and delight of concertgoers, who immediately jumped to their feet and cheered.

Buffett, who hadn’t been active due to health issues even before playing Portsmouth and was forced to cancel several gigs this year, succumbed on Sept. 1 to Merkel-cell carcinoma, a rare and aggressive skin cancer with which he had been diagnosed four years earlier. He was 76.

A Portsmouth Times photograph of Buffett’s smiling face as he played Sunset Cove was used with permission by the Palm Beach Daily News in Florida, where the singer’s passing was big news.

Shannon Donnelly, the society editor at the paper, said that as far as she could determine, the Portsmouth appearance was indeed Buffett’s last gig.

Before Buffett's death and at MacFarlane's request, Portsmouth resident Karyn Jimenez-Elliott created an illustration depicting McAnally and Buffett performing at Sunset Cove for T-shirts the restaurateur wanted to have made. Jimenez-Elliott said she was just finishing up the illustration when she learned of Buffett’s passing.

MacFarlane said he plans to donate all proceeds from sales of the shirts to the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Sail on, Jimmy.