Several friends and I chartered a 55 ft. Gulfstar sloop in Ft. Lauderdale and sailed over to the Abaco Islands. The “Syncopation” had dancing room below, drew 9 ft., and was a perfect party situation. The six of us were going to sail from Ft. Lauderdale to Nassau, pick up the wives and girlfriends (who were flying in), and continue on to Miss Emily’s Blue Bee Bar on Green Turtle Cay, which is famous for the Goombay Smash. The Goombay’s are another story all together.

At about 5:00 pm, we headed down the inter-coastal with the boat owner who was drunk as a bicycle. Our plan was to stop at a marina, top off the tanks, drop off the drunk, and head for the Gulf Stream. No problem. The wind was light, so we fired up the diesel and aimed for Don’t Rock. About two hours later, when it was dark and we were in the middle of the shipping and cruise ship lanes, the damn motor stopped. No wind for the sails, no motor, no moon, drifting around in front 800 ft. ships, not a good feeling.

We were out of options, except for MAYDAY. That worked, and we were towed back to port. After the mechanics were called, we determined the problem. The damn drunk boat owner had topped off the diesel tanks with water, and the water tanks with diesel. It only set us back a day, a bunch of “up front” cash (which we later deducted from the bill) to have the engine rebuilt. Let me tell you something though; no mater how many times you flush the water tanks – once they’ve had diesel fuel in them, your screwed.

Off we go, headed once again for Don’t Rock. After you cross the Gulf Stream, Don’t Rock (which is a navigation point) becomes visible fairly soon. The next step is tricky and depends on the stage of the tides, the depth of your keel, and the time of day. You don’t want to attempt this at night. If you sail directly for the Rock, you can save about nine hours. If you use the navigational charts, which you should, it takes much longer, but you’re safe. We decided to go for it, and as it turned out, it was a major mistake laced with some weird JuJu.

We got about three quarters of the way in to Don’t Rock and started “bumping the bottom”. Then we started to run aground (damn near hard aground), darkness was approaching, and we asked ourselves “what are we going to do now?” Our situation was not good.

This is where it gets Cosmic. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, a couple of Dolphins showed up and began swimming around the boat, jumping in and out of the water, like they were trying to get our attention. Then they’d swim aft for about 50 yards, return to the boat, and repeat the jumping again. We thought this was too cool, so we had a cold beverage and took some pictures. We were still discussing how to get out of this mess when someone said (I’ll take the credit, maybe), “lets follow the Dolphins, maybe they’re trying to show us the way out”. We certainly didn’t have anything to lose, so we began to follow them. And that is EXACTLY what they did. They showed us the way out. We did not “bump the bottom” once. It was simply amazing!

That is all.

Nope, there is one more thing. If you want to fish for Barracuda, and have no steel leaders, just use the wire that is used to connect stereo speakers. Yeap, that’s right, we gutted that damn boat.

All had a good time.