What goes around

[Vasco]

Thought I'd post an email I sent in May this year.

What goes around comes around.

This email will originate from the States but it's the last one I write from the Bahamas before we cross to the States on Tuesday, weather permitting. I thought I'd end this season with a little story. A true one, of course.

Three years ago Breathless was in a marina in Georgetown, one of the few times she's been tied to a dock in the Bahamas. I was alone as Doreen had flown home a week before for surgery after having been hit in the face by an eighty pound spotted eagle ray which had jumped out of the water ahead of us as we were tearing along in the dinghy. I was due to fly home the next day and we would be returning in a couple of weeks if Doreen was fit to travel.

About nine that night I heard some noise on deck and got out of bed to investigate. Yes, we do go to bed early when cruising, usually right after it gets dark. I saw a guy running down the dock with one of my five gallon jerry jugs of diesel. I had three yellow jugs of diesel lashed on deck and a local was running off with one of them. I chased him down the dock but he jumped into a car and sped off. I returned to my boat before reports of a naked guy running down the dock got to the police.

It was easy to see what had happened. One of the two gas stations in Georgetown is right at the marina. It was closed and the thief must have needed gas badly so he helped himself to some off the first boat he came to. I only hope he was stupid enough to pour the diesel into his gas tank later.

A couple of weeks ago, three years after the incident in Georgetown, we were sailing in the Sea of Abaco when I spotted something yellow in the water. I thought it was a lifejacket so we altered course to check it out. I got the boathook out while Doreen slowed the boat and steered towards it. When we got closer I saw it was a yellow jerry jug. I snagged it with the boathook and it nearly pulled me over as it was very heavy. When I got it aboard I saw that it was a fairly new jug, identical to my stolen one, and, when opened, it contained five gallons of what looked like fairly fresh diesel fuel. No water in it at all. I poured the diesel into the tank a few days later. What are the odds!! As they say, what goes around comes around.


Rick