Why do boaters leave early in the morning for trips?
How many miles does a boat radio get coverage?
What do you do when you lose an engine out at sea?
What do you do when you are living on a boat that needs to get pulled out of the water to repair an engine?

Unfortunately I know all the answers now. What a great few days in Staniel Cay hanging with our new BFF AJ and Tony on their boat called priority, deep-sea fishing to catch dinner was the highlight. Yellow eyed cold water snapper goes great with lamb chops, yes we caught the fish but not the lamb. It was time to make the trek back up to Nassau, we stopped on the way at Stroud Cay to anchor, grill out and take our last dip in the Exumas water. Everything was going great until 40miles outside of Nassau with no land to be seen our port (left) engine dies. Being the newly self-appointed professional captain I took to the engine room, no oil leaks or gas smells and all the hoses were still attached. Phase II of troubleshooting meant jumping in the water, snorkel mask and flippers are needed to get under the boat to see if there is any damage. To my surprise we had no prop on the left engine. A prop is the metal spinning piece that propels (get it) the boat. Its kinda like loosing your front tire on a motorcycle, not going anywhere real fast when this happens. I come to find out after hailing for help on the emergency channel that the range is only 6-8 miles. So what would John Wayne do? Improvise, adapt and overcome, once we limped at 10mph closer to shore after 2 stressful hours we came into cell phone range. Our good friend captain Oliver and captain AJ talked me through the problems and the strategy to get home. While I trouble shoot with the captains Linda is preparing for the worst, packaging a ditch bag, like it reads, a small waterproof bag with your most important items. Once we got the second engine running and realized we could get back to shore without totally freaking out, I took my thumb off the emergency distress satellite system and finger off the flair trigger and we started to eat cookies and cream ice cream as a celebration. 7:30pm as the sun is setting we pull into the marina, luckily didn’t hit any boats trying to dock with one engine but did crack a little fiberglass. Exhausted and frustrated we took it out on the casino, let’s just say they wished we never showed up at the black jack table. These pictures were obviously before the breakdown!