Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
“Overheard you guys last night with old Al.”
“Yes, a very nice guy.”
“So you guys are anchored next to Bad Jack?” he added.
“Who's Bad Jack?” I asked.
“Oh, you haven't met him yet, obviously. He is one mean old bastard. You'd do well to
ignore him. He's the most unfriendly, weird fucker I have ever met; no one likes him. He
lives on his boat and goes out near the entrance to the canal on the Pacific side, about a
hundred miles out. There are weird currents out there, and they carry you in circles around
and around. Big circles, you know?” he said, seeing the puzzled look on our faces, “I'm
talking hundreds of miles you know. He stays out there for like three months at a time do-
ing nothing but catching sharks, collecting their teeth for jewelry which he comes in to sell,
and then he goes back again. That's maybe why he is so fucking weird, man.”
“Huh! That sounds like quite a lonely lifestyle! I never heard of that before!” I said,
amazed.
The next morning was sunny and clear, and we decided to snorkel and catch fish in the
“swamp” as we had dubbed it. We were quite surprised to find huge pipes lying on the sea
bed, and in these tubes hovered a lot of nice big fish, a few of which we nabbed.
I went back to the boat to gut my catch, and Gavin continued to explore the coastline in
front of our boat. After a while he came back excitedly and said, pointing, “You won't
believe this, but I found an almost brand new outboard engine lying in those reeds over
there.”
We jumped into the dinghy and rowed ashore, and sure enough, there lying in very shallow
water was an almost brand new Mariner engine, perfect for our dinghy!
“There is a God,” I said, helping to load the treasure into the dinghy.
As we were manhandling it aboard, I noticed Bad Jack eying us suspiciously with his mean,
dark scowl. “Screw you, old man,” I muttered under my breath.
Gavin decided to strip the whole engine down to its last nut and bolt, clean off all the sea-
water, re-grease it, and assemble it again. It took him the best part of two long days to do
so; he ended the job with a handful of spare nuts and bolts, which seemed odd, but never
mind. When we had her clamped up on the after rail with her propeller off and the leg
in a bucket of water for cooling, she fired up after several hard yanks. She sprang into life
with a very healthy roar and purred delightfully until the bucket of cooling water had been
