First Annual Cannabis Cruise Goes Up in Smoke

By Drew  |  EIC, Big Dog, Chief Cannabis Correspondent 

CAPE MAY, N.J. — The first-ever Cape May–Lewes Cannabis Cruise departed New Jersey at precisely 4:20 p.m. Saturday and was expected to arrive in Lewes approximately 85 minutes later.

It did not.

Two hours later, nobody seemed particularly concerned.  Three hours later, the Coast Guard was called.  But passengers and crew aboard the vessel had apparently failed to notice there was a problem.

“I thought it was taking a while,” passenger Kevin Morris said. “But then I started looking at the water, and, dude, have you ever really looked at water?”

The special cruise was launched following the legalization of recreational marijuana in both Delaware and New Jersey, with ferry officials promising passengers “a relaxing new way to experience Delaware Bay.”

The relaxing part went extremely well.

The Delaware Bay part proved more difficult.
Coast Guard crews initially searched the normal ferry route between Cape May and Lewes but found nothing. The vessel was eventually located several hours later after a patrol crew reported hearing what appeared to be a drum circle somewhere off the coast of Ocean City.

“We couldn't see the ferry at first,” one Coast Guard officer said. “But we could hear bongos.”

Upon approaching the vessel, officers noticed that one of the ferry's navigation lights appeared to have been replaced with a lava lamp, approximately 70 passengers were lying on the upper deck staring at the sky, and the onboard snack bar had been completely stripped of inventory. Somebody had even renamed the vessel JERRY.

Coast Guard officers eventually located the captain and informed him that his ferry had been reported lost.

“Lost is kind of a judgmental word, man,” the captain replied. “Maybe we finally found ourselves. Maybe you're lost.”

Officers then asked why a vessel operating between Cape May and Lewes was approximately 40 miles south of Lewes.

“Oh, that,” the captain said.

“I was looking for that new cruise terminal in Ocean City. I read about it online.”
The Coast Guard explained that the ferry was supposed to be in Delaware, but the news was not well received.

“We already did Delaware,” one passenger complained, but Coast Guard officials later confirmed that they had not.  Another passenger objected to turning around, saying he had heard Delaware was “kind of a buzzkill this time of year.”

Eventually, the captain agreed to follow the Coast Guard back toward Lewes, although witnesses said the ferry briefly stopped moving again approximately 20 minutes later when several passengers became convinced they had seen dolphins.

The ferry, Jerry, finally arrived in Lewes shortly before 11 p.m., more than five hours behind schedule.  Waiting family members expressed relief as passengers slowly disembarked, several carrying blankets, one carrying a half-eaten hoagie, and at least two apparently hoping to catch an Uber to the Thrive Dispensary in Lewes.

One passenger called the inaugural cannabis cruise “the best ferry ride I've ever had."  When a reporter reminded him that the ferry had been lost for nearly five hours, the man stared at him.
“We were?”

Despite the lengthy Coast Guard response, officials reported no injuries, no damage to the vessel and no significant distress among the passengers.  

In its official incident report, the Coast Guard noted that morale aboard the vessel was unusually high for a maritime incident.

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