Russell Crowe was hardly the master and commander of this ship.
The 48-year-old actor was lost for 4 1/2 hours while kayaking with a friend Saturday on Long Island Sound, the Coast Guard said.
As the sky darkened, they finally headed for shore, according to Coast Guard Petty Officer Robert Swieciki.
They beached their kayaks, like the one Crowe is paddling here, in Huntington Bay, nearly 10 miles east — as the Crowe flies — from Cold Spring Harbor, where they had set out,
The Coast Guard was patrolling the area, and heard the actor call out to them from the shore at around 10 p.m.
The “Gladiator” actor and his friend, whom Swieciki didn’t recognize, paddled over to the boat.
The Coast Guard officers pulled them up and, along with their kayaks, gave them a ride to Huntington Harbor.
“He just needed a little bit of help, he just got a little lost,” Swieciki said. “It wasn’t really a rescue, really, more of just giving someone a lift.”
Swieicki said no one was injured, and the two men were wearing life vests.
He said the actor, who was grateful and friendly, seemed as if he was a fairly experienced kayaker.
Crowe sent a Twitter message at about 1:30 a.m. yesterday, thanking the officers.
“Thanks to Seth and the boys from the US Coast Guard for guiding the way . . . 4 hrs 30 mins, 7m(11.2km),” he tweeted.
But later, after a fan asked about the nautical misadventure, he tweeted, “Not lost, we knew exactly where we were, paddling around CSH [Cold Spring Harbor] into wind.
“We ran out of day.
“Grand adventure eh,’’
Crowe is on Long Island filming the movie “Noah” in Oyster Bay.
The biblical epic is directed by Darren Aronofsky and scheduled for release in 2014.
Crowe won an Academy Award for Best Actor in “Gladiator” and also played the lead role in the 2003 movie “Master and Commander.’’
With additonal reporting by Vincent Modica and AP