Bravo 2, Charlie 2, Delta 2, Foxtrot 2 & Sierra 2 2018 Adventures Day 1 – Arrivals!
written by Social Media Coordinator, Ryan Smith
July 15, 2018
Our Sail Caribbean leadership team was hard at work today turning over and replenishing our home base and boats, and most importantly, prepping for the arrival of our Bravo 2, Charlie 2, Delta 2, Foxtrot 2 and Sierra 2 programs! Our diligent team of staff moved about with extra pep in their strides today, knowing that students would be climbing on board our vessels by the afternoon and evening. Days like today are a habitual amount of collected chaos, with many moving parts maneuvering amongst each other, even from two different islands (the USVIs and the BVIs). Although the day can be rather long and tiring for our traveling students, at the end of the day, it’s almost palpable that it is also the beginning of a profound experience.
At our base, leaders of all fields (operations, office and sail) awoke with the sun and went about the day prepping the boats, inventory, provisioning, the works! A group of five of our leadership team members headed over to St Thomas via ferry ride to greet arriving STT flyers while a few EIS student arrivals were greeted by Sail Caribbean’s Founder/Director Mike Liese himself. Due to poor weather, we had two delayed flight flyers stay overnight in San Juan with a staff member, in order to join our crews the following morning.
By late afternoon, we were all together back at our base of Hodges Creek Marina, and students and staff transferred duffel bags onto their new floating homes. Students boarded either their 45′ foot catamarans or 50′ monohulls depending on which program they were participating in. Man, these vessels are some beauts. Everyone was eager to get off their feet and settle into their space, meeting their new crewmates along the way. It wasn’t long before we all were enjoying a delicious meal of chicken, rice and ‘slaw, freely devouring it from the cockpits of our new abode, among new friends.
Each boat’s crew then held their first boat meeting within their yacht’s salon. During the boat meeting, the crew can get better acquainted with each other and had brief introductions to different aspects of the program, such as the roles on the duty roster, ship’s logs and some Sail Caribbean policies, standards, and expectations during each and every program that we run.
After wrapping up the meeting, students were quick to relish in the opportunity to rest up from a long day of travel, and in anticipation of leaving the docks the following morning. Look forward to the crews’ boat photos prior to leaving docks in the next trip update for Day 2, or have an early look for yourself by checking out our Sail Caribbean Facebook page later this afternoon!
