Meet Our Delta 1 Adventure Leadership Team

Jen Borderud
Program Director
Provisions Manager
Santa Barbara, CA

Born and raised in California, Jen is most at home when close to the sea. She came to us as crew on the Echo program in 2011, and went on to study psychology at Williams College where she played varsity basketball and volleyball. Since 2013, Jen rose from Mate to Captain to Program Director of our Delta, Foxtrot and Tango programs, and worked year-round guiding Sail Caribbean’s program development in 2015. She spent the off season of 2016 in San Francisco working at an outdoor gear store and training for a 250-mile backpacking trip along the John Muir Trail which took place in August. Jen now lives in Bocas Del Toro, Panama working as the Student Affairs Manager at the School for Field Studies in the Archipelago.

Aoife Smeaton
Fleet Captain
Dublin, Ireland

Leaving Ireland in 2014 after graduating with a BSc in Zoology, Aoife has spent the past few years traveling between the USA, the Caribbean, and Canada. This year’s highlights include working as a ski instructor during the winter at an adaptive ski school in Banff National Park, and hand raising 7 wolf puppies at a nonprofit wildlife education facility this spring. After a 4th summer at Sail Caribbean, Aoife plans to move to Vancouver in September.

Ciarán Gibbons
Captain of Attila
Dublin, Ireland

This is Ciarán’s second summer with Sail Caribbean, having spent the summer of 2016 with us and loving it. He has a wide range of experience in the outdoor industry from kayaking to windsurfing to hiking, but his real passion is sailing! He spent the summer of 2015 working with Cal Adventures in Berkeley as a sailing instructor and has a lot of youth camp experience in a wide range of sports. He is always looking for a new adventure – having skydived, bungee jumped and cliff dived to name a few! Ciaran previously studied Outdoor Adventure management in Dublin and wishes to use all his knowledge and experience to ensure that the SC 2017 is the best yet.

Josh Bailey
Captain of Rioja
Montego Bay, Jamaica

Joshua Bailey is an enthusiastic and motivated Jamaican who is in love with all natural bodies of water. Always ready for a challenge in aquatics and marine sports, he has engaged in blue water cruising, regattas, open water swims and blue water scuba diving on the Pedro Bank, 90 miles off the south coast of Jamaica. The head coach of his local swim club and the University of the West Indies, Joshua graduated with a BSc in Sociology. His passion for the water lead him to become a dive instructor while working as a Marine Park Ranger. Joshua is looking forward to having some great adventures at sea.

Sarah McClain
Mate of Attila
Chicago, IL

Born and raised just outside of Chicago, Sarah started sailing at the age of 3 on Lake Michigan with her family. Since then, she has progressed to teaching dinghies at summer camp on the east coast and ocean racing J80s on the west coast. She is currently studying nursing in Los Angeles and hopes to pursue a career in flight nursing. In life, Sarah’s a student and a teacher, an adventurer and a traveler, a seasoned sailor and a wide-eyed novice. Nothing excited her more than sharing stories and making new ones with friends and mates!

Liz Jones
Mate of Rioja
Austin, TX

Liz, known at Sail Caribbean as just “Jones”, grew up in the amazing city of Austin, Texas. She always loved the outdoors and spent tons of time camping, hiking and climbing as a child, discovering her love and enthusiasm for the sea on her family’s weekend trips to the Texas coast. During a gap year after high school, Jones had the opportunity to participate in a semester program with the National Outdoor Leadership School. It was through a portion of this expedition that she was able to fulfill a life-long dream of learning to sail, cruising through the gorgeous waters of British Columbia. This experience only cemented her plans to study marine biology and work towards a career in outdoor education. Currently, Jones is in her second year at the University of California, Santa Cruz, working at the harbor as a dock master and looking forward to traveling to Australia for her studies in the fall. Aside from outdoor adventuring, Jones also loves playing guitar, singing, and cooking.