Any Sailors Under Thirty Out There ?

[jimking100]

Properly chastised...sorry. Trully thought it humorous at the time.
jim

[jackiepitts]

I imagine you may find a fair amount of younger people that are crusing as crew on someone elses boat. Especially younger people from Europe.
My daughter will be 18 when we leave to go cruising in the fall and I imagine will be one of the few young adults out there cruising (especially female).
Where we are now in Southern California there are quite a few 20 something year olds livingaboard on smaller boats but most do not have to means to go off cruising at this point in there life.
I guess if you are a young cruiser you will need to get over any age barriers you may have and just join in with all the older cruisers
Jackie

[anotherT34C]

It is kind of annoying to be a young professional, late 20's early 30's (just when you start to earn some money), and everyone still thinks you're a spoiled brat playing with your parents' toys.

[Fishspearit]

I don't quite fit into the age group anymore, but I did start cruising at 25, so I know what it's like to feel like a minority.
I can encourage you though, in that we were always able to find others our age when travelling. Just like when you see someone on the same type of boat as you, there's a strong pull to go meet each other.

Hanging out with the older crowd was always good. We hardly ever got dissed because of our age, just the opposite, we used to hear the same thing over and over again. "You're doing it right. I wish I had done it when I was your age. Now my knees hurt, my back hurts, and it's hard as hell to lift the anchor when the windlass goes out."

[GtownH20]

Im here, 26 yrs old. live in Galveston, learned to sail in clear lake, 3 gulf crossings, countless offshore trips, 50 ton captains license.

sold my second boat a few months ago to go cruising this winter. have been preparing for over one year. got over 10k saved for a 7 month trip. been my dream since i was 16 years old. only took me 10 years to make it happen. but it took the help of many friends and family to be in a position to do it. and a great boat owner/friend.

Well be in the bahamas by christmas on CoolBreezeII so keep your ears open for us on the VHF!

i think 7 months is just barely enough to make it through bahamas, virgins, to ABC's, columbia, panama, nica, bay islands, belize and home to galveston.

anyone think that is pushing to hard??

unfortunatly we will have to skip the windwards and almost all lewards due to time.

[GtownH20]

and Mr. King: the young guys like us will "like" be the ones you rely on to grind your winches, jybe your spins and push our night shifts a bit furthur so you can rest up when your too old to do crossings on your own. so give us the respect we give yall old timers.

yarggh

also, ive had many old timers tell me that back in the 70's almost half the crew at offshore races were under the age of 25. that tells me the lifestyle is hurting for the next generation. which means less newbies buying boats and stuff. which means sources for the "stuff" we need for our boats will be expensive and harder to find at far flung places.

so everyone here should find a 15-25 yr old and take them sailing! and tell them to bring there lady friends so you have something to look at.

[Hud3]

Originally Posted by GtownH20

so everyone here should find a 15-25 yr old and take them sailing! and tell them to bring there lady friends so you have something to look at.

Good advice!

Actually, my former yacht club (as with many others, I'm sure) realized the importance of getting the younger generations interested in sailing. We had a special, low dues category for younger members, and we put a lot of effort into our Junior Sailing program, teaching school-age kids how to sail.

When we were cruising, I always enjoyed seeing a young family out there with their little kids, all of them having the time of their lives.

[slomotion]

Originally Posted by GtownH20

i think 7 months is just barely enough to make it through bahamas, virgins, to ABC's, columbia, panama, nica, bay islands, belize and home to galveston.

anyone think that is pushing to hard??

Yes. But as long as you think of this a tenative plan and you are prepared to be flexible and make compromizes, you'll be OK. The whole point for most people is to go slow, find little unexpected pieces of paradise, and stay for awhile. If you're thinking of moving on but you're already in paradise and the boat or the weather isn't quite right, just stay a little longer. If you don't make it to Catagena, it's not a big deal as long as the reason is that you were having too much fun somewhere else. Schedules and timetables are anathema to cruising and they can put you in harm's way when you don't need to be.

[GtownH20]

curious as to your thoughts of my timeline. But being as hard headed as i am, unless someone says "your gonna get yourself killed" im gonna make it happen anyways as i have given it many years of thought. But i know when to listen intently to the old salt and then take it with a grain of salt.

[GtownH20]

my thought exactly slowmo! it aint cruising if your in a rush. and of course nothing can comprimise safety.

ive done enough sailing to weather in 25kt winds and 7-9ft seas to know not to head into that on purpose.

i really got alot out of a book called "the gentelman's guide to passages south" I found myself agreeing with his theory's in so many ways.

also, my fiance just didnt understand how a man could be so exicited about recieving "the explorer chartbooks" in the mail.

she now understands the actual and mental significance and symbolism they represent.

[TaoJones]

I can't speak for slomo, but my take on it would be that it isn't that you couldn't do it on that timeline, but that you'd be cheating yourself out of a lot of the enjoyment of the experience if you do it that way.

It's a bit like buying an RV in, say, New England, then driving it down I95 to Jacksonville, picking up I10 to LA, jumping on the 5 to Seattle, and doing it in two weeks. Sure, you could tell everyone about how you "saw America" on your two week vacation, but, really, what have you actually accomplished?

You could easily spend six months in the Bahamas and not tire of the cruising experience there. And even at that, you would have missed a great deal. If you see it more as a delivery, but taking the long-way-'round, then that's another matter.

At any rate, do have a great voyage! Take pictures, and keep us posted.

TaoJones

[GtownH20]

thanks for the words of wisdom, its nice to hear experienced opinions and not just talk from guys who havent left the bay/marina in 10 years.

the 7 month thing is to be back by hurricane season.

i have given thought to spending the season below 12 deg but that seems that it would extend the trip to 16-18 months. it seems we could do greenadines, trin & tob, ABC, cartegena & san blas during the hurricane season without being stuck in one spot for too long.

im sure there are many threads on it, but how do others handle hurricane season in southern, western caribbean, lattitudes. as that is where we would likely be if we didnt get back by June.

we also want to keep a large financial cusion for our return as the wife is thinking about going back to school.

i like the figure of 10k for the trip. we are always budget minded and our grocery and nightlife bills are less than $600 /month for the two of us.

we are open minded as to the route home. but going that way seemed better than going back through the bahamas.

the only thing we have set is to make it to the virgin islands for the boat owner. anything afterthat is up to us. we could go back via jamaica, caymans, cuba, but it seemed like multiple large jumps between islands.

and we got some friends in cartegena as well.

i would like everyones opinions, coming back the way we came is still certainly an option, but i would rather not.

talk to me people as this is my planning stage, the boat is almost ready.

[enovillo]

Where is the new generation? My wife and I have been members of two different yacht clubs while in our late 20's. We could hang out with the teenagers or their parents. But no one our age.

Starting this year, we have a "big" 33-footer slipped in a marina. Most of the people we've met so far are in their 50's or 60's. It's great for us, as these people have a lot more experience than us and are a great crowd to hang out with. Old salts with plenty of sailing stories. I just don't get tired of it.

But imagine our surprise when a sailboat we hadn't seen before was tied to its slip 3 boats away from ours, and the owners, who look to be in their 30's, have a 1-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter. Just like us! We were as excited as our 3-year-old daughter to meet people our age

The absence of younger sailors can't be due to the money alone. Yes, sailing can be expensive, but it is doable on a budget (I'm sure I've done it). I think it's more related to a social trend. Younger people seem to be more into ski-doos and powerboats. Some of them are into fishing and view the boats more as a tool.

This is definitely a sign that I'm getting old: I talk about "those young people"

A 36-year-old sailor.

[schoonerdog]

I just turned 36.... but...

We moved aboard 11 years ago when I was 25 and cruised when I was 27 & 28. Now my husband and I have a 4 year old son and we're STILL aboard... so he's the kid onboard.

I wrote an article for SAIL Magazine called "The Under 30 Cruising Club", about what it was like cruising in your 20's (compared to the majority 45+ out there) it was in the December 2007 issue (ironically published well after I turned 30)

If I had any idea how to link to it, I would...

[unbusted67]

Part of my experience with the age gap is that a lot of younger people are into the "sport" of sailing and not so much the cruising/liveaboard aspects. For example at my old marina out of 500 slips there was exactly 1 slip with two guys under thirty. Where as at the college where I learned to sail there was exactly one old guy taking out the Mercuries and upwards of 300 college students daysailing and racing. Does anyone have a similar experience?