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Old 22-08-2013, 10:12   #1
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Young Yachties-Sail article

In this months issue of Sail Magazine, I read a piece about, "Young Yachties". Folks who are significantly younger than the typical cruiser, but are on the high seas nevertheless. Why do you think there is an increase in young cruisers these days?

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Old 22-08-2013, 10:19   #2
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

More older, yet sturdy boats available on the market for bargains and a crap economy so more people are feeling that the rat race isn't even a viable option for rats!
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Old 22-08-2013, 10:36   #3
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

I don't think there is much of an increase. I'm 35 and I did a pacific crossing 8 years ago. There were a few young crews then and a few now. Most are on short term less than one year trips. Did not see the article, but there are always some out there.
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Old 22-08-2013, 11:15   #4
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

The article suggested as much Mimsy. Less options for jobs is making more people decide to cruise. It also sounded like cruisiing was a relatively short term thing to help people find out what they wanted to do with their lives and gain them skills to return home with. I was curious Boatguy if that was the case as well. The numbers might not really have changed a whole lot.

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Old 22-08-2013, 11:52   #5
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

It might because of the bad economy, if said young cruisers have saved money but no good job prospects, why not just buy a boat a enjoy the time you have, then when the economy improves and job prospects are better just dock the boat and go to work.
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Old 22-08-2013, 12:02   #6
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

Most of the reports I've seen have said that sailing is in decline, largely because not enough young people are adopting it to replace older folks who can no longer pursue the sport/hobby. Here's just one Google example: Saving Sailing So I would think there would be less young cruisers overall.

There's a lot of reasons both why cruising could increase and decrease with younger cruisers though. Besides the economic reasons; many of my friends/peers (I'm 28) are delaying children or choosing not to have them at all in preference for living more adventures while they're younger. Obviously people cruise with kids, though I've got to think it makes it harder, so having kids later would help young cruisers go out earlier, so to speak.

Against young person cruising though; there's a huge suburban to urban migration going on now in this generation; with many young people preferring to live in cities. Renting a mooring in Boston for a cruisable boat (26+ feet) is about $5,000+ for six months, so even if you were to buy an inexpensive boat, the costs to keep it are tremendous unless you're planning to go now and not come back. I afford to sail (and go on small 3-day to two week cruises, depending on vacation days) only by getting a bunch of friends to go in together. Another factor I think is that because sailing's been dying off for a long time, a number of young people have not been introduced to it. I've introduced probably six of my friends to sailing through day cruises to the harbor islands or longer cruises to the Elizabeth Islands, and now my crew list is always full! But they never would have discovered the sport without an active sailor introducing it to them.
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Old 22-08-2013, 12:08   #7
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

We started cruising and living aboard in our early twenties and, at that time in the early '70's, most other liveaboard cruisers seemed to be near our age. The significant change has not been much for those that are young, but the huge flood of retiring "boomers" moving aboard and cruising in their sixties plus. Maybe the economy has squelched some of those plans for retirees and left some greater opportunities. We have noticed a smaller number of seasonal cruisers moving up and down the East US Coast.
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Old 22-08-2013, 12:19   #8
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

There was a thread about this around a year ago, and I think the general feeling was that there are fewer young people cruising, and it is mostly due to a bad job market. Thinking of leaving a decent job to cruise for a couple of years , and thinking of the market when you get back can be very sobering. Remember that magazine articles are usually written for the sole purpose of generating income for the magazine or writer. There does seem to be a large number of stunt sails by young people that are written about a lot, but these are almost always paid for by other people for fame or profit. I hardly call that cruising. Just an opinion. ____Grant.
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Old 22-08-2013, 13:39   #9
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

There are also a handful of folks "pimping" the cruising lifestyle via their blogs and websites. I would imagine some in the article have their websites mentioned. I know one blogger personally that shamelessly asks for "donations" even though she comes from a very wealthy family.

anyway, I suppose nothing different than the Pardey's did. Though somehow seems more tacky.
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Old 22-08-2013, 13:40   #10
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

Where we are there are virtually no young people cruising. Very few 20-30 y.o. people either. Few 30-40. Some 40+. the majority of cruisers here are people who retired (65/72+).

I know some young cruisers who dropped out - they could no longer sustain this life style.

I think it has to do with all plain and formerly available jobs having been exported our to PRC.

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Old 22-08-2013, 13:47   #11
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

lots of youngsters on my stretch of the estuary that have bought boats to refit and live on...........just wish they weren't quite so "PC".........we used to have parties that lasted for days in the 80's and 90's when doing similar things...........
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Old 22-08-2013, 13:57   #12
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

I think it is the access to media...internet etc. I've been coastal cruising for 25 years. I'm not an old man...yet. So at one point I was young doing it. On the docks, there were an ever rotating group of like minded/aged sailors. They never made much fanfare of it as now...just left. But with all the "look at me" blogs, it's easy to see a lot of younger people getting out there but I'm not sure the percentage is any different from before. By young I am guessing 20-35.
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Old 22-08-2013, 16:45   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by barnakiel View Post
Where we are there are virtually no young people cruising. Very few 20-30 y.o. people either. Few 30-40. Some 40+. the majority of cruisers here are people who retired (65/72+).

I know some young cruisers who dropped out - they could no longer sustain this life style.

I think it has to do with all plain and formerly available jobs having been exported our to PRC.

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Where is this PRC of which you speak? Do they allow liveaboard anchor outs?
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Old 22-08-2013, 17:01   #14
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Re: Young Yachties-Sail article

I think anchoring is no problem, you just don't want to breathe the air or drink the water.
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Old 22-08-2013, 17:06   #15
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