When I began the process of recruiting crew for this little adventure up the Inside Passage, I imagined finding people on crew matching websites, advertising my intentions and offering to get to know whomever expressed interest by doing some sailing. Before investigating the websites that might be available, however, I began attending events that seemed likely to introduce me to like minded people. I joined the Corinthian Yacht Club and attended one of their monthly meet-and-greets. It was there that I met Frederic and Marta who joined me for two segments between Prince Rupert and Juneau. For one of those segments we were joined by their son and daughter Jake and Emily.
Then Tina alerted me to a Seattle Mountaineers event where a woman presented slides and talk about her solo trip up the Inside Passage in a sea kayak. At that event I was greeted at the door by Kay, who has turned out to be the ideal recruit for this trip. She quickly committed to doing the entire trip, which resolved any anxiety I might have had about having to do parts of the trip solo. She also volunteered to take on the gargantuan task of nonperishable provisioning. Shortly after agreeing to join me on the trip, she was on board with her daughter Emily, notebook and tape measure in hand, taking inventory and assessing locker space. Talk about initiative. She is the go-to-gal for so much that goes on on this boat. Every time we tie up in a town, she is on shore laundering the boat towels and restocking provisions. She's made it her mission to learn everything there is to know about operating the boat and she does an amazing job of sharing that information with new crew members. And she's a tour de force in the galley. Her brownies are to die for. I and every other crew member on this trip are so lucky to have her with us.
Tina turned out to be a great source for crew recruitment. It's in her nature to find what needs to be found and she's good at it, so when I started looking for crew, she did too. Her colleagues in the Seattle School District have some time to burn during the summer months, so she put the word out. We soon had six more people joining us for various segments: Vi, Tom, Wendy, Jerry, Mary Lou, and Knute. With friends Tina, Bob, Sue, Lavanya, and Jason, that gave us a total of seventeen in all doing one or more segments of this trip.
As I said in the introduction to this blog back in April, the primary qualifier for joining us is to be easy to get along with. Recruiting friends or by word of mouth helps insure that qualification is met. My plans to recruit using crew matching websites made me a little nervous. A week in a 37' space can be a long time to spend with someone if you don't get along with them. Thanks to Tina's help recruiting, to Kay agreeing to do the whole trip, and to every member of the Quijote crew willing to invest their time and energy into making it happen, every segment of the trip was covered with two or more people. Outstanding. I made the decision to be happy with the numbers I had and not try to bring unknown people into the mix.
As it turns out, the segments have been occupied by such a diverse mixture of personalities, abilities and interests, but every person that has come on board has been able bodied, easy to be with, and eager to learn and contribute. I've been so incredibly lucky. I couldn't have asked for better crew. Thank you all.
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