CREW STORY · 26 August 2013 · BY Dmitry Badiarov
The Voyage That Changed Everything
I didn't know that when the phone rang at my apartment in The Hague. In fact, that morning I didn't even know I was going sailing. Then somebody called.
| DatesFrom / To | VesselClass, size, tonnage | VoyagePorts visited, capacity in which sailing | Days on board | Distance logged | Night hours | Wind |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 Aug 2013 | Tall Ship Shtandart | Vlissingen - Zaandam; crew | 1 | 101 NM | — | — |
From the member's personal logbook.
Shtandart was leaving Vlissingen for Zaandam. They could use another pair of hands. I threw a few things into a bag, caught the first train south and hoped for the best. After the inevitable delays, I reached Vlissingen just as the ship was entering the locks on her way to the North Sea. Somehow, we made it. I boarded in the locks. It was during that voyage that somebody mentioned something I had never seriously considered before: skipper schools. Apparently, the Netherlands was one of the best places in Europe to learn. The next RYA Day Skipper course was starting just two months later, in October 2013. I signed up. At the time I thought I was simply enrolling in a sailing course. Looking back, I realise I had stepped onto an entirely different course. I had absolutely no idea what was waiting for me. Nor that one sentence from the instructor would completely change the way I thought about sailing. That is where the next logbook entry begins.