Hello Everyone,
Love.
This could be a long post so make sure you are comfortable and have a nice cup of tea or a glass of wine for this one.
The romance of sailing around the world on a yacht with the love of your life is a dream that many young people come into yachting with.
It is completely doable but it is incredibly hard to get jobs working together especially when you are new to the industry. But there are ways to do it! Some couples wait a long time to get a position working together. although some yachties decide to fulfil their sailing dreams not working on a superyacht, like the very lovely Charlotte and Jp from @projectworldsail who both left their jobs, and bought a boat together. They did the work themselves and decided to sail around the world, check them out on Instagram to follow their adventures.
When I first started yachting, I had just turned 19, the idea of pulling into a new port, new neighbours and the opportunity to meet a bunch of young sailors was, exciting!
For the first few years of yachting, the old sailor tradition of a "Man in every Port" was gospel. Hanging out for a few weeks whilst in the same port and then the boat schedule moves on and so do you. I made wonderful connections with people who have become some of my close friends today.
Over time, this gets repetitive and there becomes a want for something more, a person to be your constant.
So, I thought trying to have a relationship with another yachtie could work. I tried and failed at that a few times, long-distance relationships can be so difficult with working onboard when you are on different yachts.
A few particularly bad break up and I began to rule out dating. Decided if I wanted to have a successful career in yachting I had to sacrifice the idea of having a relationship. Of course, this isn't realistic and a lot of crew working onboard have stable and happy relationships.
I stopped looking and of course, as soon as you stop looking you find your person.
Out of boredom, I downloaded the dating app Hinge. I got liking to pass the time on a rainy Saturday, April afternoon sitting in the historical center of Genoa in a beautiful little coffee shop.
Very quickly, I connected with the person who is my now boyfriend, After a short few conversations via text he agreed to come have a glass of wine with me. We instantly connected and had a lot in common despite having opposite professions. A Rope access climber meets a Sailor.
Let's say the rest is History.

Long distance is incredibly difficult we try to schedule our time off at the same time and plan adventures during this time as well as exploring the UK and Europe in our T5 Transporter conversion.
The key to keeping the magic alive;
We Don't text every living, breathing moment we are apart, so when we do talk we've lots to catch up on.
We have FaceTime date night once a week when I'm on board, so we can talk without work and what was bad about our day getting in the way.
A voice note, in the middle of the workday, just to make the other person smile. Hearing someone's voice brings so much more joy than a text message.
Being Spontaneous, when I'm in Europe, if I can get to where my other half is I'll hop on a plane on a Friday after work.
Open and honest communication, talking about the hard times, and celebrating love together when we can.
Making the most of the time we have together be it, skiing, climbing mountains, adventuring in the van and planning future adventures.
Dating is completely possible whilst working onboard, although it isn't for the faint-hearted. Depending on the vessel you work on scheduling time off can be easy and make seeing your loved one much easier. Although there are yachts that don't have set schedules, organising time off can be incredibly difficult
Of course, things like, time zones and working hours changing make it that much harder but it's not that hard you should give up on having a personal life outside of your job.
To the newbie green yachties reading this blog post, have fun, explore the world, fall in love but keep insight into your own goals, and don't get lost in anyone else's.
As Always keep smiling, laughing and loving the Sea xo
Comments