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New To The Cruising Life?
There’s a Coach for That
T
here are life coaches, career coaches, performance coaches, and now cruising coaches. The need is real. Shifting from a land life to a cruising life is a huge mental, financial, and lifestyle change. Most of the advice out there comes from unvetted, anonymous armchair sailors spouting off in online forums. You log on, ask a simple question, and suddenly you’re bombarded with dozens of different answers, so you log off feeling even more confused than when you started. Basically, the advice is usually worth what you pay for it, and bad advice at sea can really cost you in the end. A cruising coach is someone who’s been there and done that with extensive miles under their keel and the breadth of experience to help people with a wide variety of cruising goals from island hopping to ocean crossing.
by Cindy Wallach
Behan and Jamie Gifford on Totem have certainly been there and done that. They’ve spent the last nine years sailing around the world with their three kids, and they have no plans of stopping any time soon. They left Seattle in 2008 when their kids were four, six, and eight years old. They have a popular blog where they do a beautiful job of illustrating through words and photos the practical and the dreamy sides of the cruising life. As their blog traffic grew, so did the emails with all manner of questions. “We were starting to get a lot of questions. We wanted to help, but it became impossible to answer everyone’s questions. Setting up a coaching business gave us a way to take the time to answer questions thoroughly and to genuinely help people, while also managing our time. It started as an official business in summer 2016,” says Behan from their boat, waiting for
##Namibia coast.
a window to cross from Florida to the Bahamas. Here’s how it works. You pay on a monthly basis, and for the month you get to exchange emails, chat, Skype, and generally pick the brains of these two experienced cruisers on just about any topic.
THE BOOK: Voyaging With Kids: a Guide to Family Life Afloat. THE AUTHORS: Behan Gifford, Sara Dawn Johnson, and Michael Robertson. SUMMARY: A factual and balanced guide offering experience, insight, and helpful information on all things on kids on boats. From schooling to health to socializing, the book looks at how families with kids from newborn to teenager have navigated the ins and outs of the cruising life. WHY: Behan says, “This is the book Jamie and I wish we had when we were getting ready to set off cruising with our kids.”
##Can you hear me now? Papua, New Guinea.
64 April 2017 spinsheet.com
WHERE: The book can be purchased on Amazon, at most marine chandleries, and in independent book stores throughout the United States. Find more at sailingtotem.com