-John Kolius

Feeling a little competitive? Want to sail with a fleet of beautiful classic sailing yachts? Join the crew of the Zodiac to participate in the 2024 Captain Raynaud International Schooner Race (aka CRISR)! (www.crisr.org) Sailors of all experience levels will work with, and become part of, our crew as we teach you everything you need to know to sail the Zodiac through the pristine waters of the San Juan Islands. Never sailed? No worries – no experience is necessary!

We’ll spend the first day of the voyage teaching you the basic in’s and out’s of sailing on a 220 ton gaff rigged schooner. Everyone will be assigned a sailing station working with our experienced crew (unless you want to come along just to enjoy the ride!), and we’ll have a class on sail theory to explain how our sails propel us through the water and how all the different stations work together. In the evening, we will rendezvous with the schooner fleet and scope out the competition! The only requirement for a boat to race in CRISR is to have a schooner rig (two or more masts with the forward mast shorter than the aft mast), so we will see all types of boats, from tiny to huge, classic to modern hull designs, and staysail-, gaff-, or hybrid- rigged.

Friday through Sunday, we’ll race through the islands! There will be plentiful opportunities to practice and fine-tune our sailing skills, taking turns at the helm and jumping to man the lines when the captain calls “Sailing stations!” Don’t worry, there will also be time to relax, take photos, and enjoy the sailing, too. At the end of each day’s racing, we’ll drop anchor in a different secluded bay or harbor with the rest of the schooners, maybe rafting up or exploring the other vessels, watching the sunset, and eating fabulous home-cooked meals from our ship’s galley. If you haven’t had enough sailing, take our ship’s sailing dinghy out for a little more fun! We will conclude the race by hosting an awards ceremony and potluck dinner with the rest of the fleet on Sunday evening, an event which celebrates not only the winners, but also the entire spirit of the race. The next day we’ll bid adieu to newfound friends on the other schooners, and sail back to Bellingham.

CRISR, held (almost) annually since 1997 in memory of Captain Adrian Raynaud, is a celebration of schooners, seamanship, and camaraderie in the Pacific Northwest. Some boats take the race seriously! Most boats don’t. Some years the big boats have the advantage, some years it’s the little ones that win. Owing to the vagaries of Puget Sound summer winds, sometimes we all have to concede to Mother Nature. Although there’s a beautiful trophy and bragging rights on the line, the purpose of the race is to have fun, and on Zodiac, we never lose sight of that goal.