the crew

Capitan Oceano (Christian)

This man is a real waterman! Besides he’s doing almost every watersport you can imagine, he’s a sailor and pirate from the bottom of his salty heart. He started sailing in his very early years, so it seems this man can feel wind and seas. It doesn’t wonder, that he always dreamt about cruising the world on a sailing boat. His sense for the ship is giving the crew a warm and safe feeling. With him as Captain you don’t need to worry about rough weather or technical troubles. His self-confidence convinces everybody, that you’re in good hands.
As an ambitious person, who learns new topics on his own very easy, it seems that he’s able to do everything. Doesn’t matter if it’s electrics, woodworks or passage planning. He’s a real caretaker when it comes to his true love, the ship. This smart man likes to be prepared.
He likes things to be right, which doesn’t mean that this way has to be the easy one. Due to his former job as an architect, he has the ability to see the bigger picture of any project and likes to make things happen. Christian is unstoppable! If he wants something, he’ll get it. Doesn’t matter if it’s a broken part on the boat needing to be fixed or working out new ideas for the galley.. his creativity seems to be limitless. But luckily this man is also communicative in nature and makes friends pretty quick, what helped to us many times wherever we’ve been, even if it’s a ride into town or giving us a hand on our projects..
He also loves dark rum and french fries. Social conventions doesn’t matter for him, because he’s a free soul, what makes him a real pirate! OK, the fries thing is not pretty pirate..

Quartermaster Fay (Ursel)

she started with windsurfing and dinghy sailing as a teen and added kitesurfing and surfing to her repertoire recently, so you could say she’s quite familiar with watersports already. Sailing on big boats is indeed new to her but she is learning so fast and adopted that lifestyle so fast that she’s almost an old saltback already. Interested in all and everything which happens outside and especially around-, in- and underwater she’s the perfect match for a life on ZERO. She loves to be in the nature, away from civilization, improving her outdoor skills like bow hunting or fixing up a proper bonfire. Give her a speargun and she takes care of dinner. Give her a brush and she paints the inside of a cabin without loosing a single drop of paint. Leave her alone on the beach and she’ll come back loaded with tons of sea shells and other swags to make her own jewellery. If you don’t stop her ZERO will be overloaded very soon. She’s multi talented and open minded which only can make anybody feel better whos close to her.

Fay joined ZERO in November 2017 for the first time. Unfortunately this little pirate girl has to go back to germany every once in a while to cut of the last lines of her former life and finish her degree in Biomedical Techniques/Medicine Physics WOW!  (Yeah that’s what I thought as well!!!). But once the damned bachelor thesis in handed in she will sail wherever ZERO sails.

Admiral Patch

the best what happened to us during our time in the boatyard was meeting PATCH. She found the way into our hearts in a millisecond. She was less than 4 weeks old when she moved onto ZERO and since then discovered every little corner and made it her home. The cutest thing on earth she’ll sail with us wherever we go and everytime we catch a fish she’s the first who gets her cut..

previous crew

Marco

Traveling the world with his 2 surfboards, Marco joined the crew in Mexico to cruise the Pacific Ocean all the way to New Zealand. He has only been on a sailboat once before but integrated into the ZERO rythm right away and sailed over 4.000nm with us including crossing the equator and meeting King Neptune. A very gentle soul and an amazing musician. Countless days he played the guitar for us. As a surfer he’s an early bird and we often woke up with coffee-smell in the cabin and could listen to him singing an italian song while he prepared breakfast. Marco stayed over 5 month with us and we hope to have you aboard again when we continue further west towards New Zealand after the plandemic.

Taiichi

Usually he fly’s around the world over 30 times per year. Yep, NO typo. OK its mostly business related but this year he decided to not fly and travel alternatively. We met him online and after the first chat we definitely wanted to know all about his story.  A Japanese/American with businesses all over the world living in the second smallest country in the world and he can’t go home because of all the restrictions the plandemic brought us. SO we put him on the crew list and promised him to bring him home to Niue, a small Island in Polynesia. As a sushi restaurant owner he made the best seafood we ever had on ZERO and showed us how to harvest everything from the fish we caught. And yes he told us his story or better said stories, many stories but you have to host him yourself to hear them.. Unfortunately we only could bring him from Mexico to Tahiti. Sorry mate but we tried as best as we cold. We had a few amazing months together and hope to cross path with you again..

Juan

A true traveler we picked up in Mexico. Juan travelled the world for the last 15 years and wanted to add an ocean passage to his repertoire. And he got what he wanted. a day after he came aboard we pulled the hook and left for a vojage noone will ever forget. As a newby to sailing he now has more than 4.000nm and an ocean crossing to show. And because we crossed the equator he shall be called shellback from now on. All the best for the adventures your heading to next..

Willi

A german boatbuilder we met in Chiapas, Mexico. In a boatyard of course! He was working on a friends boat stuck in the boatyard. We invited him along for a short trip to El Salvador to renew his visa but a few days after arrival the borders were closed and we kept sailing together for more than 2 month before he could get back to Germany. Even though ZEROs project list was pretty empty after the refit in Guaymas, his amazing knowledge about boat work was a welcome addition and we enjoyed working together as much as we did sailing. Good luck on finding the right boat for yourself my friend. Hope to share an anchorage one day..

Rebecca

Everybody remembers Rebecca!  She used to be the quartermaster on ZERO for a long time and now lives a happy life ashore. But she started dreaming about cruising the world on a sailboat since being coupled with the captain. Starting sailing after she met Christian, which is quite a while ago, she’s now a pretty good sailor. Unfortunately she’s unable to assess distances correctly, so she’s mostly scared by maneuver into small narrow harbors, but luckily doesn’t fear the open water.
One of her greatest talents is to remember important and unimportant things equally. If you can’t find something on ZERO, you’re going to ask Rebecca. She’s a true Quartermaster! She handles the whole living on ZERO. Without her no one would survive a single day. She´s the one who knows where all the stuff is stored and how much we still have left from anything. Even if it’s certain sailing gear, the oatmeal cookies stored away in the depth of the proviantation baskets or your bathing-towel you „lost“ after your last swim, she knows where you have to look for it. But don’t mess with her system to organize the boat. The little “Mr. Monk“ inside of her is waiting to drive you crazy.
What makes her really valuable for the crew is that this powerful woman can work as hard as men do. During the refit of ZERO Rebecca could improve her manual skills, which were quite undeveloped as former office administrator, and impressed by becoming a pretty good painter and an even better fiberglass sander (no, she does not react on that itchy mess! And no, you can’t hire her! One refit in a lifetime is more than enough…).
When she’s not painting or answering questions about whereabouts of things, she loves to prepare delicious and healthy meals, surfs some waves, practices Yoga, makes jewelry out of shells or just reads a book.
What makes her pirate, you ask? She’s able to make pizza fly and loves dark rum as much as the captain does! Ahrrr!

Yeah ZERO misses you!

Peter & Robin

Met these guys in Hawaii and had them aboard a few times for some day sailing around Hawaii and then we ran into each other again many thousand miles away in Alaska. What a coincidence?! Since then we call each other friends and manage to get together every once in a while in far away locations. Last time it was on his sailboat in the Bahamas.. when and where do we meet next?

Norbert & Anja

I know this guy for a long time and we met.. during sailing, of course.
They came all the way to Hawaii to join us for an adventurous sailing trip from Big Island to Oahu on Hawaii.
It was nice to have some old friends aboard and talk plenty german. Its too sad they only stayed for around 2 weeks..
We have to do this more often!

E.P. & Tiffiny

During our stay on HYC´s aloha dock we met this beautiful couple. Pretty soon we realized "these guys are fun!“ After a couple dates cooking together, laughing and sharing funny stories or just kill some bottles of wine and rum we decided to go on a weekend-trip to Pokai Bay. Never had a better spontaneous party than with these lovely people, who just asked Tif's son Shadd for a lift home and came with a big bunch of friends, food and lots of beer. Yeeha! Love you guys!

Diana - the surprise
This lovely woman we also met in Honolulu. She needed accommodation for a couple days, so we decided to help her out and offered her to stay on Zero. The gratitude was Rebecca could pass the cooking spoon to the passionate hobby cook for a while and enjoy being served. Good times with good food and wine!

Frank – the true German

Like his older brother Christian Frank grew up with sailing since his early childhood. So he has a salty heart as well and loves all kind of watersports. He came in April 2015 to join some time of his sabbatical with us and be crew on our first big leg. Unfortunately ZERO’s refit wasn’t finished when he arrived, so we had his helping hands for the final repairs.
He is the kind of relaxed musically surfer dude, who likes to compose cool electronic music or to jam some rock songs on the guitar. But don’t make him sing if you like your cristal! For some strange reason he believes he’s a good singer...maybe the rum, he likes as much as we do, makes him think that? Anyway he’s good company and it’s always fun to see his excitement when we hooked a fish.
So what makes him pirate except his love for the sea? He doesn’t deny his nature. His love for cold beer, good meat and his strong accent classify him for the title „the true German“.

Ben & Riah

Ben saw ZERO moored in Kona bay and thought "Damn, I need to get to know these guys! What a lovely boat!"
Two weeks later we accidentally met Ben in the lineup. Amusingly Ben is German too and enjoyed meeting folks with same interests. After a lovely evening aboard we invited the couple to sail the crossing to Maui with us. Ben's longtime dream came true and he spread his happiness with his good vibes and beautiful soul. Climbing the mast, campfire on the beach and playing the guitar included! Awesome days with these lovely couple!

Gaby & Carsten

The salt water hair dyeing addicted big sis' and her passionate hobby fisherman boyfriend visited us in ZERO's "early days" in San Diego. They were close to buy their own boat and wanted to test-drive as cruisers.
Carsten, who already installed navigational instruments on a friend’s boat, was as helpful for Christian installing our technical stuff as Gaby was for Rebecca with her quick rubber gloved hands and out of the box thinking mind getting ZERO clean and things well stored.
After a couple days of work on the boat and provisioning marathon we took ZERO to check out Catalina Island.
Unfortunately the weather wasn't as good as the two hoped for, but at least Gaby's hair didn't got darker 😉
And we had a great time together. Thanks for your helping hands!

7 thoughts on “the crew

  1. love your boat and your videos on sailing in mexico looking at a similar boat, needs masts replaced. can i ask you the full length of your main mast and boom length please?

    thank you,

  2. Hi. I’m Filipe from Azores islands atlantic ocean. I saw you in youtube and I thought, thats exactly the way i want to live. But I have a big question to you, how can we live in a boat and have at the same time a good financial suport.?
    Best regards
    Filipe

  3. christian, what a great sailing ship, the hudson force fify. i hope to sail blue water some day on a force fifty some day, and after about a year of youtube watching i have been sailing around the world with differnt sailing parties.. i have watched most of your presentations. i appreciate your format for the videos. i grew up racing a 19ft flying scot with my dad and brothers. my dads desire was to someday sail a big boat, and now the desire and plan is mine, to get to salt water somewhere in the world sailing on a hudson force fifty. i know this is my first communication with you. but i feel i know you through your videos. if you ever would take on crew i would be very happy to communicate on seeing if that would ever be a possibility. blessings as you continue your journey…michael… i am single and over fifty and i love to learn new things all the time, i love to work, acoustic guitar, adventure, the sun and all of nature, life, i love life…blessings..m

    1. Ahoy Michael,
      Thanks for your mail and the nice words.
      We hear that quite often when we meet with digital friends.. you/they know us from the videos or blog and we know nothing.. but it’s just a matter of time to equalize that..
      We would love to take some people out for a sail, many people asked us about that already, but zero needs some more attention. After finishing the refit we want to find a way to get you out in the water..
      So please stand by.. hopefully next spring we have something figured out..
      But if you just wanna catch up and take a tour in ZERO.. well be in San Diego for some time starting around Christmas..
      come Over..

  4. Greetings Capt Christian and mate Rebecca,
    Wonderful vessel and your lifestyle is beyond magnetic for me – always dreamed of cruising.
    My envy, admiration, and respect goes out to you – love seeing you live this style. Nice work, nicer play !
    I’m curious if you are still in Alaska ? I am currently in Oregon – inland from florence.
    If you are headed this way and want to check out some inland areas – being a native here I would be happy to show you around to best hotsprings and other places.
    Still looking at sailboats myself, and really excited to set sail one day. I would love to see your boat and meet up ,
    best regards, Ty

  5. Hey guys!!

    met you tonight in Prince Rupert! Loved chatting with you both and have so much respect for what you are doing and the course you are trying to steer! Would love to keep in touch and have some ideas for how to help you bring this adventure to others and hopefully gain their support!

    best contact for me is my email chef.basinski@gmail.com or on facebook Beth Basinski.

    You two are fantastic and can’t wait to chat again!!

    Cheers!

    beth

    1. It was great to meet you too. Wish you all the best and hope to chat a lot soon..
      Gotta sleep
      Now.. Leaving tomorrow like you guys..
      Stay safe out there..
      Aloha

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