Nitzan Levy loves adventures and is an avid sailor, but she never thought she would embark with a group of women on a sail from Florida to Cuba. A story about an experience that changed all of their lives
Original article: http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-4890756,00.html
Who has recently had an opportunity to go on a real adventure? Like sailing the high seas, cruising the most beautiful coastlines and exploring new countries and cultures?
Nitzan Levy, 39, never skips an adventure. For seven and a half years, she has lived in New York City, a city that has always fascinated her: not necessarily because of its high-rises and busy streets, but because it’s one big island. Levy, a certified captain, arrived in New York, a city surrounded by water, and immediately started to look for the local sailors’ community. When she realized that even if she looked hard she wouldn’t find such a thing, she decided to create her own. “I was seeking a sailing community similar to the community I was part of in Israel, and when I didn’t find it I just established my own club,” Levy said.
The club, Sailors NYC, was founded three years ago. Today it has 40 club members and over 400 Meetup members. “We teach sailing to all levels and offer our members access to sail the club’s boats,” Levy said. “In the winters we are organizing sailing flotillas in the Caribbean and preparing the next sailing season.”
Levy has gathered a group of people who meet on a regular basis, even during the wintertime, for lectures, instructions, meetings and other social activities. “We welcome non-sailors who have a passion for being on the water to join in order to get introduced to sailing and to sailors, and to learn,” she said.
Over a decade ago, Levy went on a trip to Cuba. “I was sitting on the beach when I saw a sailing yacht,” she remembered. “I thought to myself, ‘How amazing would it be to get to Cuba from the sea?’ and I made up my mind to come back on a sailboat.”
Cuba is one of the most exotic, colorful and intriguing destinations being revealed to the world in the last few years. In spite of its strict Communist government, which limits the locals’ lives, it has pastoral views, turquoise beaches and a rich culture. The floodgates from the United States to Cuba opened up last year, and the Israeli captain’s idea started to become feasible. “I announced a flotilla from Key West to Cuba and quickly got 15 people to sign up -- all women,” Levy said. She did not initially think it would be a women-only trip, but when she realized the enthusiasm of the women, she saw an opportunity. “I decided to make this whole flotilla a women-only journey.”
This meant changing her plans. “I let go of the male skippers who I initially contacted, and recruited female skippers,” she said, and 20 women sailed on board three yachts as part of a six-boat “Wind of Change” rally organized by Harmony Yacht Vacations in Key West.
Three weeks before the journey started, while all the women were immersed in preparations for the trip, Hurricane Matthew hit the eastern coast of Cuba. The hurricane, the strongest to hit Cuba since 2007, had taken a hard toll on people’s lives in the eastern part of the country. The women then decided to start collecting donations and provisions that could help out the Cuban people. “We realized it wasn’t an easy task,” says Levy, “but we didn’t give up. We each reached out to synagogues, churches and communities and collected things we learned were highly in demand, such as office supplies, T-shirts, shoes, USB drives.”
The women did not worry about another hurricane even though the flotilla was planned for the tail of the hurricane season, and they all got insurance in case something went wrong. “The main concern of all was the sail itself -- which for many women was the first time to do such a crossing and the fact we were planning to do it overnight.”
A few weeks back they embarked from Key West bound for Varadero, Cuba, then on to Havana and back to Key West. Most of the women did not have offshore sailing experience; however, each captain instructed her crew, and delegated responsibilities to the crew so that every woman did something and took an active part in the sail.
“We sailed 15-hour legs between the destinations and sailed most of the time overnight,” Levy said. “We assigned two to three women for every four-hour shift. Most of the sail is on an autopilot, so the main responsibility is to make sure that there are no other vessels on a collision course with us.”
Levy describes the arrival at a new coast, a country and whole new world as a Columbus-like experience. “Cuba is an exquisite country,” she said. “It’s not a poor country. The people may not have great financial means, but they are not poor. The government provides them with food, health insurance, education and jobs. In fact, Cuba has the highest average of high school graduates. Having said that, the salaries are the equivalent of $25 a month and the citizens are not allowed to leave the country. It’s like living in a cage.”
The Cubans were very excited to hear about the arrival of the women and their contributions to the community. The local TV reported their arrival and people everywhere mentioned that they heard of the sailors.
Every place they went to they passed along the donations and visited restaurants, bars and famous architectural landmarks, from the plazas to El Capitolio. Being surrounded by women only added more meaningful layers to the journey.
“It was funny, emotional and yet empowering in a way only women could bring each other towards,” Levy said. “Definitely a life-changing experience. Each of us brought something from her own life experience and shared it with the others. Sisterhood contains and helps channel those energies towards those who need them. We had younger and older women, singles, married, divorced, with or without kids, each in a different life phase, and they all got to share as well as be there for each other.”
“Cuba is going through a great change. You can feel that. In my previous visit there the only marina in Varadero was very old and neglected and the sewage was running through the streets of Old Havana. It seems that since then the Cubans have realized the economic power of tourism and a lot of improvements were already implemented and new facilities were built. I believe that now that Fidel Castro has died a lot of things will change even more, so this is the right time to see how it is before it changes completely. It is even more exciting to do it through the sea. It is a very fulfilling experience.”
