Island Life Magazine Ltd October/November 2013 | Page 36

Chloe Sandell:
Sailing in paradise

Chloe Sandell is not the type to sit
around in an office, wondering what the
big wide world is really like. She decided
to go and find out for herself.
Chloe has already sailed the east coast
of Australia and the South Pacific,
and is now taking a degree that could
ultimately see her becoming captain
of a cruise liner or even an oil tanker.
Having attended Ryde School with
Upper Chine, she completed her Duke
of Edinburgh award scheme bronze and
silver, before progressing to gold, part of
which was a ‘residential’ course. Basically
it meant being away for four of five
nights in a different environment, so she
chose sailing with the Tall Ships Youth
Trust, based in Portsmouth.
“I loved it, and that is where it all
started,” said Chloe. “The next thing I
knew I was on a 72ft Challenger yacht
on my way to Cherbourg, getting up at
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7.0am and doing anything from sailing
to cleaning. I was on the yacht for a week
and thought ‘this is for me’. I wanted to
progress and sail somewhere; see what
was out there.”
Chloe, now 19, was initially thinking
of a career in the Royal Navy, but at the
time they were not recruiting, and purely
by chance a friend told her that she
could get full sponsorship for working in
the Merchant Navy, with a guaranteed
job at the end of it.
After applying to some 15 companies,
she received three interview offers, and
Chiltern Marine agreed to sponsor her
for a foundation degree at Plymouth. But
Chloe admits she then took a big risk,
explaining: “I decided I wanted to take
a gap year, so I asked Chiltern if I could
go back to them in 12 months’ time.
They said they couldn’t really do that,
but we reached a compromise that they

would put me top of the interview list if
I re-applied a year later."
That prompted her to do her Royal
Yachting Association Flying Fish
Yachtmasters’ course in Cowes up to
day skipper level, before heading to
Flying Fish* in Sydney last November to
co ntinue her sailing education.
That entailed sailing 2,500 ocean miles
up the east coast of Australia, taking
nearly three months, before she returned
home intent on completing her final
Yachtmasters’ practical exams.
“I had only been back a couple of
weeks, when I received a phone call
from a former school friend whose dad
had bought a 13-year-old Oyster 56,
and wanted to sail the world in it. I was
asked to join the crew to do the Pacific
crossing and immediately said ‘yes’. It
puts some people off because it means up
to three weeks at sea without seeing land.