AMSTERDAM – The Caribbean sailing trip 25 Dutch high school students was supposed to end in Cuba, where they would trade a tall ship for a comfortable plane flight back to the Netherlands.
The coronavirus pandemic forced a change in plans. Now, the students, ages 14-17, are taking the long way home -- crossing the Atlantic Ocean in a 60-meter (200-foot) schooner called the Wylde Swan under the watchful eyes of 12 experienced sailors and three teachers making sure the teenagers do their school work on the way.
The organizer of the voyage expects the real lessons for the students will come from making the the five-week ocean voyage of nearly 7,000-kilometers (4,350-miles) itself. “These children have had to adapt to enormous change.