Waterfront: Waterbound Healing

More than any medicine or technology in the world, sometimes it’s the simplest joys that bring healing. This was a lesson that the late Don Backe learned after a near fatal car wreck in 1989 left him paralyzed. In the months following his life-changing collision, Backe, once a seasoned sailor, was merely subsisting, daydreaming about the things in his life he felt he could no longer do. His family decided it was time to help him get back in the saddle.

Through a system of ropes and pulleys, Backe’s family assisted him aboard his old sailboat. It was like riding a bike—as soon as he’d gained his bearings, it was like nothing had changed. There were new challenges to overcome, but his love and aptitude for navigating the blue was stronger than ever, and from it, his damaged body grew stronger too.

What Backe experienced back out on the water while fighting to stabilize himself on the small bucket seat at center of his sailboat, was an unexpected rehabilitation. Sailing strengthened his trunk and upper body. It increased his mobility and it gave him a fresh outlook on life. Something had stirred inside him—the mentality that he was still capable of achieving something. It put a fire in his belly—not just for his own life but for the lives of others in his same shoes. By 1991, Chesapeake Region Accessible Boating (CRAB) was born and Backe found his life’s new purpose—to help those who would otherwise be unable, to access the water.

For the last 33 years, on the coast of Annapolis, along Bembe Beach, CRAB has been providing boating opportunities for participants with all manner of disabilities. In many instances the experiences have been life-changing, putting smiles on the faces of people whose families claimed they hadn’t seen in years, says CRAB Marketing Director Rebecca Gonser. At their floating docks behind Back Creek, CRAB employs various methods of safely assisting disabled recruits onto boats—one method being pulleys and levers, and another, for those who require more sturdy assistance, a crane that will actually lift and lower people directly into the organization’s Beneteau 22A or Martin 16 for an hour on the water, enjoying assisted navigating into the wind. CRAB will even help the disabled loved ones of boat owners get aboard their own private boats.

Needless to say, when you give someone the power to do something they thought they had no chance of experiencing, the results are life changing. Like Backe, participants experience physical rehabilitation simply from having to dynamically stabilize their bodies while out on the moving water. There’s also, perhaps the even more important factor—joy and excitement.

There were a few hurdles. Some would-be participants could only get as far as their Back Creek docks before a sudden fear set in, stopping them in their tracks. “They’d realize that they’d have to leave their wheelchair behind and that causes anxiety,” Gonser says. “Oftentimes they’ve never had the opportunity to get out on the water before or post injury and their wheelchair has become their mobility, and some people just aren’t comfortable with leaving that behind.

About three years ago, in hopes of finding a way for more folks to get on the water without leaving their wheelchairs, CRAB set out to find a pontoon boat, figuring that its deck would make for a very stable platform. President and CEO of CRAB, Paul Bollinger landed a $200,000 donation from a charitable foundation and contacted one of the big manufacturers to explain what the team was looking for. “Nothing monumental, but you know, we don’t need the seating in the bow, just take it out and our guys will bring their own seats,” Bollinger explained to them. “And we need the gate to be wider to accommodate a wheelchair, things of that nature. And so, they told us, ‘Hey, look we’re too busy making boats.’”

Bollinger waited another year for the same company’s help, but pent up Covid-era orders were red hot and he was turned down again. “After two years we were really thinking what do we do? We’re kind of stuck here.”

After a call to the president of Annapolis Yacht Sales, the CRAB team was directed to a catamaran company, Gemini Marine, in Florida that was having trouble selling a 41-foot Gemini Freestyle 399. With a little negotiating, it was theirs. Typically built for taking divers out to reefs in places like Cancun, a Gemini cat was exactly what CRAB needed—it had the big open space with no cabin, just 11 feet by 14 to 15 feet of patio with a roof, as Bollinger describes it.

The team added tracks with securing belts to the deck—the kind you find in a wheelchair supportive van. Other customizations included relocating and reinforcing the glass door-equipped stainless-steel gates and attaching new stanchions to the stern via large vacuum cleats—with lifelines attached as a double security to avoid any wheelchairs from rolling off the back of the deck. Measurements were made so that up to five wheelchair users can board the boat, facing forward or aft.

So far, more than 15 disabled participants have boarded the Gemini, some have had an up close and personal spectating view of the various regattas CRAB holds in their local waters for disabled sailors. Bollinger says the reactions of wheelchair mobile participants, “are priceless. At first, they can’t comprehend that there’s a boat like this they can get on that’s not a giant cruise ship. So when they get on the boat, there’s a huge smile that comes across their face and they’re just beaming and what they have told us is, ‘This is incredible, I never expected to be out on the water in my own chair,’ and they all say, ‘I want to come back out again,’ and you know, we hope they bring another friend in a wheelchair.”

Not all participants are wheelchair-bound either, some are ambulatory guests working to overcome cognitive and developmental handicaps. These folks can take two steps up to the bow and enjoy some sea spray—and often once they’re there, they don’t want to leave.

Due to strong demand, CRAB is adding fishing gear to their Gemini. Last April, some members from the Paralyzed Veterans of America came to see the new adaptive boating center the organization had just finished building. “We showed them our adaptive sailboats and they were pretty attentive, but then they saw the Gemini,” Bollinger recalls. “We don’t want to go sailing,” they told him, eyeing the cat. “We want to go powerboating and we want to fish.” Bollinger assures them they’ll have their opportunity this year. The CRAB team installed rod holders and will soon be adding electric reels. That way, even if they don’t have the ability to wind a reel themselves, all participants will be able to push a button and land a fish.

CRAB’s not stopping with fishing. They’re even considering handicap accessible wakeboarding. While the details are still being worked out, Bollinger says that capable participants can be put on a “big flying wing” of sorts that would be pulled behind the Gemini.

This article originally appeared in the March 2024 issue of Power & Motoryacht magazine.

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Source: https://www.powerandmotoryacht.com/column/waterfront-waterbound-healing