I looked into sailing on tall ships years ago. It was incredibly expensive as a guest, and hard as hell to get into as crew.
hard as hell to get into as crew.
I would assume it is the same as any merchant mariner. Lots of licensing and training.
I was on the royal clipper a few years ago, it was great.
Many European navies have these as training ships and it used to be quite common that you could sign up as a recruit and spend some time on board. Probably easier than becoming a trained crew otherwise.
Many accept volunteers for the enormous amount of shore side maintenance work, and I’ve known several people who parleyed that into (low) paying work.
I live in Sausalito, where the Matthew Turner is berthed, and was fortunate to watch it, as the Educational Tall Ship subject vessel, a few years ago; today I regularly watch it on the bay from my house. It is beautiful.
