The people at Cornell Sailing Events
Cornell Sailing Events has an experienced team of sailors on hand to provide support both in the lead up to and during the event itself.
Events Team |
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| Jimmy Cornell | Doina Cornell Event Coordinator |
Luc Callebaut & Jackie Lee Operations Manager & Operations Coordinator |
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Behind the Scenes |
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| Ivan Cornell Web server administrator |
Sylvie Branton Website manager |
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Jimmy Cornell
An accomplished sailor and successful author, Jimmy Cornell has sailed over 200,000 miles in all oceans of the world including three circumnavigations as well as voyages to Antarctica, Patagonia, Alaska, Greenland, Arctic Canada and Spitsbergen.
Thousands of sailors have fulfilled their dream of blue water cruising with the help of Jimmy Cornell’s books, among them the international bestseller World Cruising Routes. Now in its 7th edition, and with 200,000 copies sold to date, this is one of the best selling nautical publications in the world.
As the founder of the highly successful ARC transatlantic rally, Jimmy Cornell is credited with having devised the offshore cruising rally concept. In the last three decades, Jimmy Cornell had organized 30 transatlantic rallies, five round the world rallies and one round the world race, with over 3,000 boats and 15,000 sailors having participated in his sailing events. His new series of rallies aimed at cruising sailors: the Atlantic, and Blue Planet Odysseys now span the world.
The Blue Planet Odyssey round the world event aimed at raising awareness of the global effects of climate change. Reflecting the growing concern for the state of the oceans, participants carried the message “The ocean, our future”. During their voyage, they engaged in oceanographic and meteorological research programs under the auspices of UNESCO-IOC and NOAA.
Nowhere are the consequences of climate change more noticeable than in the Northwest Passage. After an unsuccessful attempt to transit the Northwest Passage in 2014, in 2015 Jimmy made a successful transit from west to east on his new Aventura. Conceived by him as an ideal cruising boat for both high latitude and tropical sailing, the Garcia Exploration 45 design won the SAIL 2015 Best Boat award.
Read Jimmy Cornell’s long biography
Doina Cornell
Event Coordinator
Having two travel-obsessed parents, by the age of fourteen Doina had covered thousands of miles over land and sea, most memorably spending seven years circumnavigating the world with her family on a 36 foot yacht.
Her memoir of this time, Child of the Sea, was published in 2012.
Since then she has been mostly land-based but continues to sail whenever possible, including to Antarctica with father Jimmy and brother Ivan. In the summer of 2014 she sailed to the Arctic with Jimmy and her daughter Nera. In 2015 she joined the Blue Planet Odyssey onboard Australian yacht Drina with her son Dan and sailed to Samoa, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.
She has worked on the ARC (Atlantic Rally for Cruisers), America 500, Europa 92, and the Millennium Odyssey. She researched the first World Cruising Handbook and edited two editions of the Canary Islands Cruising Guide. In 2000 she helped set up noonsite.com which she managed until 2008 when she left to train as a primary (elementary) school teacher. She worked with Jimmy on the second edition of World Cruising Destinations, published in 2017.
She lives in Gloucestershire, UK, and was elected in 2012 to serve on her local District Council.
She now works full time for Cornell Sailing Events coordinating all the Odyssey events as well as the Science and Education programs. As part of the Blue Planet Odyssey she has sailed to the Arctic and Tuvalu in the South Pacific to raise awareness of the risks of climate change to these parts of the world.
Luc Callebaut & Jackie Lee
Operations Manager & Operations Coordinator
Luc and Jackie sail and explore the world’s warm oceans, along with their Schipperke dogs, on their 37-year old, 46ft Norman Cross trimaran.
From a background of teaching primary school, Luc left Belgium, and Jackie, from working in wilderness areas with the US Forest Service, left California, to serendipitously, meet one another as Scuba Instructors for Club Med, Guadeloupe in 1984! Since then, they have combined forces to further their passion for travel and became full time sailboat cruisers in 1992.
They sustain their voyaging lifestyle by working where they cruise. From teaching scuba diving, managing water sports on cruise ships, running a 110 ft. live-aboard dive boat, driving & guiding tourists around in Tahiti, installing pactor modems, … to reporting as travel writers and making professional video films around the South Pacific … they’ve gained a wealth of rich experiences, and garnered a lot of knowledge!
By living and working for over 20 years in the Caribbean, Pacific, and now entering South East Asia, via the Philippines, Luc and Jackie’s strength is that they’ve taken the time to really explore every corner, and discover the islands and their people, their advantages and their quirks. They love to meet people, islanders and cruisers alike… and above all, to amass and share information which will help others have as much fun as they have. They believe that one should have on hand as much info as possible in order to be better prepared when visiting places … so you can enjoy your visit to the fullest! “We hate bypassing any place along the sailing route!”
Luc has been a regional editor for the cruisers’ website, Noonsite since its inception, and both are long-time SSCA (Seven Seas Cruising Association) commodores.
They have supported the Blue Planet Odyssey sailors during their 2015 stopovers in the Pacific and Indonesia and in 2016-17 through the Indian Ocean and South Atlantic, as well as being part of the Cornell Sailing team in the Canary Islands and Cape Verdes for the Barbados 50 and Atlantic Odyssey.
Check out Luc’s Youtube Channel for videos of the Blue Planet Odyssey and Barbados 50: Tropical Sailing Life
Ivan Cornell
Web server administrator
Ivan manages our dedicated web server.
He also set up the tracking system for all our sailing events as well as that of Aventura.
Ivan sailed on Aventura from London to Greenland and streamlined all onboard systems in preparation for Aventura‘s Northwest Passage, continuing to provide technical support throughout her 2014 and 2015 expeditions.
Ivan is co-author of the Cornell’s Ocean Atlas.
Read more about Ivan Cornell here.
Sylvie Branton
Website manager
Sylvie takes care of this website remotely from her boat in the Caribbean.
She designed the Cornell Sailing website and the previous Cornell Sailing Events websites, and has been managing them since 2011.
A software engineering consultant in Paris in a previous life, she has been living and working on the sea with her life-time companion for over 20 years, traveling from Northern Europe to South America to the multicultural Caribbean that she loves.
She enjoys building attractive, effective websites for marine businesses, with attention to ease-of-use and the sailor’s perspective.
Sylvie speaks 4 languages and was a major contributor to Kathy Parsons’ popular books Spanish for Cruisers and French for Cruisers.
