At the start of a journey there are many directions to take, many questions that need answers. While the mission statement of Hands Across the Sea, Inc., is broad, we have decided to focus on helping schools while we are sailing in the Caribbean. The words "healthcare" and "environmental" will remain in our mission statement because in other parts of the world where we cruise, this type of help may become the priority for us. Below are the sister organizations and wonderful people who are helping us achieve the Hands mission, and we've also listed other organizations that fulfill medical and environmental goals in coastal communities.

Hands book donors
We are grateful to all of you who searched attics, basements, and bookshelves for children's reading books to donate to schoolchildren in the Caribbean. Thanks to friends, neighbors, relatives, cousins,

Great job! A big Hands "thanks!" to Nita, Jessica, and Rosemary of the Marion Library for donating many boxes of children's books to our current Caribbean project

and to people like Rosemary, Nita, and Jessica who packed the remainders from the Marion, (Massachusetts) Library book sale, Kathy Leavitt and Cindy Renaud of MedAesthetic Day Spa in Dartmouth, Massachusetts, who collected books on our behalf, and Connie MacSweeney of the Lady Bug Bookstore in Dartmouth, Maassachusetts, who is providing storage for donated books. If you are interested in collecting books for Hands Across the Sea, or you have some children's books to donate, please see the Book Drop page on the Hands website and contact us.

An AIT Worldwide driver picking up books donated to Hands

AIT Worldwide
There are a few steps along the way to transport books from your attics and library sales to Nevis, Dominica, and Union Island in the Caribbean. Thanks to Ray Vargo and AIT Worldwide who helped us ship over 1,000 pounds of books from Massachusetts to Boaters for Books' Punta Gorda, Florida, storage facility. And thanks to Matt Pollock of Harte-Hanks who introduced us to Ray!

Boaters for Books
Kathy Oberle founded Boaters for Books over 10 years ago as she and her husband cruised the

Solange Payne of Newtown Primary School receives books from Esther Shillingford, Dominica Lions Club President

Caribbean on their sailboat. Now land-based, Kathy continues her good work distributing books to Caribbean school children through a network she has set up on various islands. We are grateful to her and her team for shipping our books to Nevis, Dominica, and Union Island. On Dominica, delivery logistics were managed by Esther Shillingford and Louisiana Dubique of the Dominica Lions Club. We attended a "handing over ceremony" at the Lions Club in Roseau, Dominica, where Solange Payne of Newtown Primary School received your donated books from Esther Shillingford, President of the Roseau Chapter. Boaters for Books also shipped our books to Stephanie Brown Primary School on Union Island in St. Vincent and the Grenadines and to the Special Education School in Nevis. Thank you to these key partners of Hands Across the Sea. We could not get books to schoolkids without your help!

True North Missions

Dr. Alan Barber, founder of True North Missions

Hands Across the Sea is fortunate to have Dr. Alan Barber, the founder of True North Missions, on our board of directors. Dr. Barber has founded True North Missions to provide healthcare to the children of Mayan Indian tribes in Central America. These indigenous people were displaced by Guatemala's 36-year civil war, which ended in 1999. The Mayans have migrated to isolated areas in bordering countries to avoid persecution and discrimination, and as a result are isolated from access to healthcare. A visit to True North's website will fill you in on the outstanding work Dr. Barber and his volunteer medical professionals are accomplishing. To see who True North is helping, check out the wonderful slide show of their recent mission to Guatemala. True North Missions has inspired us in another way: Dr. Barber utilizes a 47-foot catamaran, outfitted especially for medical missions, to bring his teams to the site and provide a base for their work ashore.

Canvasback Missions' 71-foot catamaran, Canvasback

some other great organizations...
In looking for partner organizations we've discovered that using a boat to bring help to communities in need is unusual but not unprecedented. For example, the folks at Canvasback Missions, Inc. (http://www.canvasback.org/index.html), have been combining medical and ministry outreach in Micronesia for 26 years. And other groups are using boats in the service of medical and social assistance: Sail Vega (http://www.sailvega.com), Oceans Watch (http://www.oceanwatch.org), Project MARC (http://www.project-marc.org), Endangered Islands Expedition (http://www.eiexpedition.com/pages/1/index.htm), and Maritime Missions (http://www.maritimemissions.org), to list only a few. We hope someday to have the opportunity to work with additional groups as we continue cruising.