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That’s our island of choice right now.” On the job in Newport We still go back to Puerto Rico for mainly surfing. I windsurf obsessively, more than surf now, every opportunity I get. “If I’m not working on the water, I’m still on the water,” Land said. “We brought it over to the Swan dealers in Jamestown and it sold within a week - such an awesome boat.” “Two weeks after Emma was born I flew down to Antigua, put the boat in the water, sailed it up here, and we decided to sell it,” he said. Meanwhile, he and his wife, Amy, had two daughters, Hannah, now 9, and Emma, now 8, both born at Newport Hospital. While living in Newport and working on Block Island, he left his Swan sailboat down in the Caribbean for a few years, including a couple of years on Antigua. “That’s where I got the harbormaster jobs and the rest is history.” “We eventually made our way back to Block Island,” Land said.
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That’s when I felt like I started to get really good, sailing 800 miles offshore by myself.” “I started sailing from Block Island to St. He also bought another sailboat, a 40-foot Swan 411. While still in Boston, he started working for Interstate Navigation as first mate on the Carol Jean ferry from Port Judith to Block Island. “I did that for a little while here and there on different boats.”
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“That’s when I started working professionally on the water,” Land said. More: On-the-water tribute held on Newport Harbor in honor of the late Tim Mills They bought a house in Boston’s South End, where they lived for about four years.
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They lived on Block Island for some time before moving to Boston, where he earned his Coast Guard captain’s license and started driving boats for a living, mostly delivery vessels. “She convinced me to go to land for awhile.” He was still 24 when he started the trip to the Caribbean and turned 30 before he left the islands. “When I came back to the United States, I sailed into Block Island and met my now wife,” he said. “I’d stay on an island until I felt like leaving. “I’d get work whenever I needed money,” he said. John for 2½ of those years, then hit many of the other islands. I bought an old Pearson Coaster and went for a five-year sail in the Caribbean, just living that lifestyle.” “I graduated from college and started sailing and racing again. Land earned a bachelor’s degree in biology at the College of Charleston in South Carolina. More: Newport posthumously awards city Employee of the Year Award to Harbormaster Tim Mills In college someone handed me a surfboard and I started surfing all the time.” “I started in Optis and went on to Lasers. “I’ve been boating since I can remember,” he said. Land grew up in Westport, Connecticut, right next to the Cedar Point Yacht Club. Growing up a sailor, being a sailor, I will encourage every single regatta I can to come here." A lifelong sailor For example, the M32s will be making a footprint here this year. “Newport has some of the biggest regattas in the world. “It’s a different level of boats,” Land said. He just found out the Tall Ship Eagle will be coming in for the Newport Folk Festival this year. We’ve got many yachts coming into the shipyard and a big commercial fleet.” Newport is a nationally and internationally known harbor. “I feel really lucky that I have the experience on Block Island, but this is definitely a big step up. “It’s huge - this is a big job,” Land said. More: Newport Harbormaster Tim Mills, 58, remembered fondly after sudden death The job opened up after longtime Harbormaster Tim Mills died unexpectedly in December. Still, he knows he's stepping into a job that is different in scale. “Even though it’s a different harbor in Newport with different uses, I’m hopefully picking up the ball and running with it.” “It’s the same problems in both harbors, mooring management, boat management and people management,” he said. More: Three-month search leads to new Newport harbormaster
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During about five of those years, the family had a home on William Street in Newport, so he has familiarity with the city and the harbor. Land, 47, is not coming into the job cold, considering he served the past 10 years as Block Island’s harbormaster and the two years before that as assistant harbormaster there.