Dear Clearwater,

This story starts in 2007, when Captain Julia Wilson was pregnant with her first child. She finished out the ’07 season – well into her 2nd trimester and I was hired to replace her that winter.

I remained Captain for three seasons in 2008, 2009, and 2010 before I spent Fall of that final year in my first trimester with Amelia. I knew I could handle it, because Julia, before me, showed us it could be done.

By 2012, one-year-old Amelia and I had spent the year running around Toronto with her snug in a carrier on my back. So when Captain Nick asked if I wanted to take a turn at Revival that year, we packed up and headed down from Canada. My family enjoyed listening to a favorite musician of mine, Martin Sexton, and I was Clearwater’s Captain once more Sunday and Monday.

My daughter hung out happily on my back while we were getting underway, ran around the deck while we were sailing, tailed by a crew member, and slept soundly next to me in the Captain’s bunk that night.

Amelia was born two weeks before Revival 2011 and now, at 10, she’s more than halfway to the moment she steps on board as a deckhand herself.

I am hopeful that one day, our children’s children will sail Clearwater down Pete’s “Golden River.”

Samantha Hicks

Board Member