Vuyisile Jaca's Journey To The Maiden
The first all female black crew to race around Cape Horn on the Maiden. Vuyisile Jaca, 25, Junella King, 23, Maryama Seck, 33, sailed on the Maiden racing around Cape Horn for Leg 3 of the retro Ocean Globe Race in September 2023.
Junella, the youngest of the three, was part of a few women sailors on the Cape Honors list. Vuyisile and Maryama were apprenticed with the Maiden’s program on her world tour, then later were asked to become permanent crew members for the Ocean Globe Race. The Maiden itself has held history like this before, in 1989-1990, at the Whitbread Round the World Race, the first all female crew to partake in a round the world yacht race.
Learning about Vuyisile Jaca’s story specifically was eye opening to me . At just the age of 14 she became an orphan and had to leave her home town to live with relatives outside Durban. Her new school started offering a nautical sciences class and despite her and every other child in the village being scared of water, she and 14 others took the class. In the second year of the class they were taken to the charity Sail Africa for an intro to water. None of them knew how to swim, but Vuyisile learned, did a diving course, then became an instructor. She was allowed to come back to the charity and help work in exchange for sailing experience. It didn't take too long for her to be invited to join the Maiden’s crew. She inspires me because she overcame so much, both her parents death, her fear of water, and determination to sail.
https://www.sail-world.com/news/271426/Maiden-and-her-all-female-crew-make-history-again