Sailing toward something better
By Chris Maccini
Cover photo by Action Sports Media and courtesy of Dogsmile Adventure
On any given day this summer, you’re likely to find Jon Totten sailing the waters of Lake Pend Oreille aboard one of the boats owned by the nonprofit he started in 2021, Dogsmile Adventures. On board, you’ll find a somewhat unusual crew. It might be a group of veterans, youth with special needs, or adults with disabilities. But there’s one constant, the facial expressions that give the organization its name: wide, toothy grins like you’d see on the face of a happy puppy. A “dog smile.” And that smile is not just a side effect, it’s the whole purpose of the organization.
Dogsmile is a “therapeutic sailing” program. Unlike other boating organizations that may be focused purely on recreation or instruction, Dogsmile’s emphasis is on creating “powerful opportunities for people to discover healing and potential through sailing adventures.” Through their partnerships with other local organizations, Totten and his small team are helping people in the Inland Northwest discover the healing power of wind and waves.
An Inland Sailor
Totten’s journey to founding a sailing nonprofit began when he was a student at the University of Idaho. As an undergraduate, he got involved with the school’s outdoor recreation program and fell in love with the mountains and waters of the Northwest. Soon after graduation, he landed a job 90 minutes north, helping coordinate the Outdoor Pursuits program at North Idaho College (NIC). One aspect of that job included managing a fleet of five small sailboats on NIC’s Lake Coeur d’Alene waterfront. Totten had never sailed before, but he picked it up quickly and soon discovered that sailing gave him a feeling unlike any other.
“There was just something different about sailing that really captivated me, and it took me a long time to really put a finger on it,” Totten says. “It’s not as hard physically as climbing a mountain, but it takes immense concentration and real coordination. When I got done sailing, I just had this feeling of relief. And it just made me feel better.”
That feeling developed into a passion that eventually led Totten to get a U.S. Coast Guard Captain’s License and find work as a sailing instructor. For years, he bounced between Washington’s San Juan Islands, Idaho, and the Caribbean, leading sailing trips, guiding on rivers, and working in campus recreation.
Then, the COVID-19 pandemic threw a wrench into everyone’s lives. The recreation industry was particularly hard hit. At the time, Totten was living on the Caribbean island of Grenada, watching his water-based livelihood dry up. That’s when he decided to act on an idea he’d been mulling for years.
“The longer we were down there, the bigger the boats got, the more wealthy the clientele,” Totten says. “When you’re living in a place that has so much poverty, it started to get to me. And so it was like, god, it’d be great if I could do something with more purpose, and try to use sailing to do good. But it was no more than an idea until the pandemic, when I literally had no option other than starting a business.”
Sailing with a Purpose
Once Totten had made up his mind to start a nonprofit, he sailed his J/105—a 35-foot racing sailboat named Dogsmile—from Grenada to Florida, and then had it shipped to North Idaho. He cashed out his retirement account from his time at North Idaho College and launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise the startup capital to launch his dream of a therapeutic sailing program.
Totten was an experienced sailor, and he’d seen firsthand how impactful sailing could be, but he had no experience running a nonprofit. For help, he turned to an industry that has been providing experiential therapy for decades. “The people who had the most influence on me are the equine therapy folks,” Totten says. “What they’ve done with people and horses is what I want to do with people and sailboats.”
Totten connected with leaders of equine therapy programs and learned everything he could from them. He even borrowed their templates for his website and 501(c)3 nonprofit application. By the summer of 2021, Totten was ready to officially launch Dogsmile Adventures.
Therapeutic Partnerships
Totten’s approach—again borrowed from equine therapy—was to partner with existing service organizations to bring his new idea to people who could benefit. His first partner in the summer of 2021 was a program based in Coeur d’Alene called Specialized Needs Recreation (SNS), which coordinates recreation and socialization opportunities for children and adults with special needs.
“Initially I was like, okay, let’s go on a boat ride. We’ll see how this goes,” says SNS Executive Director Lindsay Patterson. “But instantly what I observed with a variety of our participants is an overwhelming sense of calmness and peace that literally takes over their whole being the second they step on the boat. It’s like nothing I’ve seen when they participate in any other activity.”
Sailing has since become the top-requested summer activity for SNS participants. Meanwhile, Totten has gone on to partner with several other area organizations, including those that work with veterans, individuals with ALS, college students, and underserved youth. He’s also expanded his fleet, adding two smaller sailboats alongside the original Dogsmile. With each outing, Totten—along with a small staff and volunteers—is able to tailor the sailing experience to each group’s needs and abilities. It’s an approach that Lindsay and SNS especially appreciate. “He’ll find a very specific, targeted task that he needs help with,” she says. “Maybe it’s just stacking the life jackets in the cabin, or maybe it’s holding onto a rope that really doesn’t do anything. But sure enough, they feel like they’ve really contributed to the experience.”
This summer, Totten is hoping to create new partnerships and get more people on the water. He also offers private sailboat charters for tourists and other visitors—which in turn helps subsidize the therapeutic sailing trips. You can learn more about Dogsmile Adventures or book your own sailing voyage at dogsmileadventures.org.
Chris Maccini is a writer and audio producer based in Spokane. This summer, you can find him hiking the trails of the Northwest with is dog, Hank.
