Boating

Making Wave s

ON BOARD WITH ...

You grew up in Saginaw,

Michigan. Did you boat there?

I didn’t have any exposure to boating in

Michigan. The closest I came to any boat-

ing was fishing for perch on Saginaw Bay

— in 12 feet of water.

What was your first job at sea?

I took a job as a delivery mate on a boat,

and it just bit me hard. My first trip was on

a sailboat just quietly gliding through the

water. I thought, you know, you can actu-

ally get paid to do this? When I came back

from that delivery, I told the wife, “You

know, I think it’s time for a career change.”

How did you get on Bravo’s

television show Below Deck?

I was actually a captain on a 50-meter

Benetti and Bravo wanted to charter it for

a new TV show called Below Deck. Bravo

had its crew, captain, deckhands and

stewardesses. It had everything it needed,

and all I had to do was tag along and

make sure the boat got taken care of. I

was looking at a nice, paid vacation just

hanging out in the islands, but, because of

a set of circumstances, Bravo’s captain

was unable to fulfill his obligations. Bravo

said, “Well, why don’t we let Lee do it and

see how he feels about being on TV?”

The title for the first season’s

trailer is “Drama on the High

Seas.” Is that what daily life is

like for these charters?

We hire young, attractive people to work

in close quarters in an environment that

can be very stressful. They have a lot of

pressure on them because when they’re

catering to millionaires and billionaires,

they need to get it right. The workday is

long — usually 14 to 16 hours — and there

aren’t many breaks. There are no days off

until the charter is over, so there is a lot of

stress. And are they going to act up in

some way, shape or form? Usually.

It seems like you’ve become sort

of a center for the show. What do

you think attracts people to you?

I don’t know; I pretty much just wear it on

my sleeve. People get what they see. I

don’t do a lot of beating around the bush.

Sometimes I’m just brutally honest, which

some people can take and other times,

not so much. Usually people appreciate

that. If you don’t really want the answer

to the question, then I’m probably the

wrong person to ask. If you’re just looking

for someone to agree with you because

that’s your philosophy or opinion, I’m

probably not the person you want to ask. PHOTO: COURTESY

BELOW DECK

Capt.

Harold Lee

Rosbach

Below Deck

Captain

When Capt. Harold Lee

Rosbach was in his mid-

20s, he left the cold

Midwest for the restaurant

business in the Turks and

Caicos Islands. When he

was in his mid-30s, he left

land itself to captain yacht

charters. Now Capt. Lee is

chartering new territory as

the center of the Bravo

reality TV show Below

Deck. — Morgan Sherburne

To read the full

interview online, go

to boatingmag

.com/belowdeck.

MORE

ONLINE!

20 BOATINGMAG.COM APRIL 2016