Excerpted from The Rhode Island Foundation Yearbook

Christine Grinavic Adventurer's Fund

Christine Grinavic was a true adventurer. A citizen of two of the 19 countries she traveled to on five continents, and the treasured friend of countless numbers of people all over the world, she impressed everyone who met her with great enthusiasm for life and a shiningly positive attitude.

A 2001 recipient of a Foundation Metcalf Fellowship, Christine used that grant for travel to Omrit, Israel, for a second summer on the dig that had spurred her interest in studying archaeology. "This Irish/Lithuanian girl," says her mother, "became an honors scholar in Hebrew at Macalester College in Minnesota before transferring to URI. She graduated with a degree in English after studying abroad in New Zealand. She fit in trips to worldwide locations between school obligations."

Soon after, she began life as a crewmember with her "other family," on the sailboat "Arabella," based in St. Thomas and Newport, traveling around the Caribbean and Martha's Vineyard.

Christine, 26, was crewing on the sailing vessel, "Flying Colours," when it went missing off the Carolinas during the first named storm of 2007. She was the only child of Mary and (the late) James Grinavic. Yet for all her wanderlust, Christine was also a local girl at heart, teaching her classmates at Macalester the finer points of the term "wicked," drinking Dunkin' Donuts coffee whenever possible, spending "the best summer ever" in Newport, enjoying Trinity's "Christmas Carol" every year, supporting her beloved Red Sox, and hanging out with her gang of "Cumberland Girls." A gifted writer, she brought her friends and family along on every adventure; painting vivid word pictures of her escapades through emails back home.

Supplementing the income available through the Michael P. Metcalf Memorial Fund, this fund will "broaden perspectives and enhance personal growth" of students participating in travel and career internship programs abroad. It is a fitting tribute to Christine's extraordinary journey and a way to "pay forward" her philosophy of life.