The Loss of a Giant
Our sailing lives would be forever different if Larry Pardey had not been who he was. Or, more accurately, if he and his wife, Lin, had not shared their lives in countless books and articles.
Way back in 1991, when this idea of buying a boat and going cruising was brand new and yet unrealized, Jeremy made a list of 7 different boats to check out. They ranged from heavy displacement monohulls to racing trimarans, from small yard semi-custom vessels to offerings from large production yards. What we wound up with, of course, is the same Bristol Channel Cutter we still own today.
Calypso, after we splashed her.
It’s not a stretch to say that without the Pardeys, there would be no Bristol Channel Cutter. No, they didn’t build the boats, but their years (and yarns) of successful cruising on their 24’ Serrafyn led directly to Lyle Hess being asked to design the 28’ fiberglass BCC that was built by the Sam L. Morse Company.
For us, the Pardeys captured our imaginations with tales of cruising that wooden boat they built themselves in the late 1960s. They made cruising feel attainable. Their philosophy of “Go small, go simple, go NOW!” totally resonated with just-out-of-college us.
That philosophy still resonates with us.
It’s not just the philosophy. The similarities between our boats (even though ours is fiberglass and not wood) run the gamut from how the boats sail to the layout of storage under the settees to thinking about how to deal with things like anchor stowage. We’re in the process (okay, “we” means Jeremy) of building a windvane self-steering unit that’s to Larry’s design (we only wish we could afford one of Mike Anderson’s pieces of art!) and are eyeballing how to install a whisker pole arrangement like they had on board Serrafyn.
We met Larry once, at the Annapolis Boat Show back in 1998 (I think anyway), when he and Lin had Taleisin, their second boat, in the show as a fundraiser for Chesapeake Region Accessible Boating. He signed a copy of the newly-released “Cost-Conscious Cruiser” and answered some of our star-struck questions.
Larry died last week at age 81, felled by a combination of Parkinson’s and dementia and resulting compounding health issues. Though he’s not been sailing for a few years, his legacy remains and continues to inspire.
A friend wrote a blog post about Larry’s death, and in a comment to him I pointed out that it’s because people like Larry made such a difference in our lives that we mourn when they go. More importantly though, their legacy can live on precisely because they DID make a difference. Every action we take that was inspired by them means that difference is still here.
If you’re so inclined, there’s been a fundraiser established to support the Larry Pardey Memorial Observatory. It’ll allow countless young people to see the stars he navigated by for so long.
Larry. Photo by Lin Pardey.