Origins of the Dream   

What makes someone want to roam the world and cross oceans on a sailboat? Not surprisingly, it’s a question I get asked from time to time. And, fair enough; it isn’t what most people do, or contemplate.

For me, the seeds of wanderlust were planted way back in early childhood, as was the allure of boating.

My father, a journalist, travelled a great deal, sometimes taking the whole family along. It seemed like a normal part of life. Indeed, my earliest memories are of living Europe where we were based for two years. As people did in the fifties, we crossed the Atlantic, each way, aboard ocean liners. Our belongings neatly packed into big blue steamer trunks.

The family home in Toronto, was less than a block from the shores of Lake Ontario. Close enough to hear its dull roar on stormy nights. As a kid, I spent endless hours wandering the beaches, skipping stones, and watching the comings and goings of boats large and small. More often than not, I’d wonder where they were going, and what might lay beyond the horizon.

But it was on the smaller ‘cottage country’ lakes north of Toronto where I gained my early boating experience – initially in row boats and canoes. Once strong enough to pull the start rope, I graduated to aluminum boats with small outboard motors. Odd as it may seem today, at the time, no one thought twice about ten-year-old kids bombing around by themselves in small boats.

Another important vector was the ground-breaking TV series, ‘The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau’. Beautifully filmed and narrated in exotic locations around the globe, Cousteau awakened and inspired the imaginations of an entire generation, to the many wonders of the sea. 

Fiberglass revolutionized boatbuilding in 1960, significantly lowering the price of entry into what had previously been viewed as a rich person’s pastime. Southern Ontario emerged as a hotbed for sailboat building as innovative new manufacturers adapted technology and leveraged expertise from the local aviation and automotive industries.

The popularity of sailing skyrocketed through the late sixties and seventies. The trend wasn’t lost on me as a young teen. Particularly since there was a sailing club situated along the banks of a nearby river. I was fascinated by the way sailors could tack their small boats out the narrow channel against the wind, often coming within inches of the seawall.

At some point in the early seventies, I went to the Toronto International Boat Show with my parents and our next-door neighbour. We came home with bags full of brochures, and spend many evenings afterwards discussing the merits of our various dreamboats.

Later that decade, after my parents divorced, my mother and her husband Bill, bought a brand new 17-foot Siren and joined the local yacht club.  That pivotal event proved life-changing for me by opening up a whole new world. Rather than looking on from land, now I was now on the water.

That little Siren was soon replaced by a Catalina 22, which not long after gave way to a C&C 26. Concurrently, sailing grew to become my dominant summer activity – racing with and against my mother and Bill, and cruising with them as well as other club members.   

My mother’s passing late last month brought back a flood of memories. It also caused me to reflect on the profound influence my parents had on the person I became. My father was certainly the more adventurous, of the two. But as I sit here aboard Turtlebones – our floating home – on the cusp of setting out across the Pacific, my mother’s imprint is undeniable. She is the one who introduced me to sailing and sparked what turned into a life-long passion.

Bill