Family trips have a way of following us around in life. We keep them alive in photographs kept on fridges and shelves, and we reproduce them (or at least try to) when we’re older. Some, like Captain Liz Clark, go a notch farther. When she was nine years old, her parents brought her family on a six-month sailing trip from San Diego to Mexico, and the notion of a life at sea took hold. Years later, after graduating college, Capt. Clark left Santa Barbara on a 1966 Cal 40, a sailboat designed initially by Bill Lapworth for racing, and has been sailing the world ever since.
Earlier this year, Capt. Clark detailed 20,000 nautical miles’ worth of exploits in a memoir called Swell, which is also the name of her sailboat. “Exploits” is perhaps a stereotypical way to describe Capt. Clark’s journeys — the word conjures up images of pirates and buried treasure — but it’s also apt; her story includes Colombian drug runners, rogue waves and a scene in which, after a successful day of fishing with the locals, she ceremoniously consumes the still-warm heart of a tuna.
Viewed from above, Capt. Clark’s life is idyllic. She departed California in search of a life of freedom (and the best surfing waves in the world), and she found it. The collections of photographs that form the various intermissions in Swell depict open horizons and empty waves, but also rough, gray seas and proof of her vessel’s neverending upkeep. Her story is just as much about self-discovery as it is about adventure — and loneliness in nature (a theme that hearkens back to Robinson Crusoe) is constantly at play (“If I screw up, my own life is the only one at stake,” Capt. Clark writes).
Capt. Clark’s sole companion for most of the trip is Swell. The sailboat is at once the cornerstone of her seafaring lifestyle, her home, and a constant source of difficulty that requires continuous maintenance and upkeep. Sailing the world isn’t what it’s made out to be on Instagram and Capt. Clark is forthcoming about it.
In addition to Swell, there are countless smaller items that Capt. Clark relies on — things like pumps and chains and shaft tubes — that all have large roles to play. But while everything that Capt. Clark deems worthy of space aboard Swell has a specific purpose, there are some items that she gets to be more choosy about. Below, she tells us about her favorites.
