Built in 1974 by Nautor in Finland, Pirate was designed by Sparkman & Stephens with oceans to cross in mind. She was not dreamed up by a commercial committee trying to maximise berths in a beamy hull. She proved to be a fast and safe cruising yacht, with good sail area and clean lines. The sailors who crewed and lived on the yacht over many years and many miles left more than a little of themselves behind. They gave the boat a soul.
The Voyages of Pirate – 55,000 Ocean Miles on a Classic Swan is a set of recollections about their adventures. Author Juan E Corradi is a New Yorker of Argentinian extraction, chairman emeritus of the Seamanship Committee of the New York Yacht Club and has been professor of political sociology at New York University. Clearly a man to be taken seriously, he wears his laurels lightly. His thoroughly enjoyable account of extended voyaging on his 38ft Swan is modest and as non-hysterical as Erik Hiscock at his best.
I love this chapter on his first Atlantic crossing on . To quote the old Lancashire poem about Albert and the Lion, ‘there was no wrecks and nobody drownded,’ yet the spiritual wonder of the experience, missing from so many accounts, shines through
