In Memoriam: Stephen Carlman

Stephen Carlman, former Vice Commodore for the Vancouver Chapter, died suddenly on February 19, 2025, of cardiac arrest caused by a severe gastrointestinal bleed. He joined BCA first in 1979 after attending a rendezvous at Newcastle Island in his Contessa 32’ Akvavit. All the attendees gathered on the Tremblays’ boat just before they left to go cruising. Stephen let his membership lapse until he rejoined in 1993 when he knew he wanted to go cruising offshore.

In 1982 Stephen bought Fairwyn, a 1957 wooden Sparkman & Stephens classic yawl, and had it trucked from Halifax to Vancouver’s Boaters’ Village under the Granville Street Bridge. Three years later he was the founding president of the Vancouver Wooden Boat Society (VWBS). The VWBS was born because wooden boats were getting more difficult to maintain as boat builders switched to fibreglass. On only a few weeks’ notice, the VWBS sponsored a wooden boat show for two weeks at Expo ’86. Later, it ran a wooden boat festival at Granville Island every August from 1988 until 2020 when the pandemic stopped everything.

During the summers Stephen and his wife Nancy cruised Fairwyn in B.C. waters, and made a four-month trip to Alaska in 1993.

Stephen and Nancy at a Port Browning rendezvous

Between 1993 and 1999 while maintaining and upgrading Fairwyn, Stephen became active in BCA at Vancouver Chapter meetings, volunteering at the boat show, and joining Fleet, (then led by Sarah Curry). In September of 1999, Stephen and Nancy threw Fairwyns mooring lines on the Granville Island dock at the end of the Wooden Boat Festival and headed south. They intended to cruise for about five years, but in the end, they were away for 15.

Their route took them down the west coast of the U.S., to Mexico and Central America, then to Ecuador and the Galapagos before the transit of the Panama Canal to the Caribbean. They explored the western side of the Caribbean up to the U.S. gulf coast and were moored safely in a marina north of Lake Pontchartrain during hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005.

Stephen painting Fairwyn’s sign on the breakwall in Horta, Faial, Azores, 2009

They followed the coast of the U.S. around Florida and as far as Cape May, NJ, before sailing directly to Nova Scotia where they celebrated Fairwyn’s 50^th Anniversary in 2007 with the family of the man who first commissioned her, Charles MacCulloch.

Crossing to Europe from Chester, NS, via a winter in the Azores, Fairwyn cruised in the Mediterranean for three summers, re-crossed the Atlantic to Antigua in 2013-14, then made her way north to Florida.

From Lake Worth Fairwyn was trucked to Anacortes, WA. There she was launched back into the water so she could arrive home to BC “on her bottom.”

When Fairwyn returned to Vancouver in 2014, she was given a BCA Offshore Award.

In 2017 Stephen sold Fairwyn in her 60^th year to Californian Rick Leland who has cruised, raced, and upgraded her.

Stephen, as Vice Commodore, Vancouver, presenting a Leavers’ Package to Astrid Weiss and Jeff Clark in June 2019.

Once Stephen and Nancy were “doners,” they became active in BCA again. Stephen served as Vice Commodore of the Vancouver chapter from 2018-2021 and was BCA’s representative on the Council of BC Yacht Clubs at the time of his death.

A Celebration of Stephen’s life will be held at the Vancouver Rowing Club later this spring.

At a a BCA AGM / Christmas Social in Dec 2018. From left to right: Don Brown (incoming BCA Treasurer), Leslie Hansen (Commodore), Stephen Carlman (Vancouver Vice Commodore), Jennifer Handley (Past Commodore) and Fred Baldwin (outgoing BCA Treasurer).