‘Wild Spirit’ — Cruising West Coast Waters Since 1978
All sailboats have a history, no matter how brief. But when we discover a sailboat with a history we know about, it’s fun to connect the dots and learn where the boat is now, and perhaps where it’s been. In the case of Wild Spirit — designed by Tom Wylie, built by C&B Marine of Soquel, CA, and launched in 1978 — we recently heard from her current owners, Larry Vito and Kait Reid. It appears that Wild Spirit now spends much of her time cruising in Mexico.
Wild Spirit is a Wylie 36, a custom cold-molded cruising cutter designed and built for Sausalito sailmaker Peter Sutter. In November 1978, we published an interview with Peter in which he told the story of how Wild Spirit came into existence. The boat was the result of a discussion shared among Peter, Tom Wylie, Dave Wahle, and Skip Allan about their ideal cruising boat. They all came up with almost the same designs.
We’re still missing 35 years of Wild Spirit‘s life, but we do know that Larry has been her caretaker for the past 12 years. During that time she has sailed to Mexico with the Baja Ha-Ha, at least once. She was among the fleet of 168 registered boats in 2018. In 2023, Larry and Kait started an Instagram account for their cruising adventures aboard Wild Spirit, though it appears the cruising couple have been too busy enjoying life to get bogged down with social media, and we heartily approve.
At this time, or at least as of early May, Larry and Kait are “bouncing between cruising in Sea of Cortez, Mexico, in the winter” and adventuring in their camper van over the summer — this year heading to Alaska.
If you know where and with whom Wild Spirit spent her time between Peter and Larry’s ownership, we’d love to hear from you.
In the meantime, you can read the interview with Peter Sutter in the November ’78 issue of Latitude 38.
I can fill in the Wild Spirit blanks if Larry doesn’t get back to you.
We met Wild Spirit and Pete in October 1994 in New Zealand and cruised in the same areas for the next few years enjoying Pete’s laid back style and wonderful philosophies. Shared many a happy hour aboard Wild Spirit and beach pot luck with he and his various crews and were devastated as his health declined. He was an active member of the Comedy Net, our morning maritime mobile ham net and W6DQN (Don’t Quit Now was his phonetic rendering of the call sign) kept up a sunny outlook despite his illness. “Well, isn’t that just swell” was a common rejoinder from him, no matter the subject!
A cruising role model for us all, and we are glad to hear that the yacht continues to provide joy to this day.
Jim and Ann Cate
s/v Insatiable II, lying Port Cygnet Tasmania
Wild Spirit, a bit more on the where and who: After her launch, Peter Sutter spent eight years sailing and racing Wild Spirit in the San Francisco Bay Area. Soon after retiring from his sail making business, Pete set off on a remarkable six-year voyage deep into the South Pacific, looping back through Japan, and eventually sailing north to the Pacific Northwest.
While in Friday Harbor, Pete invited and welcomed aboard an intrepid German world traveler named Christine El Barins who would eventually become his wife. Together they explored Puget Sound and the Inside Passage before sailing south to Sausalito in the fall of 1990, or thereabout, where they spent several months preparing Wild Spirit for another long cruise.
Pete and Christine then embarked on a second six-year odyssey through the South Pacific. Sadly, the journey was cut short when Pete’s health began to decline. He returned to California for treatment and Christine sailed Wild Spirit solo from Vanuatu to Samoa where the boat was loaded onto a freighter and shipped back to Sausalito.
Peter Sutter passed away in 1996 and Wild Spirit was left in Christine’s able hands. Important that she complete her teaching career, Christine reluctantly returned to Germany and entrusted me to care for and sail the boat. I recall after evening sails we would tiller scull this handy 36-footer back into her berth after the wind had completely died.
Over the next four summers, Christine returned to Sausalito to carry out an ambitious refit: a new engine, standing and running rigging, complete DC rewiring, and more—preparing Wild Spirit for the voyage she had long dreamed of. That dream set sail in 2000 and for the next two years she cruised Mexico’s Gold Coast and the Sea of Cortez before making another crossing to French Polynesia. Christine often single-handed but would take on crew for making longer passages. She closed the loop five years later returning to Sausalito via Hawaii. Christine’s successful voyaging aboard Wild Spirit earned her the Cruising Club of America’s John Parkinson Memorial Transoceanic Passage Trophy in both 2003 and again in 2005, an award that Pete had also earned after his voyaging.
Shortly after returning to Sausalito and with a heavy heart, Christine sold the boat she loved to a sailor who then lived aboard in Alameda. In 2009, Wild Spirit found a much needed and devoted new steward in Warren Sanke, a master shipwright and wooden-boat sailor. Warren poured fresh energy and craftsmanship into her, replacing on-deck teak and having custom bronze winch pedestals cast in Port Townsend. But fortunes changed, Warren remarried, and in 2013 Wild Spirit was passed on again, this time to her current owner Larry Vito.
Passing by the old Bay Marine yard in 2013, I recognized the unmistakable hull with a blue mast and there I met Larry who was under the boat replacing through-hulls as a first step of another extensive refit. He later berthed the boat at RYC and 5 years later, set sail to pursue his lifelong dream. These days, Wild Spirit, Larry, and his wife Kait are still sailing and living that dream seasonally in the Sea of Cortez.