Ahoy Mate! The 38th Annual Boat Parade of Lights Goes Pirate

It was cannons and gun powder and planks to walk – aye aye the pirates have arrived! this year for the 38^th Annual Boat Parade of Lights, held on Sunday, December 8. Our proud sailors, boaters, and commercial fishermen took this year’s theme, “Yule Tide Pirates” to the next level with their spectacular boat lighting, high flying pirate flags, costumes, music, singing, and all out swashbuckling lighted sword fighting, and more.

Grand Prize went to Rick Wallace,sword in hand, and his band of 29 costumed pirates for his amazing display of this year’s theme on his sailboat the Bosporus, entry #39. Here we saw a wide display of red lights, spooky pirate swords, and flags on the main sail, cascading white lights and fishing nets strung up the masthead, while towing a second kit-boat of skeleton-pirates. Wallace also won first place in the sailboat category.

Additional First place winners were:

Commercial Fishing Boat: Chad McClintock, No Quarter, boat #8

Commercial Other: Shawn Hughes,Scruba Dub Dive Se What, boat # 41

Power Boat: Bill Hahn, Blue Haven, boat, #10

Human Power: Julie Gordon, Barkbeard’s Bounty

The Parade of Lights event is led by City of SB Waterfront Administrative Analyst II and Public Information Officer Angela Rodriguez,with Parade of Lights Committee Chair Captain Skip Abed, Waterfront Director Mike Wiltshire, Captain Dave Bacon with his wife Cathy as emcees, and faithful Damian who for over 10 years has spot lit the boat numbers for the judges and tallies up the winners’ scores.

The Waterfront Holiday event started with Santa and Mrs. Claus at the Stearns Wharf Santa Village. There was faux snow, elves, holiday music, and the official tree lighting at the Sea Center. The Boat Parade of Lights was held at both 3 pm for the Human Powered category and then at 6 pm for the power and sail categories. This year saw over 30 entrants total. 

Each year, I am honored with a VIP pass to the official judges’ perch and viewing VIP viewing party hosted at The Moby Dick Restaurant by Karl Hutterer, President and CEO of The Stearns Wharf Company.

The Parade Judges were President of the Commercial Fishermen of Santa Barbara Chris Voss,the 2024 Commodore of the SB Yacht Club Dennis Boneck, Harry Rabin representing Heal the Ocean,Senior Financial Planner at Mercer Advisors Adam Stanowick,and City of SB Administrator Kelly McAdoo.

This year’s Parade of Lights event was sponsored by the City of Santa Barbara Waterfront Department, Santa Barbara Harbor Merchants Association, Stearns Wharf Business Association, and the Santa Barbara Yacht Club.  

See 411 the complete list of entrants and winners

411: https://tinyurl.com/sb-boats-lights